Study on hydraulic performance of drip emitters by computational fluid dynamics

Because of small size and complex structure of labyrinth-channel used in most drip emitters, it is not possible to observe the flow behavior of water passing through the channel. In this study, the flow in labyrinth channels was simulated by using the method of computational fluid dynamics (CFD) to calculate the distributions of pressure and velocity of the flow, and to calculate the relationship between pressure and rate of discharge for channels with three different shapes: triangular, rectangular, and trapezoidal. The triangular channel had the highest efficiency of hydraulic energy dissipation. Moreover, the results of simulation for the labyrinth channel well matched the measured data in laboratory. Computational fluid dynamics provides a promising tool to help in the design of labyrinth channels used in drip emitters.