Finite Element Analysis of Magnetohydrodynamic Pump Flow

A Finite Element Analysis (FEA) parametric study of 2D Magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) pump flow is presented. The analysis assumes steady, viscous, incompressible fluid flow in the presence of a magnetic field applied normal to the plane of motion. The fluid is electrically conducting and the analysis is applicable to the design and performance evaluation of DC electromagnetic MHD pumps. The primitive variable Galerkin finite element approach is used to discretize the complete Navier-Stokes equations governing fluid motion which are coupled to both the Maxwell’s equations governing electromagnetic fields, and the conservation of energy equation governing the temperature field. Analysis variables include: velocity; pressure; temperature; voltage; electric field; magnetic flux; current density and pump efficiency. These variables are evaluated for low to moderate values of the magnetic interactive parameter. The velocity field distortion is compared to other numerical results and insight into solution convergence difficulties is presented.