Experimental study of droplet behavior in a swirl flow field induced by two kinds of guiding vanes and inlet structure optimization

Droplet breakage is a common phenomenon in converting a pipe flow to a swirl flow in a vane-type pipe separator (VTPS)' inlet. The evaluation of the dispersed droplet sizes after breakage is crucial to the optimum design of the inlet structure and the estimation of the oil-water separation performance. This paper studies the droplet behavior in a swirl flow produced by guiding vanes. Experiments are performed with two different guiding vanes at the inlet of the VTPS. The sizes of the produced oil droplets at the downstream of the guiding vanes are measured in situ using a Malvern Insitec SX. The results indicate that the streamlined deflector is superior to the semi-elliptical plate for the VTPS' optimization based on the comparison of the droplet sizes in their respective induced swirl flow fields, which can be explained by a modified T-model. Our study suggests that the use of the modified T-model is a reliable method to optimize the design of the guiding vane in the swirling generating stage.