Investigating the effectiveness of vortex-enhanced particle settling in a hydraulic separator using physical modeling

Abstract

Hydraulic particle separators which incorporate “Vortex” technology often imply that they provide enhanced particle settling. In this study, a generic vortex particle separator was closely examined using physical modeling to help understand typical flow hydraulic conditions. The study was conducted using particle capture analyses under different internal structure configurations, inflow rates and inlet pipe configurations to examine how resulting changes to flow conditions influenced the settling of particles. The purpose of this paper was not to evaluate performance or obtain absolute particle removal rates of a particular particle separator design; instead, the focus was on understanding how modifications to the flow conditions in the examined separator could affect the particle settling efficiency. The comparison results showed that the inflow-generated large internal vortex does not effectively improve the particle settling; possible explanations were given based on hydraulics and physics principles. The study method and results can be extended to examine and improve other hydraulic particle separators.