A new pneumatic conveying system that applies soft fins mounted vertically on a center plane of pipe in the inlet of the gas-particle mixture is developed to reduce power consumption and conveying velocity. The effect of different fin’s lengths on a horizontal pneumatic conveying is experimentally studied in terms of the pressure drop, conveying velocity, power consumption, particle flow pattern, and additional pressure drop. The test pipeline consisted of a horizontal smooth acrylic tube with an inside diameter of 80 mm and a length of about 5 m. Two kinds of polyethylene particles with diameters of 2.3 mm and 3.3 mm are used as conveying materials. The superficial air velocity is varied from 10 to 17 m/s, and the solid mass flow rate is from 0.20 to 0.45 kg/s. Compared with conventional pneumatic conveying, the pressure drop, minimum and critical velocities, power consumption, and additional pressure drop can be reduced by using soft fins in a lower air velocity range, and the efficiency of fins becomes more evident when increasing the length of the fins or touching particles stream by the long fins. The maximum reduction rates of the minimum velocity and power consumption by using soft fins are about 20% and 31.5%, respectively. The particle concentrations of using fins are lower than those of non-fin near the bottom of the pipe and are higher than those of non-fin in the upper part of the pipe in the acceleration region. Based on analyzing the frequency features of the fin’s oscillation, the Strouhal number of more efficient fins is about St ≈ 0.75 in the air velocity range of lower than 13 m/s.
Effect of fluidization on pressure drop and power consumption in packed bed columns
