Large-Eddy Simulation of the Particle-Laden Turbulent Flow in a Cyclone Separator

A gas cyclone separator represents a classic field of application where turbulent particle-laden flows play a major role. In order to evaluate the performance of a recently developed Euler-Lagrange simulation tool based on the large-eddy simulation (LES) technique and the point-particle approach, this practically relevant flow problem is considered in the present study. As a first step towards a full simulation taking all interactions between the two phases (fluid-particle, particle-fluid and particle-particle) into account, a one-way coupled prediction is carried out. Nevertheless, the entire simulation methodology is described in detail including a sandgrain roughness model and a deterministic collision model. For the latter a performance analysis was carried out demonstrating that even for a high mass loading the computational effort for the collision detection remains below 10% of the entire CPU-time. The predicted LES results for the cyclone flow are compared with corresponding measurements and a reasonable agreement is found.