Study on bubble and liquid velocities in an area-varying horizontal channel

Two-fluid equations are widely used to simulate thermal-hydraulic phenomena in a nuclear reactor. Simulation accuracy depends on the modeling terms in the two-fluid equations. For a dispersed flow, the overall two-phase pressure drop by wall friction must be apportioned to each phase in proportion to the fraction of each phase (Kim et al., 2014). By applying this approach, the prediction of bubble phase velocity can be close to that of liquid for a fully developed flow in a horizontal pipe with a constant area. One may want to know what would happen in the area-varying channels. It is always true that the bubble density is much lower than the water density. Hence, the bubble would accelerate faster than the liquid in a nozzle in which the pressure decreases along the downstream; the bubbles would decelerate more quickly than the liquid in a diffuser in which the pressure increases along the downstream. The purpose of this study was to investigate those behaviors in an area-varying channel using the experimental data and MARS simulations. Experiments were made of turbulent bubbly flows in an area-varying horizontal channel. The velocities of two phases were measured with the help of the PIV technique. The experimental result showed that the two-phase velocities were no longer close to each other in the area-varying regions. The bubble was faster than the liquid in the nozzle region; in contrast, the bubble was slower than the liquid in the diffuser region. MARS code simulations were performed to assess the wall drag model. By replacing the original wall drag partition model in the MARS code with Kim's one, the simulation results were consistent with experimental observations.