Experimental investigation of air‐water‐oil three‐phase flow patterns in inclined pipes

Experiments of air-water-oil three-phase flow pattern is investigated in a 20 mm diameter inclined pipe with a length of 6 m using a high speed digital camera. The superficial velocities are in the range of 0.25-3 m/s, 0.25-2.3 m/s, and 0.08-13 m/s for water, low viscosity oil and air, respectively. For describing flow patterns in three-phase flow, two parameters are considered: Interaction of gas and liquids mixture, and interaction of water and oil phases. The flow patterns for different pipe angles are discussed. Observed flow patterns are stratified-oil/water (or water/oil), wavy-stratified-o/w, bubbly-o/w, slug-o/w, plug-o/w, plug-stratified and annular-o/w. Major flow patterns for upward and downward pipe are slug-o/w and wavy-stratified-o/w, respectively. Also the effects of inclination angle varying from −45° to +45° and different oil cuts on flow patterns have been studied. The results show that by increasing the oil cut for different inclination angles, bubbly region extends and plug region becomes smaller.