Numerical Investigation on the Influence of Nozzle Lip Thickness on the Flow Field and Performance of an Annular Jet Pump

The performance of an annular jet pump( AJP) is determined by its area ratio A( ratio of cross sectional area of throat and annular nozzle) and flow rate ratio q( ratio of primary and secondary flow rate,Qs/Qj),while the nozzle lip thickness is neglected in the present studies. This paper presents a study on the effect of the thickness on the flow field and performance of an AJP with A = 1. 75. With the increasing flow rate ratio and nozzle lip thickness,a small vortex forms at the nozzle lip and keeps on growing. However,as the flow rate ratio or nozzle lip thickness is extremely low,the vortex at the lip vanishes thoroughly. Moreover,the recirculation width varies conversely with the nozzle lip thickness when the flow rate ratio q ≤ 0. 13. While the deviation of the recirculation width with different nozzle lip thickness is negligible with q ≥ 0. 13. Additionally the existence of nozzle lip hinders the momentum exchange between the primary and secondary flow and leads to a mutation of velocity gradient near the nozzle exit,which shift the recirculation downstream. Finally,based on the numerical results of the streamwise and spanwise vortex distributions in the suction chamber, the characteristics of the mixing process and the main factors accounting for the AJP performance are clarified.

An Integrated Oil Production Enhancement Technology Based on Waterflooding Energy Recovery

A new integrated oil production enhancement technology based on water-flooding energy recovery is proposed.After providing an extensive review of the existing scientific and technical literature on this subject,the proposed integrated technology is described together with the related process flow diagram,the criteria used to select a tar-get facility for its implementation and the outcomes of the laboratory studies conducted to analyze emulsion formation and separation kinetics.Moreover,the outcomes of numerical simulations performed using Ansys CFX software are also presented.According to these results,using the proposed approach the incremental oil production may reach 1.2 t/day(with a 13%increase)and more,even at low flow rates(less than 10 t/day),thereby providing evidence for the benefits associated with this integrated technology.

Experimental investigation of the flow characteristics of jet pumps for zero flow-ratio conditions

Experimental research was conducted on the performance curves and the cavity evolution for different flow and geometric parameters in jet pumps for zero flow ratio(ZFR)conditions.New pressure ratio,Pr,flow ratio,qr,were used in place of the conventional performance parameters h,q,to characterize the jet pump flow performance.A super cavitation cavity in the jet pump was observed to fill most of the flow channel,which hindered further increases of the flow rate and increased qr to one,thus,created a critical point on the new P_(r)-q_(r)^(2)curve.Before the critical point,P_(r)was proportional to q_(r)^(2)with a coefficient that was much more sensitive to the area ratio than the relative throat length and the diffusion angle.After the critical point,the flow rate reached its maximum,the limiting flow rate,which only depended on the total inlet pressure and the area ratio.The total inlet pressure was proportional to the square of the limiting flow rate with a flow coefficient that was only a quadratic function of the area ratio.

Optimal performance of water-oil axial jet pump in an egyptian offshore oil field

The jet pump is an artificial lift employed when the reservoir pressure declines and the well deviation increases.The use of computer well models for optimizing the oil well output has proven to be a suc-cessful strategy,and has helped increasing the efficiency and production of numerous wells.The objective of this study was to use a production optimization technique that achieves some improve-ments,and recommend approaches toward increasing the oil well production.The effects of the motive fluid flow rate and pressure on the oil production rate were investigated to determine the optimal in-jection rate and pressure on the performance of the deep well water-oil axial jet-pump.Additionally,the effects of the well-head pressure,water cut,and roughness of tubing on oil production of this jet pump type were investigated.The results revealed that the impact on the oil lift performance is significant.The oil production increased by 19.43%,and the optimal economic value for the injection rate and pressure for the GA-1A well are 744.44 BFPD and 2722.22 psig,respectively.In summary,increasing the tubing roughness decreased the well's total liquid production.Thus,maintaining the well integrity is a very important factor because not doing so can lower the productivity by up to 20%-25%.

Large eddy simulation of the transient cavitating vortical flow in a jet pump with special emphasis on the unstable limited operation stage

This paper studies the unsteady three-dimensional cavitating turbulent flow in a jet pump.Specifically,thefocus is on the unstable limited operation stage,and both the computational and experimental methods are used.In the experiments,the distribution of the wall pressure,as well as the evolution of cavitation over time,are obtained for a jet pump.Computation is carried out using the large eddy simulation,combined with a mass transfer cavitation model.The numerical results are compared with the experimental results,including the fundamental performances(the pressure ratio h and the efficiencyη),as well as the wall pressure distribution.Both the experimental and computational results indicate that the evolution of the cavitation over time in a jet pump is a quasi-periodic process during the unstable limited operation stage.The annular vortex cavitation inception,development and collapse predicted by the large eddy simulation agree fairly well with the experimental observations.Furthermore,the relationship between the cavitation and the vortex structure is discussed based on the numerical results,and it is shown that the development of the vortex structures in the jet pump is closely related to the evolution of the cavitation.The cavitation-vortex interaction is thoroughly analyzed based on the vorticity transport equation.This analysis reveals that the cavitation in a jet pump dramatically influences the distribution and the production of the vorticity.The process of the annular cavitation inception,development,and collapse involves a significant increase of the vorticity.

Numerical investigation of turbulent flow coherent structures in annular jet pumps using the LES method

Annular jet pumps that are used in hydraulic machinery have a very simple structure but very complex internal flow fields. Large eddy simulations were used to study the coherent structures in the turbulent flows in annular jet pumps with various area ratios,m. The distribution, movement and evolution of the coherent structure in the annular jet pumps are described based on vorticity,pressure and Q criteria. All the criteria demonstrate that the vortexes are mainly distributed in the recirculation region and in the mixing and the boundary layers, which have large velocity gradients. The various characteristics of the coherent structures are shown by the different criteria with the vorticity criterion describing the distribution, movement and evolution of the vortexes,the pressure criterion describing the movement and the Q criterion describing the vortex movement and evolution. The vorticity variation in the spanwise direction is larger than the variation in the streamwise direction; however, the streamwise vortex is the main mechanism driving the entrainment of the secondary flow and the mixing. The annular jet pump with m=3.33 had a higher vortex shedding frequency(about 1000 Hz) than that with m=1.72(313–417 Hz). The azimuthal instability is the main reason for the generation of the streamwise vortex from the spanwise vortex. The vortex structures in the recirculation region are very strong,but small and disordered with no periodic vortex rings.

Numerical Prediction of the Pump jet Propulsor Tip Clearance Vortex Cavitation in Uniform Flow

Previous studies show that the tip clearance loss limits the improvement of pumpjet propulsor (PJP) performance,and the tip clearance flow field is the most complicated part of PJP flow.In this work,the non-cavitation and cavitation hydrodynamic performances of PJP with a tip clearance size of 1 mm are obtained by using the detached-eddy simulation (DES).At constant oncoming velocity,cavitation first occurs on the duct and then disappears with the decrease of the advance ratio.The rotor blade cavitation occurs at the low advance ratio and comprises tip clearance cavitation,tip leakage cavitation,and blade sheet cavitation.In the rotor region,the typical vortices include tip separation vortex,tip leakage vortex,trailing edge shedding vortex,and blade root horseshoe vortex.Combined with the pressure distribution,both the Q and λ2 criteria give reliable results of vortex identification.The cavitation causes an expansion of tip leakage vortex in the circumferential direction and decreases the intensities of tip separation vortex in the whole tip clearance area and tip leakage vortex in the cavitation area,and enhances the strength of tip leakage vortex in the downstream non-cavitation area.

Large eddy simulation of turbulent flow structure and characteristics in an annular jet pump

The large eddy simulation（LES） of the flow characteristics in an annular jet pump（AJP） is conducted, and the flow characteristics are systematically analyzed from both time-averaged and instantaneous aspects. The jet expansion, the velocity distribution and the energy are considered to analyze the time-averaged evolution of the flow field in the AJP. The transient flow characteristics can also be acquired from the analysis of the turbulence intensity and the Reynolds stress. The simulation demonstrates that in the time-averaged characteristics, the potential cores increase linearly with the increase of the flow ratio. With the flow development, the jet half-width gradually increases and the residual energy coefficient decreases. Compared with the distribution of the time-averaged axial velocity, that of the instantaneous velocity is more complex and disorderly. The high intensity of the axial turbulence mainly occurs in the mixing layer and the near-wall regions of the diffuser. The annular distribution of the Reynolds stress is mainly in the mixing layer and the recirculation region. There is a low-stress zone between the mixing layer and the high-stress region in the wall-boundary layer. The intensity of the spanwise vortexes is larger than that of the streamwise vortexes, and therefore, the former make greater contribution to the total vorticity. This research provides a better understanding of the flow characteristics in the AJP.

Numerical analysis of bubble dynamics in the diffuser of a jet pump under variable ambient pressure

Recent studies have shown that the collapse of cavitation bubbles in a jet pump can generate an extremely high pressure with many potential applications. The dynamics of the bubble is governed by the Rayleigh-Plesset equation. With the bubble dynamics equation and the heat and mass transfer model solved with the Runge-Kutta fourth order adaptive step size method, the oscillations of the bubble in the diffuser of the jet pump are assessed under varied conditions. To obtain the pressure variation along the diffuser, the Bernoulli equation and the pressure measured in experiment are coupled. The results of simulation show that a transient motion of the bubbles can be obtained in the diffuser quantitatively, to obtain the pressure and temperature shock in the bubble. Moreover, increasing the outlet pressure coefficient would result in a more intense bubble collapsing process, which can be used in the subsequent studies of the cavitation applications. The predictions are compared with experiments with good agreement.

A NEW TECHNIQUE OF OIL TRANSPORTATION IN PIPELINE BY STEAM INJECTION

The direct contact heating of crude oil with steam is a promising technique for improving crude oil transportation in pipelines. Crude oil temperature is increased greatly by a small quantity of steam due to the high steam latent heat and direct contact heat transfer. A jet pump was developed for injecting steam into oil in order to get a high efficiency by transferring momentum and energy from a high-velocity jet to ambient fluid. The jet pump was designed based on the free injection principle, which has no rotation parts and no converging mixing chamber, therefore it would not be blocked by the viscous crude oil. The technical feasibility of this method has been tested in the Liaohe Oilfield of China.

Design and simulation of gas burner ejectors

Ignition within gas burner ejectors can lead to off design conditions and has significant influence on the burner behavior.Thus ignition in the ejector should be prevented.In the present study the influence of combustion reactions on the performance of gas burner injectors is investigated.To investigate if ignition is possible,simulated ignition delay times,using a detailed reaction mechanism,are compared to predicted mean residence times of the gas in the ejector.Gas burner ejectors are designed using one dimensional analytic equations,based on energy and momentum conservation equations and conventional isentropic equations.1D results are compared to 2D computational fluid dynamics(CFD)simulations,to take into account non-ideal mixing effects along the ejector.Results are validated with experiments with air at room temperature.1D results show very good agreement not only with CFD simulations for the case of non-reactive flows,but also with performed experiments.It is shown that the assumption of ideal mixing along the ejector and thus the comparison of the ignition delay time to the gas mean residence time,to predict ignition in the ejector,is not valid.Ignition in the ejector is possible,even if the ignition delay time is more than thirty times higher than the mean residence time.In addition to that,it is shown,that ignition and the choice of reaction mechanism have significant influence on the predicted gas burner ejector performance.Thus,the accurate prediction of ignition delay time and the use of a detailed reaction kinetic are mandatory to correctly predict the burner ejector behavior.