Numerical Solution on Flow Property of a Shear-Thinning Gel Propellant in a 90⁰ Pipe Bend

Abstract

To evaluate an influence of the various bend diameter ratio Rc/R and velocity on the flow property of gel propellant in a 900pipe bend, the 3D governing equations of the steady, incompressible, isothermal, laminar flow of a power-law, shear-thinning gel propellant in pipe bend were formulated, discretized and solved, a SIMPLEC numerical algorithm was applied for the solution of the flow field, which on a series of sharp 900curved pipelines with nine kinds of bend diameter ratio and the inner diameters of 8mm were used on condition of seven kinds of Reynolds numbers. The pressure and velocity distributions were obtained, the empirical equation of local resistance coefficient from numerical experiments was conducted, providing the interrelations between the best bend diameter ratio and flow velocity in engineering design. The results indicate that the pressure and velocity distributions were non-linear, and which become tremendous with increasing Reynolds numbers. The results suggest that the dot of maximum velocity occurs the wall outside of a pipe bend, and which is more near to the wall outside of a pipe bend along the flowing direction and increasing the velocity. The phenomena of particle sedimentation should be took into account to investigate the flowing behavior of gel propellant in curved pipes on condition of lower Reynolds numbers.