No abstract

Oil–water two-phase flows widely exist in industrial production, especially in the petroleum industry. The liquid holdup is significant for understanding reservoir production characteristics and improving oil recovery. This paper focuses on the helical capacitance sensor for the measurement of water holdup of oil–water two-phase flows. A new double helix capacitance sensor with an electrode rotation angle of 360° is designed. The sensitivity field distribution of the sensor with different parameters is simulated by the finite element analysis method, and the optimal geometric size of the sensor is obtained. The measurement characteristics of the sensor under different flow conditions are investigated by dynamical experiments of vertical oil–water flows. By analyzing the response signal of the helical capacitance sensor, the flow pattern can be identified, and the apparent water holdup can be calculated. The results show that the proposed sensor is suitable to measure the water holdup in a wide range of water cuts. Even in flow conditions of a high water cut, the sensor still retains good resolution in the D O/W flow pattern. This study expands the water holdup measurement of a capacitance sensor in the case of an oil–water two-phase flow with a high water cut.

We first employ multi-scale time asymmetry (MSA) to analyze typical chaotic signals from Schuster maps and indicate that the MSA method can characterize the distinct time asymmetry of chaotic time series. Then we propose a modified MSA method, i.e., multi-scale weighted time asymmetry, and a novel time asymmetry index to investigate fractal Brownian motion signals and demonstrate its effects on discriminating between fractal signals with different Hurst exponents. Considering that the dynamic behavior of slug flow exhibits chaotic features, we apply the MSA method to analyze experimental signals from a gas-liquid two-phase flow and find that slug flow presents a unique time asymmetric structure. In addition, we further explore the mechanism leading to the formation of time asymmetry in terms of adaptive optimal kernel time-frequency representation. The results suggest that the MSA method can be a useful tool for detecting the complex flow structure underlying a gas-liquid two-phase flow.