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Unit Operations Thumb Rules
Unit Operations Thumb Rules
This section contains engineering rules-of-thumb that may be useful for the design
problem calculations.
Engineering rules-of-thumb are rough estimates that represent the collective experiences
of many engineers. While the rules-of-thumb cannot be used in place of detailed
economic and process-specific design calculations, they can be used to obtain reasonable
estimates of many process parameters. As a result, they may be useful for design
parameters which must be chosen by the Planner in the design calculation section of each
report.
Overview
Chemical engineers are often responsible for the design, construction, and operation of
chemical plants and processes. Design engineers are constantly searching for information
that will aid them in these tasks.
Engineering publicatios, process data from existing equipment, laboratory and pilot-plant
studies are just a few of the many sources of information that design engineers must use.
It is important for students to learn the difference between "theoretical" designs and
"practical designs". Design calculations must often be modified by engineers to reflect
economic, safety, construction, and maintenance realities that will affect the design. For
example:
Design calculation for a reactor might show that the optimum pipe diameter is D
= 3.43 inches. A survey of supplier catalogs will quickly show that schedule-40
steel pipe is not manufactured with this diameter. The design engineer must then
choose between either the 3.07 or 3.55 inch diameter pipe that can be easilty
obtained from the vendor.
Design calculations for a distillation column might show that a 600 ft tower is
required to achieve the specified product separation. The maximum height of
towers are generally limited to about 175 ft, however, because of wind-loading
and construction considerations. A 600 ft tower would therefore need to be built
in several different sections if alternative designs were not available.
You should strive to achieve as much realism as possible in your design calculations.
For students who have not yet taken the department's design course, the rules-of-thumb in
this section have been taken from two books that are currently available at Walter
Library:
Chemical Process Equipment: Selection and Design
Stanely M. Walas, Butterworths, Boston, MA 1988
Walter Reference: TP157.W334 1988
Plant Design and Economics for Chemical Engineers, 4th Ed.
M.S. Peters and K.D. Timmerhaus, McGraw-Hill, Inc., New York, NY, 1991.
Walter Reserve: TP155.5 .P4 1991
For small piping installations, however, the following rules-of-thumb are sufficiently
accurate:
Pumps
As chemical engineers, you will most likely encounter two different types of pumps:
1. Centrifugal pumps, and
2. Positive-displacement pumps.
Centrifugal pumps are more common, but positive-displacement are used to achieve high
pressures.
I. Centrifugal Pumps
A centrifugal pump, in its simplest form, consists of an impeller rotating inside a casing.
The impeller imparts kinetic energy to the fluid. The velocity head, which is created by
moving fluid from the low-velocity center to the high-velocity edge of the impeller, is
converted into pressure head when the fluid leaves the pump.
Centrifugal pumps are simple to construct, low cost, and deliver the fluid at a uniform
pressure without shocks or pulsations. In addition, they can handle liquids which contain
large amounts of suspended materials.
Centrifugal pumps CAN be throttled (partly shut off) on the discharge side to control the
flow rate of the material being pumped.
the pump.
For more information about centrifugal pumps, go to the pump tutorial.
II. Positive-Displacement Pumps
There are two types of positive-displacement pumps:
1. Reciprocating Pumps
The chamber is a stationary cylinder. The liquid is drawn into the cylinder by the
withdrawal of a piston. The liquid is forced out of the cylinder on the return
stroke.
2. Rotary Pumps
The chamber moves from the inlet to the discharge and back again. In a gear
rotary pump, for example, two intermeshing gears rotate; the liquid is trapped in
the spaces between the teeth and forced out at the discharge.
Reciprocating and rotary pumps can be used to very high pressures, whereas centrifugal
pumps are limited in their head and are used for lower pressures.
Reciprocating and rotary pumps CANNOT be throttled (partly shut off) on the discharge
side--pumping against a closed valve will damage the pump! To change the flow rate, the
speed of the motor must be adjusted--this is difficult to do using an electric motor (it gets
very expensive!).
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Liquid-Liquid Extraction
1. The dispersed phase in a liquid-liquid extraction column should be the phase that
has the higher volumetric flow rate. In equipment that is subject to backmixing,
however, the dispersed phase should be the material which has the smaller
volumetric flow rate.
2. The most significant cost in a liquid-liquid extraction process is the cost of the
solvent. As a result, the solvent will generally be recycled after use--as a result,
the solvent entering the column will generally contain some of the product (it is
very rarely "pure").
NOTE: This is why you have to measure the concentration of acetic acid in the
toluene feed for the liquid-liquid extraction lab.
3. You will not recover 100% of the product from a liquid-liquid extraction column!
Columns are typically designed to recover 90-99% of the product. High-value
products would be closer to 99%.
See Geankoplis Table 3.4-1 and Figure 3.4-3 for more information.
For estimating the approximate magnitudes of the overall heat transfer coefficients, U, in
shell-and-tube heat exchangers, you can refer to the following values:
Mechanism U (W/m²-K)
Water to Water 1140 - 1700
Water to Organic Liquids 570 - 1140
Water to Condensing Steam 1420 - 22700
Steam to Boiling Water 1420 - 2270
Water to Air (Finned Tube) 110 - 230
Light Organics to Light Organics 230 - 425
Heavy Organics to Heavy Organics 55 - 230
NOTE: Conversion: 1 btu/h-ft²-°F = 5.6873 W/m²-K
Fouling
In practice, heat transfer surfaces do not remain clean for very long. Dirt, soot, and
various deposits form on one or both sides of heat transfer surfaces and/or tubing. Like
any other material, these deposits add additional resistances to the flow of heat and
reduce the overall heat transfer coefficient, U.
For example:
Coke and other substances can deposit on surfaces in petroleum processes,
Algea can grow in cooling towers and biological processes, and
Corrosion products can form on many different surfaces--seriously affecting the
resistance to heat transfer.
The effect of these deposits (i.e. "fouling") is generally taken into account by adding
resistances, 1/hdi and 1/hdo, to account for the fouling inside the tube, hdi, and for the
fouling outside the tube, hdo, in the equation for the overall heat transfer coeficient, U. See
Eq. 4.3-17 in Geankoplis' text.
Typical values for the fouling coefficients are shown below:
Deposit hd (W/m²-K)
Distilled and Seawater 11350
City Water 5680
Muddy Water 1990-2840
Gases 2840
Vaporizing Liquids 2840
Gas Oils and Vegetable Oils 1990
NOTE: Conversion: 1 btu/h-ft²-°F = 5.6873 W/m²-K
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