Performance Prediction of Mud Pump using CFD Analysis
A commercial CFD code is used to caculate the 3-D viscous flow field within the centrifugal pump impeller. Design conditions are changed by pump inlet diameter(203.2㎜) and pump outlet diameter(152.4㎜). Numerical calculation was performed by changing flow rate from 7 to 12m 3 /min. Working fluids are clean water and muddy water. The viscosity of muddy water is measured by the unsteady capillary of the viscometer. The pump performance is predicted well through the computer simulation. The results are summarized as follows: the pump characteristics of the total pressure, efficiency and shaft power with high viscosity fluids by muddy water was different from those clean water. When the viscosity of the applied fluid increased, the total pressure, and efficiency more decreased than those of clean water. The decreasing gradients of the total pressure and the efficiency were larger than water due to the increased disk friction losses at the duty operation point. The shaft power of clean water and muddy water increased. This study shows that the calculated results agree well with the analysis results of design condition.