Influence of elbow curvature on flow structure at elbow outlet under high Reynolds number condition

In the design of Japan Sodium-cooled Fast Reactor (JSFR), coolant velocity is beyond 9 m/s in the primary hot leg pipe of 1.27 m diameter. The Reynolds number in the piping reaches 4.2 × 107. Moreover, a short-elbow is adopted in the hot leg pipe in order to achieve compact plant layout and to reduce plant construction cost. Therefore, the flow-induced vibration (FIV) arising from the piping geometry may occur in the short-elbow pipe. The FIV is due to the excitation source which is caused by the pressure fluctuation in the pipe. The pressure fluctuation in the pipe is closely related with the velocity fluctuation. As the first step of clarification of the FIV mechanism, it is important to grasp the mechanism of flow fluctuation in the elbow. In this study, water experiments with two types of elbows with different curvature ratios were conducted in order to investigate the interaction between flow separation and the secondary flow due to the elbow curvature. The experiments were conducted with the short-elbow and the long-elbow under Re = 1.8 × 105 and 5.4 × 105 conditions. The velocity fields in the elbows were measured using a high-speed Particle Image Velocimetry (PIV). The time-series of axial velocity fields and the cross-section velocity fields obtained by the high-speed PIV measurements revealed the unsteady and complex flow structure in the elbow. The flow separation always occurred in the short-elbow while the flow separation occurred intermittently in the long-elbow case. The circumferential secondary flows in clockwise and counterclockwise directions flowed forward downstream of reattachment point alternately in both elbows.