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    Dissolved Gas

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    Diego1980b
    Dissolved Gas pump npsh Chen

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    Dissolved Gas

    Uploaded by

    Diego1980b
    100 views6 pages
    Dissolved Gas pump npsh Chen

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    © © All Rights Reserved

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    Dissolved Gas pump npsh Chen

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as PDF or read online from Scribd
    Download as pdf
    100 views6 pages

    Dissolved Gas

    Uploaded by

    Diego1980b
    Dissolved Gas pump npsh Chen

    Copyright:

    © All Rights Reserved
    Download as PDF or read online from Scribd
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    ENGINEERING PRACTICE Optimal system design requires the right vapor pressure. Here’s how to calculate it the pressure of the liquid at the inet of centrifugel pump must be high enough to prevent vaporization within the pump, beeause this va- porization (called cavitation) hinders the ‘pumping and can damage the impellers ‘This pressure requirement mustbe taken {nto aocount when deciding how high to place the pump feod vessel relative to the Iheightf the pump itself ‘Basically, the pump suction pressure rust be greater than the fluids vapor pressure at the pumping temperature. ‘The difference between pump suetion pressure and vapor pressure is the net positive suction head (NSH). For eases in which the liquid contains no dissolved gases, the vapor-pressure determination fs straightforward, With dissolved gases, ‘the situation is more complicated, because ‘vapor-pressure data for such systems are usually notat hand, ‘Adding to the complication isthe fact that centrifugal pumps generally can, ag it happens, tolerate a small amount of ‘vapor about 2 to 8% by volume) atthe im- pelle eve. Ifthe solubility ofthe dissolved ‘gas is low and the tomperature is far below the boiling point of liquid, the amount of vapor released in a pump is {ikely not to exceed the tolerable value un- Jess the pressure reduction is substantial ‘Accordingly ifthe engineer plays it safe and assumes (for lack of data) that the process pressure ofthe liquid-gas so- Iution in the feed drum is its vapor pres- sure, and if he or she consequently de- mands enough feed-drum elevation to fully compensate for friction losses be- €.C.Chen Litwin Engineers and Constructors, Inc. twoen the drum and the pump, this ele- vation may well be greater than neves- sary. Conversely, ifthe engineer ignores ‘the presence ofthe gas and bases the el vation caleulation onthe vapor pressure ofthe pure liquid, the drum may not be high enough. For an economical pumping-system design, an effective vapor pressure that lies between the process pressure and ‘the liquid vapor pressure should be used -ReBRCCAPERRY in calculating the available NPSH, or NPSHA. Presented here is a relatively simple method to determine that effec- tive vapor preseure.* Setting the stage ‘The method builds upon two earlier ap- proaches tothe dissolved gas problem pre- sented in CB. First, Penney [1] developed ‘or infomstinn co dealing wth eis that carey ssid aad pu CE bebe, me COPE WITH DISSOLVED GASES IN 105 CHEMICAL ENGINEEAING/OCTOBER 1983 basic equations to express the volume fraction of flashed gas asa function of sol- ubility, vapor and liquid densities liquid vapor pressure and total pressure. He used these equations to analyze some pump-performance problems ereated by dissolved gas, However, he did not provide an explicit method to caleulate the effec- tive NPSHA of a pump. Four years later, Tsai (2] introduced ‘an “artificial,” or effective, vapor pres- sure of a gas-saturated liquid for ealex- lating the effective NPSHA. He defined this as the pump-eye pressure at which the volume of flashed gas is 2.5% of the total volume. Then he determined this effective vapor pressure by applying ‘trial and error to Penney's equations. ‘The present article offers an analytic way to caleulate Tsai's effective vapor pressure without trial and error, Fur- thermore, it presents some eurves gener- ated from the analytic equations, to fur- ther simplify the determination when the allowable gas volume at the pump eve isin fact 2 to 3%, Deriving the equations When the pressure of a saturated solu tion is reduced from the feed drum pres- sure P, to the pump eye pressure P, the volume fraction of flashed gas (including liquid vapor) ean be written as: Figures 1 (left) and 2 (right). These graphs can simply the calculation of effective va Volume fraction of lashed gas 0,020 (Liquid Vey(Operating pressure) = Set S205 — Set S001 820.01 — $20.05 7 1 “PIR -RIRY O-B IR), ‘SPIRIG-PIP,) where S = W,py/og, @ Equation (1), the basis for the analyti- cal equations derived in the present arti- cle, was developed by Penney. He as- sumed that the gas obeys the ideal gas Jaw, Dalton's law and Henry's law. W, is the weight fraction of dissolved gas inthe liquid in the pump feed drum. Ifsolubil- ity data or a Henry's law constant is ap- plied, partial pressure (not total pres- sure) ofthe gas is employed to calculate W,, They isthe liquid density, assumed to'be constant (because only a small amount of gasis flashing). The pq isthe ans density atthe tomperatue ard pres- ‘sure (total pressure, not partial pressure) in the pump feed drum, For conservative calculation, the liq- uid is normally assumed to be saturated with the gas, as noted earlier. However, in reali process operation the gas-liq. uid contact time is frequently not long ‘enough to reach equilibrium. Ifthe per- centage approach to equilibrium ean be catimated by test data or operational ex perience, the amount of dissolved gas can be reduced by a saturation factor a (Oto 1) and expressed as: f a W,=

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