Chemical Engineering Science 66 (2011) 834847

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Chemical Engineering Science

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CFDDEM simulation of the gassolid ow in a cyclone separator

K.W. Chu a, B. Wang a,c, D.L. Xu b, Y.X. Chen b, A.B. Yu a,n
a
Laboratory for Simulation and Modelling of Particulate Systems, School of Materials Science and Engineering, University of New South Wales, Sydney, NSW 2052, Australia
b
Institute of Powder Engineering, School of Materials Science and Engineering, Xian University of Architecture and Technology, Xian 710055, PR China
c
Key Laboratory of Western Chinas Environmental Systems, College of Earth and Environmental Sciences, Lanzhou University, Lanzhou 730000, PR China

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: In this work, a numerical study of the gassolid ow in a gas cyclone is carried out by use of the combined
Received 25 August 2010 discrete element method (DEM) and computational uid dynamics (CFD) model where the motion of
Received in revised form discrete particles phase is obtained by DEM which applies Newtons equations of motion to every
1 November 2010
individual particle and the ow of continuum uid by the traditional CFD which solves the NavierStokes
Accepted 11 November 2010
equations at a computational cell scale. The model successfully captures the key ow features in a gas
Available online 26 November 2010
cyclone, such as the strands ow pattern of particles, and the decrease of pressure drop and tangential
Keywords: velocity after loading solids. The effect of solid loading ratio is studied and analysed in terms of gas and
Cyclone solid ow structures, and the particlegas, particleparticle and particlewall interaction forces. It is
Gassolid ow
found that the gas pressure drop increases rst and then decreases when solids are loaded. The reaction
Computational uid dynamics
force of particles on gas ow is mainly in the tangential direction and directs mainly upward in the axial
Discrete element method
Separation direction. The reaction force in the tangential direction will decelerate gas phase and the upward axial
Granular dynamics force will prevent gas phase from owing downward in the near wall region. The intensive particlewall
collision regions mainly locate in the wall opposite to the cyclone inlet and the cone wall. Moreover, as the
solid loading ratio increases, number of turns travelled by solids in a cyclone decreases especially in the
apex region of the cyclone while the width of solid strands increases, the pressure drop and tangential
velocity decrease, the high axial velocity region moves upwards, and the radial ow of gas phase is
signicantly dampened.
& 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction unrealistic tangential velocities. Recent studies suggested that

Gas cyclones are widely used in industries to separate dust from
gas or for product recovery because of its geometrical simplicity,
relative economy in power usage and exibility. The most impor-
tant performance variables of a gas cyclone are usually gas pressure
drop and solid separation efciency, both of which are known to be
signicantly affected by solid loading ratio or concentration (Yuu
et al., 1978; Hoffmann et al., 1992; Fassani and Goldstein, 2000).
Yuu et al. (1978) reported that the presence of dust reduced the
pressure drop by as much as 30% even at extremely low concen-
trations such as 0.2 g/m3, and in one case the tangential velocity
reduced as much as 40%. Understanding and modelling the physics
underlying this phenomenon is however very challenging.
In the previous numerical models of gas cyclones for the
simulation of gas ow, conventional computational uid dynamics
(CFD) method was mainly used. Boysan et al. (1982) developed one
of the rst CFD models for gas cyclones and showed that the
standard k  e turbulence model was inadequate for simulating
ows with swirl since it led to excessive turbulence viscosities and
n
Corresponding author. Tel.: +61 2 93854429; fax: + 61 2 93855956.
E-mail address: a.yu@unsw.edu.au (A.B. Yu).
turbulence models like Reynolds Stress Model (RSM) and Large
Eddy Simulation (LES) that can address anisotropic turbulence
problems should be used for gas cyclones and the corresponding
numerical results obtained are comparable with experimental
measurements (Hoekstra et al., 1999; Slack et al., 2000; Hu
et al., 2005). For the simulation of solid ow, except for a few
continuum models (Meier and Mori, 1998; Qian et al., 2007), the so-
called Lagrangian particle tracking (LPT) method is mainly used,
where the effect of solids on gas ow and particleparticle
interaction force are usually ignored (Yoshida, 1996; Pant et al.,
2002; Derksen et al., 2006; Wang et al., 2006). The LPT approach is
able to qualitatively study the effect of parameters such as
geometry, gas ow velocity and particle size. However, it cannot
satisfactorily describe the effect of solids on gas ow and conse-
quently parameters such as solid concentration or loading ratio.
Efforts have been made to overcome this deciency by various
investigators. For example, Crowe and Pratt (1974) developed a
two-dimensional (2D) model to predict the increase of the overall
collection efciency with solid loading ratio. Recently, Derksen
et al. (2008) developed a modied LPT model and showed that the
presence of solid particles causes the cyclone to lose some swirl
intensity and the turbulence of the gas ow is strongly damped.
They also pointed out that the modelling of particleparticle

0009-2509/$ - see front matter & 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.ces.2010.11.026
 K.W. Chu et al. / Chemical Engineering Science 66 (2011) 834847 835

interaction in a gas cyclone is important. By means of a similar
approach, Wan et al. (2008) successfully predicted the signicant
change of gas ow eld as a result of the presence of solid particles
and spiral dust strand. Nonetheless, in theory the calculation of the
reaction force on gas phase acted by solid phase is mainly based on
solid concentration and the relative velocity between solids and
gas; the accurate prediction of solid concentration depends on the
modelling of particleparticle interactions that is not shown in the
LPT models.
On the other hand, in recent years, the so-called combined
approach of discrete element method (DEM) and CFD (CFDDEM)
has been developed (Tsuji et al., 1992; Xu and Yu, 1997; Zhou et al.,
2010) and accounts for both particleparticle and particleuid
interactions. The CFDDEM approach has proven to be effective in
modelling various particleuid ow systems (Tsuji et al., 1992; Xu
and Yu, 1997; Li et al., 1999; Xu et al., 2000; Rhodes et al., 2001;
Kafui et al., 2002; Yu and Xu, 2003; Limtrakul et al., 2004; Di Renzo
and Di Maio, 2007; Tsuji, 2007; Kuang et al., 2008; Malone and Xu,
2008). In particular, efforts have been made to extend the CFD
DEM approach to study complex particleuid ow systems
(Kawaguchi et al., 1998; Rong and Horio, 2001; Ibsen et al.,
2004; Chu and Yu, 2008a; Chu et al., 2009a; Chu et al., 2009b;
Gui et al., 2009; Zhao et al., 2009). To date, to the authors
knowledge, few studies have been made on the gassolid ow in
a gas cyclone by means of CFDDEM approach.
In this work, a CFDDEM model is developed to describe the
gassolid ow in a gas cyclone. The effect of solid loading ratio is
then investigated, aiming to generate a comprehensive under-
standing of this complicated gassolid ow system.
2. Mathematical model
The CFDDEM model used for the present work has been well
documented in the literature (Xu and Yu, 1997; Zhou et al., 2010).
For brevity, therefore we only give a brief description of the
method here.
The solid phase is treated as a discrete phase and described by
the so-called discrete element method (Cundall and Strack, 1979).
According to the model, the translational and rotational motions of
a particle at any time, t, can be described by Newtons law of
motion:
Xki
dv
mi i f pf ,i f c,ij f d,ij mi g 1
dt j1
governing equations in TFM, developed by Anderson and Jackson
(1967). According to Zhou et al. (2010), Set II and in particular Set I
can be used generally, and Set III can only be used conditionally. In
this work, Set I is used. Thus, the conservations of mass and
momentum in terms of the local mean variables over a computa-
tional cell are given by
@rf e
rUrf eu 0 3
@t
and
@rf eu
rUrf euu rPFpf rUes rf eg rUrf uuuu
@t
4
where e, u, u , t, rf, P, Fp  f, s and g are, respectively, porosity, mean
0
and uctuating uid velocity, time, uid density, pressure, volu-
metric uidparticle interaction force, uid viscous stress tensor,
P
and acceleration due to gravity. Fpf 1=Vcell ki c 1 f pf ,i , where
fp  f,i is the total uid force on particle i and kc is the number of
particles in a CFD cell. rf uuuu is the Reynolds stress term due to
turbulence and solved by the Reynolds Stress Model (RSM)
provided in commercial CFD software Fluent. The equations used
to calculate the forces in Eqs. (1)(4) are listed in Table 1. They are
very much standardised now (Zhu et al., 2007).
The uid ow eld can be obtained by solving Eqs. (3) and (4) by
use of a standard CFD method, and the solid ow can be produced
by solving Eqs. (1) and (2) by an explicit time integration method,
facilitated by initial and boundary conditions for a given ow. The
modelling of the solids ow by DEM is at the individual particle
level, whilst the uid ow by CFD is at the computational cell level.
Their two-way coupling (uid forces act on particles and particles
react on uid) is numerically achieved as follows. At each time step,
DEM will give information such as the positions and velocities of
individual particles, for the evaluation of porosity and volumetric
uidparticles interaction force in a computational cell. CFD will
then use these data to determine the gas ow eld which then
yields the uid forces acting on individual particles. Incorporation
of the resulting forces into DEM will produce information about the
motion of individual particles for the next time step. The uid force
acting on individual particles will react on the uid phase from the
Table 1
Components of forces and torques acting on particle i.
Forces and torques Symbols Equations

and Normal forces

E p 3=2
Contact fcn,ij  2Ri dn n
ki
X 31v2
d xi !1=2
Ii Tij Mij 2 Damping fdn,ij 3mi E
dt j1 p
cn p vn,ij
21v2 Rdn
where mi, Ii, vi and xi are, respectively, the mass, moment of inertia, Tangential forces "   3=2 #
Contact fct,ij ms f cn,ij min 9dt 9, dt,max
translational and rotational velocities of particle i. The forces acting  1 1 dt
9dt 9 dt,max
on solids are the gassolids interaction force, fp  f,i, inter-particle p!1=2
Damping fdt,ij 1dt =dt,max
forces between particles i and j, which include the contact forces, ct 6mi ms f cn,ij vt,ij
dt,max
fc,ij, and viscous damping forces, fd,ij, and the gravitational force,
Torque
mig. In this model, the gassolid interaction force includes the Rolling Tij Ri  (fct,ij + fdt,ij)
viscous drag force (fD,i) and pressure gradient force (fpg,i). The inter- Friction Mij mr f cn,ij x
^ ij
particle forces are summed over the ki particles in contact with Body force
particle i. Torques, Tij, are generated by the tangential forces and Gravity Gi mig
Particleuid interaction force
cause particle i to rotate because the inter-particle forces act at the !2
Viscous drag force fD,i 4:8 rf 9ui vi 9ui vi pd2i
contact point between particles i and j and not at the particle centre. 0:63 ei b
Re0:5 2 4
Mij is the rolling friction torque that is in opposition to the rotation p,i
Pressure gradient force fpg,i Vp,irP
of the ith particle. where: n Ri =Ri , vij vj  vi + oj  Rj  oi  Ri, vn,ij (vij  n)  n, vt,ij (vij  n)  n,
The governing equations of gas phase are the same as those used o^ ij xij =oij , Rep,i di rf ei 9ui vi 9=mf ,
in the two-uid models (TFM) (Anderson and Jackson, 1967; P
b 3:70:65 exp1:5log Rep,i 2 =2, e 1 ki c 1 Vi =DVc
Gidaspow, 1994; Enwald et al., 1996). There are three sets of
836 K.W. Chu et al. / Chemical Engineering Science 66 (2011) 834847

particles, so that Newtons third law of motion is satised (Xu and hand, it is noticed that for particles which are not so non-spherical,
Yu, 1997). their ow behavior can be simulated by adjusting the sliding and
The above CFDDEM principles have been well established. Our rolling friction coefcients (e.g. see, Zhou et al., 1999; Yu and Xu,
previous CFDDEM programs are all in-house codes. For compli- 2003; Zhou et al., 2004). The effectiveness of this approximation
cated ow systems, the code development for the solution of uid will be examined in details, in connection with our on-going work
phase could be very time-consuming. On the other hand, com- on hydro or dense medium cyclones (Wang et al., 2007; Chu et al.,
mercial CFD software packages such as Fluent, CFX and Star-CD are 2009b). In the simulation, the gas ow is rst solved by use of
readily available for this purpose. In order to take advantage of this Fluent to reach its macroscopic steady ow state (dened as the
CFD development, we have extended our CFDDEM code with state when the macroscopic pattern and parameters of the ow do
Fluent as a platform, achieved by incorporating a DEM code into not change much by time). Then particles are introduced at the inlet
Fluent through its User Dened Functions (UDF). This approach has of the cyclone, with the number of particles added per second
been successfully used in our recent study of various complicated calculated according to the pre-set solid mass owrate. After the
uidsolid ow systems (Chu and Yu, 2008a,b; Chu et al., 2009a, ow reaches its steady ow state, the pressure drop is calculated by
2009b), and is used in this work. the average static pressure at the cyclone inlet minus that at the
outlet of the cyclone vortex nder.
Physical experiments have also been conducted to validate the
3. Simulation conditions numerical model. The experimental method is the same as that in
our previous work (Wang et al., 2006). In such an experiment, air
The cyclone considered is a typical Lapple cyclone. Fig. 1(a) was blown into the inlet of the cyclone, with its owrate measured
shows the geometry and notations of the cyclone dimensions and by a owmeter. The inlet gas velocity was set to 20 m/s. The exit
Table 2 gives their values. Fig. 1(b) shows the computational tube was open to the air and the gas pressure at the top of the vortex
domain, containing 47,750 CFD cells. The whole computational nder was around 1 atm. A ve-hole probe consisting of an
domain is divided by unstructured hexahedron grids. At the zone
near wall and vortex nder the grids are dense, while at the zone
away from walls the grids are rened. Three grid domains were Table 2
tested in our preliminary computation, containing 25,900, 47,750, Geometry of the cyclone considered (D 0.2 m).
95,350 cells, respectively (Wang et al., 2006). The difference is less
a/D b/D De/D S/D h/D H/D B/D
than 5% for all variables examined, suggesting that computed
results are independent of the characteristics of the mesh size. 0.25 0.5 0.5 0.625 2.0 4.0 0.25
Totally 6 runs of simulation is carried out. The only parameter
changed in each run is the ratio of solids to gas by mass at the
cyclone inlet, which is 0, 0.5, 1, 1.5, 2 and 2.5, respectively
Table 3
(correspondingly volumetric ratios at the inlet are 0, 0.002,
Parameters used in the work.
0.004, 0.006, 0.008 and 0.01, respectively). The other simulation
conditions are summarized in Table 3. Note that in the DEM Solid phasea Gas phase
simulation, the computational effort increases with the decrease of
Particle diameter (mm) 2 Type of gas Air
particle size exponentially. Therefore, in order to reduce computa-
Particle density (kg/m3) 2500 Density (kg/m3) 1.225
tional effort and to develop a mechanistic understanding, coarse Particle inlet velocity (m/s) 3 Gas inlet velocity (m/s) 20
particles are used in this work although ne particles are normally Sliding friction coefcient 0.3 Viscosity (kg/m/s) 1.8  10  5
encountered in gas cyclones. Moreover, the particles are assumed Youngs modulus (N/m2) 1  107 Time step (s) 1  10  4
to be spherical. In principle, CFDDEM simulations can be per- Poissons ratio 0.3 Grid number 62,105
Damping coefcient 0.3 Grid type Hexahedron
formed for non-spherical particles as, for example, recently done
Rolling friction coefcient 6  10  5
for ellipsoidal particles (Zhou et al., 2009; Hilton et al., 2010).
However, such simulations are computationally very demanding, a
For convenience, the wall is assumed to have the same properties as particles
particularly for complex ow systems like cyclones. On the other but innitely diameter.

Fig. 1. Schematic and grid representation of the cyclone considered, together with the denitions of the sections for discussion: (a) 3D view of geometry; and (b) 3D view of
CFD grids; (c) top view of the sections; and (d) front view of the sections.
 K.W. Chu et al. / Chemical Engineering Science 66 (2011) 834847 837

adjustable frame and ve pressure transducers was used to

measure the pressure of the gas eld at the cyclone inlet. When
the ve-hole probe was placed in a ow eld, voltage signals
obtained through the ve pressure transducers were transferred to
an amplier. The magnied voltage signals were acquired through
a data acquisition system containing a microprocessor and a
personal computer. The material used both in simulation and
experiment is mono-sized glass beads with diameter of 2 mm.

4. Results and discussion

4.1. Model validation

Pressure drop is one of the most important operational para- Fig. 3. Comparison of simulated and measured pressure drops at different solid
meters for gas cyclones and is used as the major parameter for the loading ratios.
purpose of validation in this work. For pure gas ow, Fig. 2 shows
that the simulated pressure drops under different inlet gas
velocities agree with the experimental results. For gassolid ow,
Fig. 3 shows that the predicted pressure drop decreases with the Solid loading ratio
increase of solid loading steadily, which is in good agreement with Inner
(kg solid per kg air) Inner
cylinder
the experimental measurement. It also qualitatively agrees with cylinder
wall
the trends reported in the literature (Yuu et al., 1978; Hoffmann wall
et al., 1992; Fassani and Goldstein, 2000; Bricout and Louge, 2004;
Cortes and Gil, 2007).
The phenomenon that the tangential velocity decreases with the
increase of solid loading was found in experiments (Yuu et al.,
1978) and can be captured by the current numerical model. From
Fig. 4 it can be seen that the tangential velocity apparently
decreases with the increase of solid loading and the trend agrees
with the experimental measurements. Note that the comparison is
only qualitative since the present simulations were not carried out
under the same conditions as the experiment.
Outer Outer
The information shown in Figs. 24 suggests that the developed
cylinder cylinder
CFDDEM model can capture the major ow characteristics in a gas wall wall
cyclone. One of the advantages of CFDDEM model is that it is a
rst-principle approach and at a particle scale, and can thus provide
rich microdynamic information about the gassolid ow. The
analysis of this information can lead to better understanding of
the ow structure and mechanics in a gas cyclone as discussed in
the following sections.

4.2. Gassolid ow pattern

4.2.1. Particle ow
It is known that the macroscopic ow pattern of solids in gas
cyclone is that most particles congregate at the wall immediately
after entering the inlet and then descend in strands or bands
(Muschelknautz and Greif, 1997; Wang et al., 2006; Li et al., 2009).

Fig. 4. Distributions of the tangential velocity of gas phase at the cylinder section of
the cyclone under different solid loading ratios: (a) simulation results and (b)
experimental measurement (Yuu et al., 1978).

This ow pattern in strands has not been well predicted in some of

Fig. 2. Comparison of the simulated and measured pressure drops at different inlet the previous LPT models (Wang et al., 2006; Derksen et al., 2008).
gas velocities. However, as shown in Fig. 5, it can be satisfactorily captured by the
838 K.W. Chu et al. / Chemical Engineering Science 66 (2011) 834847
Fig. 5. Snapshots showing the dynamic ow of particles in the cyclone when solid
loading ratio is 2.5 (particles are coloured by particle velocity in Z-direction).
current CFDDEM model. It can be seen that the ow reaches its
macroscopically steady state ow after 2 s. Particles have a higher
descending angle and velocity in the cylindrical part than in the
conical part, because of the supporting forces acting on particles by
the cyclone conic wall (Wang et al., 2006).
It would be interesting to know the differences in the solid ow
patterns when the reaction forces of solids on gas ow are ignored
(one-way coupling) and considered (two-way coupling). Fig. 6
compares the ow patterns when solid load ratio is 2.5. It can be
seen that the ow patterns are similar in the cylinder section of the
cyclone except that the descending angle of solids under the one-
way coupling is smaller than that under the two-way coupling
condition. For the ow in the conic section, the ow patterns are
however quite different. Under the one-way coupling condition,
strands ow pattern is not clearly observed in the conic section.
There are much more particles residing in the conic section than
that under the two-way coupling condition. Furthermore, the axial
velocities of particles under the one-way coupling condition are
generally higher than those under the two-way coupling condition.
The differences originate from the fact that solids affect the ow of
gas signicantly, especially in the conic section as discussed in
Section 4.2. They also highlight the need for two-way coupling for
cyclones. In the following, unless otherwise specied, all the results
are based on the two-way coupling approach.
Fig. 7 shows the comparison of the solid ow patterns under
different solid loading ratios. Clearly, strands ow patterns are
observed, irrespective of solid loading ratios. However, the details
Fig. 6. Comparison of solid ow patterns when the reaction of solids on gas ow is:
(a) not considered (one-way coupling) and (b) considered (two-way coupling). Solid
loading ratio was 2.5 kg solid per kg air for both cases and snapshots were taken at
t 2 s. Particles are coloured by the axial velocity of particles.
are different. It can be seen that the number of turns travelled by
solids in the cyclone decrease with the increase of solid loading
ratio. The strands are wider when solid loading ratio is high,
which qualitatively agrees with the nding by Trefz and
Muschelknautz (1993). The overall axial velocity of particles
decreases with the increase of solid loading ratio.
Fig. 8 shows that the mass of solids residing in the cyclone
increases more than linearly with the increase of solid loading ratio.
When solid loading ratio is 0.5, the mass of solids residing in the
cyclone is 0.11 kg (Point A). However, if the mass residing in the
cyclone is assumed to increase linearly with solid loading ratio,
then the mass of solids in the cyclone should be about 0.067 kg
(Point B), 64% less than that in the real case. The reason why solids
accumulate in the cyclone easier at lower solid loading ratios is that
particles tend to keep rotating in the conic section when the ow is
dilute and particleparticle interaction force is not big enough to
make particles move downward.
4.2.2. Fluid ow
Pressure drop is one of the most important parameters in the
operation of gas cyclone since it represents the energy consump-
tion. It varies with solid loading ratio, as shown in Fig. 3. Increasing
solid loads decreases the pressure drop, which is consistent with
the literature (Yuu et al., 1978; Hoffmann et al., 1992; Fassani and
Goldstein, 2000). This phenomenon was thought to be contrary to
the rationale. For example, in uidization or pneumatic conveying,
pressure drop usually increases with solid loading ratio. A notice-
able nding from the present CFDDEM simulations is that the
pressure drop increases slightly at the beginning (t o0.1 s) and
then decreases sharply, as shown in Fig. 9. Actually, from Fig. 5 it
can be seen that the ow at the inlet of the cyclone is similar to the
one in pneumatic conveying, which results in the increase of
pressure drop when solids are loaded at the beginning (t o0.1 s in
the current case). The sharp decrease of pressure drop after t 0.1 s
is caused by the gassolid interaction which will be discussed in
Section 4.3.
The inner ow structures of gas phase under different solid
loading ratios at a vertical central plane of the cyclone are shown in
Figs. 1013. Fig. 10 shows the pressure distributions with different
 K.W. Chu et al. / Chemical Engineering Science 66 (2011) 834847
Fig. 7. Comparison of solid ow patterns (at t 2 s) under different solid loading ratios: (a) 0.5; (b) 1.0; (c) 1.5; (d) 2.0; and (e) 2.5.
Fig. 8. The mass of solids residing in the cyclone under different solid loading ratios.
solid loading ratios. It can be seen that the pressure is high on the
cyclone wall and can be negative in the centre of the cyclone. The
magnitude of pressure near the cyclone wall decreases steadily
with the increase of solid loading ratio. When comparing Fig. 10(a)
with Fig. 10(b)(d), it can be seen that the negative pressure zone in
the apex of the cyclone disappears after loading solids. This
suggests that the solids have a higher impact on the gas ow in
the apex than in the other regions. Another obvious trend shown in
Fig. 10 is that the length of the negative pressure zone decreases as
the solid loading ratio increases.
Fig. 11 shows the tangential velocity distributions with different
solid loading ratios. An obvious trend is that the tangential velocity
decreases with the increase of solid loading ratio, especially in the
apex of the cyclone. It also suggests that the solids have a higher
impact on the gas ow in the apex than the other regions. Another
trend shown in Fig. 11 is that the distribution of the tangential
velocity is not symmetric. This is caused by the fact that there is
only one inlet which is not symmetric in geometry.
There are limited experimental and numerical data about the
axial and radial velocities in gas cyclones when solids are loaded.
However, those velocities can be readily produced by the current
839
Fig. 9. Pressure drop vs. time under different solid loading ratios.
model. From Fig. 12(a) and (b) it can be seen that when the solid
loading ratio is 0.5, the high axial velocity region moves toward to
the centre of the cyclone. This is particularly so in the lower region
of the conic part. From Fig. 12(b)(d) it can be seen that the highest
axial velocity region moves upward as solid loading ratio increases
further. This trend is believed to be caused by the accumulation of
particles in the cyclone which prevents gas from owing down-
ward since the reaction force acting on gas phase by particles
generally points upward in the axial direction (see Fig. 19).
Fig. 13 shows the different radial velocity distributions with
different solid loading ratios. Fig. 13(a) demonstrates that the
forced vortex in the centre of the cyclone for pure gas ow looks like
a helical twisted cylinder. The axis of the forced vortex is not
straight but curved. After a small amount of solids are loaded, as
shown in Fig. 13(b), the axis of the forced vortex at the cylinder part
of the cyclone becomes almost straight while the twisted forced
840 K.W. Chu et al. / Chemical Engineering Science 66 (2011) 834847
Fig. 10. Pressure (Pa) distributions at the central section vertical to the cyclone inlet
under different solid loading ratios: (a) 0.0; (b) 0.5; (c) 1.5; and (d) 2.5.
Fig. 11. Tangential velocity (m/s) distributions at the central section vertical to the
cyclone inlet under different solid loading ratios: (a) 0.0; (b) 0.5; (c) 1.5; and (d) 2.5.
vortex becomes more intensive in the conic area of the cyclone. As
solid loading ratio increases further, the forced vortex in the conic
part is dampened greatly (Fig. 13(c) and (d)).
Fig. 14 shows the spatial distributions of pressure and tangential
velocity of the gas phase in more details. It conrms the signicant
change of the ow after loading solids. It also shows that ow is
largely symmetric even though the cyclone geometry is not
symmetric, i.e., there is only one inlet in the cyclone.
The change of gas velocities after loading solids can be further
illustrated by considering the total kinetic energy of the motion of
gas phase, as shown in Fig. 15. Here, the kinetic energy is the sum of
Fig. 12. Axial velocity (m/s) distributions at the central section vertical to the
cyclone inlet under different solid loading ratios: (a) 0.0; (b) 0.5; (c) 1.5; and (d) 2.5.
Fig. 13. Radial velocity distributions at the central section vertical to the cyclone
inlet under different solid loading ratios: (a) 0.0; (b) 0.5; (c) 1.5; and (d) 2.5.
P number 2
the kinetic energy ( cell cell 1 1=2mcell 9vcell 9 ) in each computa-
tional cell. mcell and vcell are the mass and velocity of gas phase in a
CFD cell, respectively. The kinetic energy is also shown in different
directions, calculated using the tangential, axial or radial compo-
nents of vcell. According to this denition, the total kinetic energy is
the sum of the kinetic energy in the tangential, axial and radial
directions. It can be seen that the tangential kinetic energy
decreases signicantly with the increase of solid loading ratio
while the radial and axial kinetic energy are almost constant. As the
kinetic energy is directly related to velocity, these ndings conrm
 K.W. Chu et al. / Chemical Engineering Science 66 (2011) 834847
Fig. 14. Pressure (I) and tangential velocity (II) distributions at different sections (dened in Fig. 1): (a) pure gas ow and (b) gassolids ow when solid loading ratio is 2.5.
Fig. 15. Kinetic energy of gas phase at a macroscopically steady state as a function of
solid loading ratio.
the signicant decrease in the tangential velocity. Moreover, Fig. 15
shows that the total tangential kinetic energy is much larger than
the axial and radial kinetic energies and thus dominant. Comparing
Figs. 3 and 15 suggests that the relationship between the pressure
drop and solid loading ratio is very similar to that between the
tangential velocity of the gas phase and solid loading ratio. Thus,
the decrease of the pressure drop is strongly related to the decrease
of the tangential velocity.
It should be noted that the pressure drop and tangential velocity
may not always decrease with the increase of solid loading ratio in
certain extreme cases, especially when particles are extremely ne
(Bricout and Louge, 2004). When a large portion of particles fed at
the inlet are too ne to be collected in the spigot of the cyclone, the
841
majority of particles would not ow as strands in the region close to
the outer wall of the cyclone. Instead, they would ow in the inner
region of the cyclone and nally escape through the vortex nder.
In this situation, the impact of particles in the inner region on gas
ow may be different from that in the region close to the outer wall.
Therefore, the effect of solids on gas ow obtained in this work is
only applicable to the situation where particles are large enough to
be collected at the spigot through the cyclone outer wall, which is
important since about 95% of particles can be collected at under-
ow in most of the operations of gas cyclones.
4.3. Forces governing the motion of particles
According to the model framework of the current work, the
motion of particles in a cyclone is governed by the particleuid,
particleparticle and particlewall interaction forces. In this sec-
tion, the three forces are examined to better understand the nature
of the ow in a cyclone.
4.3.1. Particleuid interaction force
Two particleuid forces, i.e., the gas drag force and pressure
gradient force (PGF) are considered in this work. Fig. 16 shows the
PN PN
total ( i p 1 9f i 9) and averaged (1=Np i p 1 9f i 9) forces acting by
gas phase on particles for different solid loading ratios, where Np is
the total number of particles residing in the cyclone. For conve-
nience, the particleparticle and particlewall interaction forces
are also shown in this gure. The forces on a particle are all
normalized by dividing the gravity force of the particle. Fig. 16(a)
842 K.W. Chu et al. / Chemical Engineering Science 66 (2011) 834847

Fig. 16. Normalized total (a) and averaged (b) forces in the cyclone under different Fig. 17. Spatial distribution of the gas drag forces acting on particles in the cyclone
solid loading ratios: line I, particleparticle interaction force; line II, particlewall when solid loading ratio is 2.5.
interaction force; line III, drag force; and line IV, pressure gradient force.

shows that both the total drag force and PGF increase with solid
loading ratio but Fig. 16(b) shows that the average values decrease
slightly with the increase of solid loading ratio. The increase of the
total forces should be due to the increased mass of solids residing in
the cyclone (see Fig. 8). The decrease of the average drag force and
PGF should correspond to the decrease of the tangential velocity
(see Figs. 4 and 11) and the pressure drop (see Figs. 3 and 10),
respectively. Fig. 16 also shows the magnitude of the drag force is
much larger than that of the PGF, suggesting the drag force is more
dominant for this ow system.
The spatial distributions of the drag force and PGF acting on
individual particles, when the solid loading ratio is 2.5, are shown
in Figs. 17 and 18, respectively. Both gures show that the spatial
distributions of the two forces are not uniform. They are higher in
the inlet region of the cyclone and there are two separating regions
in the strands: the regions close to the cyclone wall have lower drag
forces and PGFs while the regions away from the wall have higher
drag forces and PGFs. The drag force on particles is low because of
the no-slip condition between the cyclone wall and gas phase,
which may lead to low gas velocity and hence low drag force. The
PGF is relatively low close to the cyclone wall because the pressure
does not decrease signicantly near the wall regions but decreases
signicantly in the centre regions (from positive to negative), as
shown in Fig. 10. PGF is proportional to the pressure gradient, as
shown in Table 1.
In this work, the uid drag force is the only force considered that
is related to the gas velocity. Therefore, it is expected that the Fig. 18. Spatial distribution of the pressure gradient forces acting on particles in the
distribution of the uid drag force will follow the trend of the cyclone when solid loading ratio is 2.5.
velocity of the gas ow. This is indeed conrmed by Fig. 17, which
shows that the uid drag force directs dominantly in the tangential velocities. On the other hand, Fig. 18 shows that the direction of the
direction. As shown in Figs. 1215, gas ows mainly tangentially PGF is almost vertical to that of the drag force, pointing from the wall
since its tangential velocity is much larger than the axial and radial to the centre of the cyclone. This agrees with the radial pressure
 K.W. Chu et al. / Chemical Engineering Science 66 (2011) 834847 843

distribution where the pressure decreases gradually from the wall to Yuu et al. (1978) suggested that the decrease of the tangential
the centre of the cyclone (see Fig. 10). velocity is caused by the increase of friction due to the movement of
According to the current model framework, the forces acting on particles attaching to the outer cylinder wall. They coated a layer of
particles (fp  f,i) by gas phase are at a particle scale and the reaction particles on the cylinder wall, making it rough and again measured
forces acting on gas phase (VcellFf  p) by particles are at a CFD cell the tangential velocity, and found that the decrease of the
scale, while they obey Newtons third law of motion, i.e. tangential velocity under rough outer cylinder wall condition
P
Fpf 1=Vcell ki c 1 f pf ,i . This force is shown in Fig. 19. Two was not as great as that under gassolid ow condition. In our
phenomena can be observed from the gure: The rst one is that work, the decrease of the tangential velocity of gas phase after
the reaction force of particles on gas phase increases with solid loading solids is captured, even though the effect of the presence of
loading ratio in the upper part but decreases generally in the lower solids on the friction between gas and the wall is not considered.
part of the cyclone. This is because the magnitude of the reaction Thus, it is thought that the decrease of the tangential velocity of gas
force depends on two factors: one is the magnitude of uid force on phase after loading solids is mainly due to the reaction force of
particles and the other one is the number of particles in a CFD cell or particles on gas phase in the current conditions. Trefz and
solid concentration. When solid loading ratio is low, the reaction Muschelknautz (1993) has described this phenomenon as that
force is small in the upper part of the cyclone since the solid the exchange of tangential momentum between the slowly
concentration is low. When solid loading ratio is high, the reaction slipping wall layer of solids and the gas decelerates the vortex
force is small in the lower part of the cyclone since the gas ow while they did not provide any evidence.
velocity and pressure gradient are relatively low in that part (see
Figs. 1013). The other phenomenon is that most of the vectors are
shown in red, which means that the reaction force acted by particles
on gas phase is generally upward. The presence of solids in the
cyclone will produce a resistant force to the downward ow of gas.
Fig. 20 shows the vectors of the reaction forces of particles on
gas phase in a horizontal plane when solid loading ratio is 2.5. From
Fig. 20(a) it can be seen that the reaction force points upward,
which means particles will prevent gas from owing downward.
From Fig. 20(b) it can be seen that the reaction force mainly points
tangentially, because the uid drag force is mainly in the tangential
direction and the PGF is much smaller than the drag force even
though PGF mainly points radially. According to Newtons third law
of motion, this tangential force is in the reverse direction of the
tangential velocity of gas phase. Thus, according to Newtons
second low, this force will decelerate the tangential ow of gas
phase, which may explain why the tangential velocity of gas phase
decreases signicantly after loading solids (see Figs. 3 and 10). Fig. 20. Vectors of the reaction force of particles on gas phase on a horizontal plane
When the tangential velocity of the gas phase decreases, the when solid loading ratio is 2.5: (a) front view and (b) top view. The force is  Ffp term
pressure drop will decrease correspondingly. in Eq. (4).

Fig. 19. Spatial distributions of the reaction force of particles on gas phase under different solid loading ratios: (a) 0.5; (b) 1.5; and (c) 2.5. The vectors are coloured by the axial
particleuid volumetric force.
844 K.W. Chu et al. / Chemical Engineering Science 66 (2011) 834847
4.3.2. Particleparticle interaction force
Particleparticle interaction relates to particle breakage or
attrition, which may be important when separating solid products
from gas. The information regarding the particleparticle interac-
tion at different solid loading ratios is shown in Figs. 16 and 21.
Fig. 16 clearly shows that both the total and averaged particle
particle interaction forces are much larger than the other three
forces, suggesting that the inclusion of particleparticle interaction
is important in the modelling of gassolid ow in gas cyclones.
Moreover, this gure shows that the magnitudes of both the total
and averaged particleparticle interaction forces increase with
solid loading ratio. This is because the solid concentration in the
cyclone increases with solid loading ratio. When solid concentra-
tion is high, the chance for particleparticle interaction is high.
Fig. 21 shows the spatial distribution of particleparticle inter-
actions. It can be seen that there are strong particleparticle
interactions inside the strands of the solids. Outside the strands,
there are very few particles in red, which means the particleparticle
interaction force is quite small there. Fig. 21(a) also demonstrates
that the particleparticle interaction in the upper part of the cyclone
is not strong when solid loading ratio is low, because a strand is not
clearly formed there. Fig. 21(d) shows the transient variation of the
total particleparticle interaction force with time. It can be seen that
the total particleparticle interaction forces increase from zero to a
maximum value and then uctuates around a constant. The trends
are different when the solid loading ratio is different. As solid loading
ratio increases, the total particleparticle interaction force reaches
its stable state quicker and the magnitude of both the uctuation and
the absolute value become larger. Those trends look similar to that of
the pressure drop as shown in Fig. 8.
4.3.3. Particlewall interaction force
Particlewall interaction force in cyclones relates to the wearing
of cyclone wall which could be a serious problem for cyclones
operating at high solid loading ratios. For example, it is observed in
practice that the apex of a cyclone in the preheating system in
cement industry can be seriously worn out. The information of
Fig. 21. Spatial distributions of particleparticle interaction force (normalized by dividing particle weight) under different solid loading ratios: (a) 0.5; (b) 1.5; and (c) 2.5, and
(d) transient variation of the total particleparticle interaction forces with time.
particlewall interaction is shown in Figs. 16 and 22. Fig. 16 shows
that the magnitude of the particlewall interaction is slightly lower
than the particleparticle interaction, but higher than the particle
uid forces. This suggests that particlewall interaction is an
important factor in the modelling of gas cyclones. Moreover,
Fig. 16(a) shows the total particlewall interaction force increases
with solid loading ratio but Fig. 16(b) shows that the averaged
particlewall interaction force decreases with the increase of solid
loading ratio. The increase of the total particlewall interaction
should be due to the increase of the solids residing in the cyclone, as
shown in Fig. 8. The decrease of the averaged particlewall
interaction force may be caused by the shielding effect of
particles. Not all particles can collide with the wall since some
particles only collide with the particles bouncing back after
colliding with the wall.
In this work, the spatial distribution of the particlewall
interaction is quantied by use of the so-called Time Averaged
Collision Intensity (TACI) which is related to wear (Finnie, 1972),
dened by
Pt T Pkm
t0 i1 9f cn,i f dn,i f ct,i f dt,i 9
TACI 5
AT
where A is the surface area of a sample wall, T is the simulation time
or sampling time, km is the number of particles making contact with
the sample wall at a given time. Physically, it can be understood as
the particlewall interaction forces per unit (wall surface) area per
unit time.
Fig. 22 shows the spatial distribution of TACI between particles
and wall for different solid loading ratios. Generally speaking, the
high TACI regions mainly establish on the wall opposite to the inlet
of the cyclone and the conic and apex wall. The TACI on the wall
opposite to the inlet is high because particles enter the cyclone
from the inlet and then heavily collide with the cyclone wall where
they change their ow directions signicantly. The conic wall gets
high TACI because it constricts the diameter of particle orbits by
particlewall contacts. Fig. 22 also shows that the distribution of
TACI varies with solid loading ratio, especially on the conic part of
 K.W. Chu et al. / Chemical Engineering Science 66 (2011) 834847
Fig. 22. Spatial distributions of particlewall Time Averaged Collision Intensity under different solid loading ratios: (a) 0.5; (b) 1.5; and (c) 2.5, and (d) transient variation of the
total particlewall interaction forces with time.
the cyclone. As solid loading ratio increases, the area of the cyclone
wall experiencing particlewall interaction decreases while the
intensity of the particlewall interaction increases.
Fig. 22(d) shows the transient variation of the total particlewall
interaction force with time. It can be seen that the total particle
wall interaction forces increase from zero to a maximum value and
then uctuates around a constant. The trends are different for
different solid loading ratios. As solid loading ratio increases, the
total particlewall interaction force reaches its stable state quicker
and the magnitude of both the uctuation and the absolute value
become larger. Those trends are similar to that of the pressure drop
(Fig. 8) and the total particle interaction force (Fig. 21(d)). None-
theless, an obvious difference is that the magnitude of the total
particlewall interaction force is not so sensitive to solid loading
ratio. It suggests that the wear may be improved under high solid
loading conditions for a given amount of solid to handle.
5. Conclusions
A CFDDEM model has been developed to describe the gassolid
ow in a gas cyclone. Its validity is demonstrated by its successful
capturing the key ow features in a cyclone separator such as the
ow pattern of particles along the cylinder wall in strands, and the
decrease of pressure drop and tangential velocity after loading
solids. The effect of solid loading ratio has been analysed on this
basis, leading to the following conclusions:
 As the solid loading ratio increases, there are less turns travelled
by solids, especially in the apex region of a cyclone, and the
width of the strands increases. The total mass of solids residing
in the cyclone does not linearly increase with solid loading ratio.
More solids tend to accumulate in the cyclone when the solid
loading ratio is low.
 The gas pressure drop rstly increases and then decreases
to reach a stable value when solids are loaded. When the
ow reaches a macroscopically steady ow state, the pressure
845
drop and the tangential velocity of gas phase decrease steadily
with the increase of solid loading ratio. At the same time, the
high axial velocity region moves upwards and the radial ow of
gas phase is signicantly dampened, especially in the apex
region.
 In general, the magnitudes of the particleparticle and particle
wall interaction forces are much larger than that of the particle
uid force. On the other hand, the magnitude of the drag force is
larger than the PGF. The drag force is mainly in the tangential
direction but the PGF is mainly in the radial direction. The
reaction force of particles on gas ow is mainly in the tangential
direction and directs mainly upward in the axial direction. The
reaction force in the tangential direction will decelerate gas
phase and the upward axial force will prevent gas phase from
owing downward in the near wall region. Both the total and
averaged particleparticle interaction forces increase with the
increase of solid loading ratio. The most intensive particle
particle interaction regions locate within the particle strands.
The total particlewall interaction increases but the averaged
particlewall interaction decreases with solid loading ratio. The
intensive particlewall collision regions mainly locate in the
wall opposite to the cyclone inlet and the cone wall. When solid
loading ratio increases, the area of the cyclone wall experiencing
particlewall interaction decreases but the intensity of the
particlewall interaction increases.
The ndings should be useful to the development of a compre-
hensive understanding of the gassolid ow in cyclones. However,
it should be pointed out that the present study is carried out for
large, cohesionless and spherical particles because of the current
computer capability. Thus, the present study is largely qualitative
and for fundamental understanding, while showing the capability
of the CFDDEM approach applied to gas cyclone. Therefore, more
detailed, systematic studies are necessary in order to understand
the effects of variables related to operational conditions, particle
and material properties, and cyclone geometry, and hence generate
results useful to engineering application.
846 K.W. Chu et al. / Chemical Engineering Science 66 (2011) 834847

Nomenclature p particle phase

pg pressure gradient
A area, m2 pf between particle and uid phases
c damping coefcient, dimensionless t in tangential direction
d particle diameter, m
E Youngs modulus, Pa
fc contact force, N
Acknowledgement
fd damping force, N
fp  f particleuid interaction force, N
F volumetric force, N/m3 The authors are grateful to the Australia Research Council (ARC)
g gravity acceleration vector, 9.81 m/s2 for the nancial support of this work.
G gravity vector, N
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