Micro-chemical plants are chemical plants that use micrometrics structures by performing a numbering-up of microdevices. The flow distributor is responsible for the flow uniformity distribution through these microdevices. Inadequate designs reduce the plant performance. Thus, 3D printing is a good alternative to allow fast and economic development to test these distributors. The present research aims to apply 3D printing to manufacturing flow distributors and evaluate the flow uniformity obtained from experimental tests. Three conical distributors with obstacle (CDO) were tested in water flow and values of the non-uniformity flow coefficient (Ф) were obtained for each distributor. At low flow rates, was observed the presence of air bubbles that contributing to a flow maldistribution. The flow rate increment resulted in a Ф values decreasing, reaching a good flow uniformity with deviation below 2%. Therefore, 3D printers are a potential fast manufacturing route at low cost supporting further development of distributor designs with good performance.
Microchemical plants achieve large scale production using several microdevices in parallel arrangement. For this, it is necessary to have flow uniformity through all of them, using for that a flow distributor. Thus, the objective of this work is to analyze the influence of distribuitor geometry on flow uniformity. Different distributors were manufactured by 3D printing and were submitted to flow tests. It was observed that tapered distributors are more efficient than rectangular distributors and distributors with intermediate heights cause greater uniformity than short or high distributors.
Micro-chemical plants are chemical plants that use micrometrics structures by performing a numbering-up of microdevices. The flow distributor is responsible for the uniform distribution through these microdevices. Inadequate designs reduce the plant performance. Thus, 3D printing is a good alternative to allow fast and economic development for design tests. The present research applied 3D printing to manufacture flow distributors and evaluated the flow uniformity from experimental tests. This data article presents values of the non-uniformity flow coefficient (Ф) of three distinct distributors: the rectangular distributor (RD), the conical distributors with obstacle (CDO) and the conical distributor without obstacle (CD). The distributors were tested in water flow and at low flow rates, it was observed a flow maldistribution, related to the presence of air bubbles. For high flow rates the Ф reduced to values below 1%. The results presented here were used to validate the numerical simulations of flow distributors for numbering-up of biodiesel synthesis in micro and millidevices, “CFD analysis of flow distributor designs for numbering-up of biodiesel synthesis” [1].
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