Author(s)

L.C. Fang, J.W. Cleaver & D. Nicolaou

Abstract

Presented in this paper is a preliminary numerical and experimental study of the hydrodynamic removal of contaminants contained in cavities which are situated on the floor of a two-dimensional duct. Applications include the cleaning of fouled rough surfaces which may occur in the food and chemical processing industries. The process of fluid renewal in a cavity is modelled via a numerical solution of the Navier-Stokes equations for transient flows. The results show that cavity cleansing occurs at a higher rate during the unsteady start-up of the flow and gradually diminishes as steady flow conditions are reached. Cleansing is enhanced with increasing cavity aspect ratio (Width/Depth) and Reynolds number. The results also show that there exist specific times beyond which prolonged duct flow has little or no

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