International Journal of Refrigeration 139 (2022) 113–127

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International Journal of Refrigeration

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/ijrefrig

Study of a novel inlet geometry for ejectors

Étude d’une nouvelle géométrie d’entrée pour les éjecteurs

Amin Bauzvand a, *, Ebrahim Tavousi b, Aminreza Noghrehabadi c, Morteza Behbahani-Nejad a

a
Department of Mechanical Engineering, Shahid Chamran University of Ahvaz, Ahvaz, Iran
b
School of Engineering and the Built Environment, Faculty of Computing, Engineering and the Built Environment, Birmingham City University, Birmingham, B4 7XG, UK
c
Department of Mechanical Engineering, Alzahra University, Tehran, Iran

A R T I C L E I N F O A B S T R A C T

Keywords: Enhancing the ejector’s performance increases the ejector refrigeration systems’ performance and increases their
Two-phase ejector competitiveness in real applications. In this paper, a new concept for ejector geometry, different from conven­
Entrainment ratio tional geometry, has been proposed to improve their performance characteristics and dimensional compactness
Multi-nozzle
for small scale applications like household air conditioning. The proposed inlet geometry has the multi-nozzle
Swirl effect
Ejector performance
and swirls effect features simultaneously. The proposed geometry has been applied to a liquid-gas two-phase
ejector in this study. Then, the liquid-gas two-phase flow inside the ejector was studied by CFD, and experiments
Mots clés:
Éjecteur diphasique
validated the performance results. The velocity and pressure fields have been studied in different operating
Performance de l’éjecteur conditions. The obtained results show that pressure, velocity, and the phases’ volume fractions change oscillating
Taux d’entraînement with gradually damping amplitude along with the ejector axis, which means there is no sensible mixing shock in
the mixing process. The mixing process completes in a relatively short distance and the required mixing section
length becomes less. Also, the results of the proposed ejector were compared with the experimental results of a
conventional ejector. The results show that the new ejector has a better entrainment ratio and efficiency than the
conventional ejector in similar operating conditions. The maximum enhancement of efficiency of the new ge­
ometry occurs at 116.67 lit min-1 primary flow volume rate, and it is 158% higher than the conventional
geometry.

1. Introduction
Ejectors have attracted the researchers’ interest because they have
advantages such as simple structure and operation, non-moving parts,
low maintenance costs, high reliability, and especially, their ability to
use low-grade energy and cheap resources. Moreover, reasons like the
global warming problem (GWP) and economic factors led to the use of
ejector technology more and more (Abdulateef et al., 2009). Therefore,
using the ejector technology will solve a significant number of the
problems in an energy crisis or where transferring electrical energy is
impossible or challenging as the result of any cause (He et al., 2009).
One of the applications of the ejectors are in the refrigeration system
that traditionally used water as refrigerant. However, the performance
of ejector refrigeration system is significantly low, using
variable-geometry of ejector can optimum the performance (Yu et al.,
2006, Sun, 1996, Sun, 1999).
Among many refrigerants that are used until now, carbon dioxide is
one of the most promising refrigerants due to its environment-benign
nature (Zheng et al., 2015). However, it suffers from high expansion
loss and hence needs expansion work recovery. The ejector expansion
refrigeration cycle (EERC) is one of those two-phase ejector applications
designed to overcome this problem. The CERS, NERS, and EERC use an
ejector to replace the expansion valve to recover throttling loss and in­
crease cycle efficiency. However, the EERS CO2 refrigeration is more
attractive for the development of a high-performance refrigeration sys­
tem because of its higher expansion loss (Zheng et al., 2015).
On the other hand, many theoretical and experimental studies have
shown that the performance of EERC strongly depends on the ejector
characteristics (Elbel and Lawrence, 2016). After the relatively suc­
cessful application of CO2 EERC in supermarkets, recently, researchers
are trying to apply smaller ejectors in EERCs. They may do this to
incorporate the EERCs into small-scale applications like home refriger­
ation and air conditioning (Elbel and Lawrence, 2016). However, there

* Corresponding author.
E-mail addresses: Bazvand.a@gmail.com (A. Bauzvand), Noghrehabadi@alzahra.ac.ir (A. Noghrehabadi).

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijrefrig.2022.04.011
Received 5 October 2020; Received in revised form 20 February 2022; Accepted 9 April 2022
Available online 11 April 2022
0140-7007/© 2022 Published by Elsevier B.V.
A. Bauzvand et al. International Journal of Refrigeration 139 (2022) 113–127

Nomenclature Ps Suction chamber entrance pressure (bar)

Pt Pressure at the mixing throat exit (bar)
Symbols Qm Primary flow volume rate (lit min-1)
a Diffuser area ratio, At/Ad Qs Secondary flow volume rate (lit min-1)
B Motive nozzle/mixing throat area ratio, An/At Ro Mixing chamber radius (m)
c Area ratio, A2o/An=(1-b)/b
Ad Diffuser exit cross sectional area (mm2) Subscripts
An Primary jet flow cross sectional area (mm2) for d Diffuser exit
conventional geometry, and nominal value of the primary m Primary flow
flow inlet channels for the new geometry (mm2) o Mixing throat entrance
Aneff Effective or normal cross sectional area of the primary flow s Secondary flow and suction chamber
inlet channels for the new geometry (mm2) t Mixing throat exit
A2o Area of mixing throat entrance that secondary flow passes Greek letters
through it (mm2) Δ Two-phase pressure differential ratio
At Mixing throat exit or diffuser entrance cross sectional area α Inlet channels swirl angle
(mm2) β Inlet channels rotation angle
Dd Diffuser exit diameter (mm) γ density ratio, ρ2o/ρl
Dt Mixing throat diameter (mm) κ Pressure differential ratio
Dti Diameter of the inner part of the mixing throat of new η Ejector efficiency (%)
geometry (mm)
L1 Length of the inner part of the mixing throat of new Abbreviations
geometry (mm) CERS Conventional ejector refrigeration system
Ld Diffuser length (mm) COP Coefficient of performance
Lt Mixing throat length (mm) EERC Ejector expansion refrigeration cycle
Md Volumetric flow ratio at the diffuser exit GA Genetic algorithm
Mo Volumetric flow ratio at the mixing throat entrance GWP Global warming problem
Ms Volumetric flow ratio at the suction chamber MED Multi-effect desalination
Mt Volumetric flow ratio at the diffuser entrance NERS New ejector refrigeration system
Pd Ejector back-pressure, or diffuser exit pressure (bar) TVC Thermal vapor compressor
Pm Pressure at the primary flow port (bar)
Po Pressure at the mixing throat entrance (bar)

is a problem in making the ejectors smaller. Smaller applications of
ejectors will face the challenge of manufacturing very small nozzle
throat (e.g. on a scale of 0.5 mm) without the risk of clogging (Zheng
et al., 2015). Another critical challenge of applying small ejector
refrigeration systems is the high cost of the control system. In the su­
permarket and similar commercial applications, the cost of their
complicated control system is justifiable as compared to their low COP
values (Elbel and Lawrence, 2016).
Generally, ejectors’ low efficiency and performance sensitivity to
operating conditions are the significant disadvantages of ejector tech­
nology. These problems decrease their competency compared with
conventional technologies (He et al., 2009). Therefore, improving the
performance of the ejector has been one of the important proposed
topics in studies related to the ejector. Some conducted it by optimizing
conventional geometry and obtaining the proper dimensions to increase
the ejector’s performance in a certain application. Some others tried to
conduct it by proposing a different geometry. The purpose of all these
studies has not essentially been efficiency increase. Some of these
studies may follow certain purposes; for example, Hu et al. (Hu et al.,
2000) tried to increase the flow entrainment; on the other hand, the
energy loss was increased; thus, the efficiency was decreased. These
researches can generally be classified into two groups: The first group
deals with subjects such as ejector position in the system, using a serial
or parallel arrangement of arrays of ejectors or using an ejector in
addition to the main ejector or combining ejector cycles with other
conventional cycles; and optimize the conventional geometry of the
ejector followed by increasing the efficiency performance, or entrain­
ment performance or pressure rise performance, using the simple
methods such as simple comparison or smart optimization methods such
as genetic algorithm (GA) (Wang et al., 2015). Yu and Li (Yu and Li,
2007) theoretically studied a regenerative ejector refrigeration cycle
that uses an auxiliary jet pump and a conventional regenerator to
enhance the performance of the cycle. They found that the improvement
of COP of the enhanced cycle is approached to 17.8% compared with
that in the conventional cycle under the operating condition. Yu et al.
(Yu et al., 2006) used an additional jet pump to decrease the
back-pressure of the ejector in a conventional ejector refrigeration cycle
(CERS). They found that ejector and jet pump are the key part of the
system, and entrainment ratios have a great effect on COP. they
concluded that jet-pump as a type of liquid–vapour ejector has an
important role in the system.
In practical application, a jet pump of high efficiency and great
entrainment ratio should be considered first in order to improve COP.
Goktun (Göktun, 1999) theoretically found the optimum conditions for
a combined absorption/ejector system. He used a steady flow approach
of finite-time thermodynamics to calculate the optimum coefficient of
performance (COP). The combined cycle gives an increase of about 40%
in the COP compared to that of a simple absorption cycle. Sadeghi et al.
(Sadeghi et al., 2017) studied a multi-generation hybrid system from the
viewpoint of thermodynamics. Their system is composed of a combined
power generation and an ejector refrigeration cycle with a desalination
system at the top cycle. They conducted multi-objective optimization
using the genetic algorithm (GA) optimization toolbox of the MATLAB
software. They determined the optimum operating conditions for their
proposed system. Fan et al. (Fan et al., 2011) studied a jet pump by
computational fluid dynamics (CFD). Firstly, they developed an initial
jet pump design using an analytical approach and then improved its
efficiency using a computational fluid dynamics model. They could in­
crease the pump efficiency from 29% to 33% and decrease the pump’s
energy requirements by over 20%. Li et al. (Li et al., 2012) investigated
the entrainment performance for gas-gas and gas-liquid ejectors by CFD.
They determined the optimum values for geometrical parameters of

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Fig. 1. Experimental setup and its schematic sketch.
ejectors. Cizungu et al. (Cizungu et al., 2001) investigated ejector per­
formance for different refrigerants. They found that for different boiler
temperatures, the entrainment ratio and the system efficiency (COP)
depend mainly on the ejector geometry and the compression ratio.
From the above briefing, it could be concluded that the ejector ge­
ometry plays a vital role in the system performance and energy re­
quirements for given operating conditions. In the following, the
important researches that focused on changing the ejectors’ structure
are given. These researches have generally aimed to increase the ejec­
tor’s performance range by changing the geometrical structure of the
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International Journal of Refrigeration 139 (2022) 113–127
ejector. The studies conducted about ejector structure change were
limited and, in some cases, do not have significant results. Bodys et al.
(Bodys et al., 2016) studied the effect of rotation in primary flow. The
main problem in their work was to use the rotating primary nozzle that
increased the system operation complexities. They had also made the
primary flow to rotate before exiting the nozzle, which led to an addi­
tional energy loss. Yano (Yano et al., 1990) presented a new design
named it bend type in which the primary and secondary flow was liquid
water. In this study, the ejector was studied theoretically and experi­
mentally. They claimed that their design would be suitable for the flow
A. Bauzvand et al. International Journal of Refrigeration 139 (2022) 113–127

Fig. 2. The proposed geometry of this research, green channels for the primary flow and yellow channels for the secondary flow, lines AC and BD parallel to the
ejector axis. Views of the alternative parallel inlet channels for the primary and secondary streams, and swirl angle definition.

Fig. 3. Dimensions definition for the proposed and the conventional geometries used in this study.

contains big particles, but they have not investigated this claim. Havelka
et al. (Havelka et al., 1997) studied the structural effects of the ejector on
the entrained flow and energy consumption for the gas-liquid ejector.
This research studied the effect of multi-holes in the primary nozzle and
rotation in primary flow. The study results showed that rotation in
primary flow improves the suction flow rate and mixture efficiency. The
experiment results showed that when there is no rotation in primary
flow, mixture efficiency and the suction rate increase slightly by
increasing the mixing chamber length. Louis (1965) & Schmidt (1975)
presented and studied a kind of multi-nozzle (DeJong, 2002). In this
ejector, there is a linear array of parallel nozzles that makes the primary
flow. The mixing chamber for the ejector was rectangular shaped. This
ejector structure increased the entrainment ratio and the ejector effi­
ciency and also was more resistant to cavitation. In another design of the
multi-nozzles, a circular array of parallel nozzles were placed next, and
the primary and secondary flows were mixed in annular space. This
design of the ejector has the prior design characteristics and also had
more compact dimensions. Dejong (DeJong, 2002) studied this design

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Fig. 4. Grid generated by GAMBIT software.
Fig. 5. CFD mixture velocity field contour.
and concluded that this design performance is similar to the central jet.
However, the difference was that its performance was highly dependent
on the number of nozzles. Hu et al. (Hu et al., 2000) studied a kind of
lobed nozzle and compared its performance with a conventional circular
nozzle. Their results showed that for the compression ratios near enough
to 1, lobed nozzle increases the pumping ability by 200-300% and de­
creases the necessary mixing length by 33-50% compared to the con­
ventional nozzle design.
McBean and Birk (McBean and Birk, 2006) studied the performance
of a nozzle with installed triangular tabs in a detailed program. They
concluded that for the compression ratios near enough to 1, the
entrainment ratio was increased by 60-90%. Chang and Cheni (Chang
and Chen, 2000) studied another type of lobed nozzle. Their results
showed that the area ratio must be increased to increase the compression
and entrainment ratio compared to the conventional nozzle. In another
study, Opgenorth et al. (Opgenorth et al., 2012) added lobs to the
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International Journal of Refrigeration 139 (2022) 113–127
circular nozzle and investigated its effects. Their experiments showed
that this resulted in improving the critical pressure provided that the
entrainment ratio is constant. Lin et al. (Lin et al., 2013) studied an
ejector with a variable area ratio, numerically and experimentally; also,
Varga et al. (Varga et al., 2013) studied a refrigeration system that used
that ejector. The Area ratio has been changed using a movable spindle.
They investigated the effects of geometrical parameters on critical
pressure. Their design has problems such as possessing moving parts and
the complexity of the control system for moving parts. Hong et al. (Hong
et al., 2004) proposed using a rotating impeller. Despite its good per­
formance affections, using this idea causes loss of the ejector’s advan­
tages. Checking the above and similar studies show that making the flow
swirling and multi-nozzle primary flow each have good potential for
improving the ejector’s performance. Park (Park, 2010) investigated the
impact of the motive flow swirl effect on the entrainment performance
of the ejector used in a MED system. He concludes that a high entraining
A. Bauzvand et al.
Fig. 6. CFD mixture total pressure filed contour.
performance at a reference condition and good operational stability in
wide operating ranges has been achieved under some conditions
(improving on performance parameter as sacrificing some others). Also,
Park (Park, 2010) do not study the efficiency performance for his TVC’s.
The studies that have tried to present new ideas about ejector ge­
ometry are not so much; plus, many of these studies have been presented
for limited purposes. As discussed above, under some conditions, the
swirl effect could gradually improve the performance of ejectors. Also,
not all efforts have achieved those results. In this study, it has been tried
to introduce a new inlet geometry for ejectors. The proposed inlet ge­
ometry has the features of the multi-nozzle and swirls effect simulta­
neously. The multi-nozzle will increase the contact area between the
primary and secondary flows, i.e., it increases the shear layer area,
resulting in more momentum exchange. The characteristic of the swirl
effect enhances the mixing of streams, which means smaller mixing
length and less friction loss, and then, less space is required. Then,
applying this inlet geometry to a two-phase liquid gas, the effects of flow
swirling and multi-nozzle primary and secondary flows, simultaneously
on the ejector’s flow field and performance, have been investigated.
This ejector (just if it is used as a liquid-gas ejector and not a water-
air ejector) will be used in the NERS (as in the work of Yu et al. (Yu et al.,
2006)) or CO2 EERC as an auxiliary ejector to decrease the main ejec­
tors’ back-pressure. Also, there are many investigations in the field of
the ejector refrigeration system used water to evaluate the characteris­
tics of ejectors (Sun, 1999, Cizungu et al., 2001, Alexis, 2005, Ma et al.,
2010, Shen et al., 2005, Kasperski, 2010, Sun et al., 1996, Hong et al.,
2011, Aphornratana and Eames, 1997, Ruangtrakoon and Aphornra­
tana, 2014, Šarevski and Šarevski, 2014). Water and air have been used
in this study because of their most environmentally friendly substance,
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International Journal of Refrigeration 139 (2022) 113–127
availability and the test rig’s limitations (Chunnanond and Aphornra­
tana, 2004). Although their mass and phase transfer characteristics are
much different from CO2 and other common refrigerants, the base
concept of this study is changing the ejector geometry such that the form
of the flow changes. In this research, there are no usage of mass and
phase transfer features of the working fluid as a refrigerant. Thus,
similar results for CO2 and common refrigerant are expected, provided
that some modifications in dimensions may be needed to achieve
desirable results. For this, a lab-scale model was designed and built to
conduct the experimental study and validate the simulation results
(Fig. 1). This ejector was studied numerically and experimentally. In this
study, the pressure and velocity flow field and the entrainment and ef­
ficiency performance of the ejector was investigated at different
back-pressures and primary volume flow rates for a fixed geometry.
2. Geometry description
2.1. Proposed geometry and its working principle
Two standard views of the proposed geometry have been shown in
Fig. 2. In the front view, a schematic of the cross-sectional view normal
to the ejector’s centerline or axis in the parallel channels for the primary
and the secondary streams has been shown. Also, the arrangement of
parallel channels and the swirl angle’s schematic definition can be seen
in Fig. 2. The flow direction in the channel is from point G toward point
E, and the line EF is parallel to the ejector’s centerline or axis. The swirl
angle, β, is the measure of rotation between, axially positioned, the first
and the last sections of the swirling channels. However, the flow di­
rection angle, α, is needed in calculating the effective inlet area. From
A. Bauzvand et al.
Fig. 7. CFD contour of the primary phase volume fraction.
the extended view of the curved triangle EFG, mapped into EFG’, the
angle α is calculated as follow:
( ′)
FG
α = tan− 1 (1)
FE
Where from Fig. 2 it’s evident that:
′
FG = FG = β⋅Ro (2)
The effective inlet area represents a cross-sectional area normal to
the flow direction that differs from the apparent or nominal value due to
the presence of rotation. The swirl angle will affect the effective inlet
area. Theoretically, the flow direction angle, α, can range from 0 to 90
degrees. Because of the presence of rotation, the effective cross-sectional
area of the primary jet flow differs from that of a straight one. As can be
seen in Fig. 2, the line “FH” stands for the direction normal to the flow
direction in the swirl channels for both the primary and secondary flows.
Thus, if the line “FG’” represents the apparent or nominal flow cross-
section, An , and line “FH” stands for the normal or effective flow
cross-section, Ameff , then the effective flow area is calculated as:
Ameff = An ⋅cosα (3)
As shown in Fig. 2 and Fig. 3, the primary flow enters axially, and the
secondary flow is entrained laterally into the parallel channels. These
two streams move through helical parallel channels and then enter the
annular space of the mixing chamber. Finally, the mixed flow passing
through the diffuser is discharged from the ejector.
The proposed geometry of this study has some geometrical specifi­
cations. The first key parameter of this geometry is the number of
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International Journal of Refrigeration 139 (2022) 113–127
channels per each stream. Conceptually, the more channels’ numbers,
the more shear layer area value, and the more distributed and better the
mixing process. That means more channels result in better efficiency and
entrainment performance. However, in an actual case, the number of
channels cannot be infinite, and the thickness of the common walls
between the channels is a limiting factor. A limiting issue raised from the
number of channels is that the friction loss of the inlet geometry in­
creases as it increases. This pressure drop means more motive pressure
(more input energy) is required. This issue will decrease efficiency
performance.
According to Eq. 3, both the primary and the second effective areas
depend on the swirl angle and the apparent area. As the primary flow
area increases (this certainly causes the secondary flow area to
decrease), keeping the primary flow mass flux constant will result in the
primary jet’s velocity, thus decreasing the jet momentum. This area
increase will decrease the entrainment and the critical back-pressure of
the ejector. However, if the primary jet’s velocity is held simultaneously,
the more elevated critical back-pressures are tolerated. On the other
hand, the entrainment increases as the secondary flow area increases;
instead, the critical back-pressure decreases.
The swirl angle will affect both the frictional and non-frictional
pressure drop components of the primary flow pressure drop, i.e.
changes the static pressure into dynamic pressure and waste some of it.
The static pressure is converted to the momentum of the primary jet
flow. If the swirl angle has been increased, then more static pressure is
converted to the jet momentum. The more momentum of the primary jet
means that more energy will be available to be exchanged between the
primary and the secondary flows in a desirable form. This energy con­
version will improve the efficiency performance of the ejector. On the
A. Bauzvand et al. International Journal of Refrigeration 139 (2022) 113–127

Fig. 8. Profiles of velocity magnitude and primary phase volume fraction along the lines AC and BD.

other hand, the frictional component of pressure drop is an undesirable Karassik et al., 2008):
sequence of increasing the swirl angle.
Pm − P0 = Z(1 + Knz ) (4)
In which Knz is defined as the dynamic pressure of the primary jet
2.2. Conventional ejector model flow. In Eq. 4, Z is dynamic pressure of the primary jet, and defined as:

In this study, a conventional liquid-gas ejector was designed based on Z=

the works of Li (Li et al., 2012) and Cunningham (Cunningham, 1974),
Cunningham and Dopkin (Cunningham and Dopkin, 1974), and also the
pump handbook (Karassik et al., 2008). This ejector was built and
experimentally was tested. Its results were used to compare with the
results of the proposed geometry of this research. The schematic of the
proposed geometry and the conventional ejector has been shown in
Fig. 3.
The governing equations for the conventional ejector of this study
are component-based. In the motive (primary) nozzle, the incompress­
ible form of energy equation will give the pressure drop as the follow (Li
et al., 2012, Cunningham, 1974, Cunningham and Dopkin, 1974,
ρi Vn2
(5)
2
Where Vn is the velocity of the primary jet flow at the primary nozzle exit
position (showed in Fig. 3), also, ρl is density of the primary fluid.
The pressure rise equation for the mixing section and throat is
complex because of the presence of a two-phase flow. It could be stated
as the follow (Li et al., 2012, Cunningham, 1974, Cunningham and
Dopkin, 1974, Karassik et al., 2008):
[ ]
2γMo b2
Pt − Po = Z 2b − (2 + Kth )b2 (1 + γMo )(1 + Mt ) + (6)
1− b

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Fig. 9. Profiles of the Relative total pressure along the lines AC and BD.

Table 1
Dimensions of the studied ejectors.
Rotation angle, β (degree) An (mm2) L1 (mm) Lt (mm) Dt (mm) Ld (mm) Dd (mm)
Proposed geometry 32.4 53 10 30 20 120 44
Regular geometry 0 53 77.5 271 12.5 145 29

In Eq. 6, Kth and b are the friction loss coefficient of the mixing throat
and the nozzle to throat area ratio, respectively. Also, Mo and Mt
represent the volumetric flow ratios at the mixing throat entry and
throat exit positions (Fig. 3), respectively. Another parameter in Eq. 6 is
γ which is defined as the follow (Li et al., 2012, Cunningham, 1974,
Cunningham and Dopkin, 1974, Karassik et al., 2008):
ρgo P2o
γ= = (7)
ρl ρl RT2o
Secondary flow has been considered as an ideal gas in Eq. 7, where
P2o and T2o are the pressure and temperature of the secondary flow at the
mixing throat entry, respectively, and ρgo is the secondary flow density
(an ideal gas here) at the mixing throat entry.
Similarly, the pressure rise equation for diffuser becomes (Li et al.,
2012, Cunningham, 1974, Cunningham and Dopkin, 1974, Karassik
et al., 2008):

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Fig. 10. CFD-vs-Experimental results, entrainment ratio, and motive and outlet pressure difference.

Fig. 11. Experimental results, motive pressure and Entrainment ratio-vs-back pressure for different primary flow volume rates.

[ ]
Pd − Pt = Z(1 + γMo ) b2 (1 + Mo )2 − a2 b2 (1 + Md )2 − Kdi b2 (1 + Mt ) performance of a device or system. The definition of efficiency for liquid-
Pd gas ejector is as follows (Li et al., 2012, Cunningham, 1974, Cunning­
− Po Mo ln (8) ham and Dopkin, 1974, Karassik et al., 2008):
Pt

Where, Kdi and a are the friction loss coefficient of the diffuser, and the
diffuser area ratio, respectively. The M’s are the volumetric flow ratios
at the corresponding positions specified in Fig. 3.
Efficiency is one of the most important parameters for evaluating the

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Fig. 12. Experimental results, comparison of entrainment performance on the pressure differential ratio basis for the tested ejectors.

Fig. 13. Experimental results, comparison of entrainment performance on the two-phase pressure differential ratio basis.

Pd Pd as the ratio of the secondary flow rate to the primary flow rate (Li et al.,
Ps ⋅ln Ps ⋅ln
Ps Q s Ps 2012, Cunningham, 1974, Cunningham and Dopkin, 1974, Karassik
η= ⋅ = ⋅Ms
Pm − Pd Qm Pm − Pd et al., 2008):
Pd (9) Qs
Ps ⋅ln
Ps Ms = (11)
Δ= Qm
Pm − Pd
η = Δ⋅Ms For more details one can see the works of Li (Li et al., 2012), Cun­
ningham (Cunningham, 1974), Cunningham and Dopkin (Cunningham
In the above equations, P’s are the static pressures at the specified and Dopkin, 1974), and Jumpeter (Karassik et al., 2008).
locations in Fig. 3. Also, the P’s and M’s are related based on the
following equality (Li et al., 2012, Cunningham, 1974, Cunningham and 3. Numerical simulation
Dopkin, 1974, Karassik et al., 2008):
Pd Md = Pt Mt = Ps Ms = Po Mo (10) In order to properly conduct the simulations in the computational
domain, a computational grid will be undoubtedly required. In this
The Ms is called the volumetric entrainment ratio for liquid-gas study, the commercial software GAMBIT was utilized to create the
ejector, also. The entrainment ratio of the liquid-gas ejector is defined required computational grid Fig. 4 carefully. After meticulously

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Fig. 14. Experimental results, comparison of efficiency performance.

Fig. 15. Experimental results, efficiency performance on the Δ-parameter basis.

preparing the computational grid, the model’s flow field calculations
have been performed using the software ANSYS FLUENT. The required
simulations in this descriptive study were carried out in 3-Dimensional
space due to the geometry of the ejector and its flow field. In order to
ensure the effective grid independence of the numerical solution results
of the simulations, the different grids were produced and studied. The
number of cells in the studied grids is approximately 300K-3000K. The
size of cells is finer near the walls, and also during solving progress in
areas where the sharp gradients occurred in the flow field (for example,
in the area that the primary and secondary fluid flows come into con­
tact), the cell size has been smaller, and their number has been
increased.
The fluid flow has been simulated as a steady-state. Water and air
fluids were used in this study. Air solubility in water was supposed to be
negligible. Since the pressure and temperature of the water are higher
than the evaporation point, plus the air was at ambient conditions (not
dry air) thus, the liquid phase evaporation was supposed to be negli­
gible. Besides, for two-phase gas-liquid flow, it was supposed that the
mixing process comes with viscosity diffusion and small scale turbulent
convection. The Two-Phase Mixture Model was used to describe the two-
phase gas-liquid flow. The Manninen hypothesis (Manninen et al., 1996)
was used for the slip velocity calculation. The governing equations have
been linearized and solved by the implicit scheme using a
Pressure-Based solver. The SIMPLE algorithm was applied for coupling
the velocity and pressure equation.
Moreover, the second-order upwind scheme was used to discretise
the convective terms in all conservation equations; PRESTO! and QUICK
schemes were applied for pressure and volume fraction, respectively.

124
A. Bauzvand et al.
The Realizable k-ε turbulence model was used to model the turbulence
in the flow field properly. In FLUENT, an algebraic relative velocity has
been applied for the Two-Phase Mixture model. The critical assumption
used in the algebraic relative velocity model is that local inter-phase
equilibrium on short length scales is established. The standard wall
function seems to present accurate results for the near-wall region flow
field.
3.1. Boundary conditions
Since the used fluid in the primary flow is water, and its operating
pressure range is relatively low, the primary flow was supposed to be
incompressible. However, air as the secondary fluid was considered
compressible with the ideal gas equation of state.
In solving the two-phase equations, water was considered as the
primary continuous phase and air as the secondary discrete phase. The
liquid phase’s properties, such as viscosity, specific heat, density, and
the thermal conductivity coefficient, were obtained based on the
experimental conditions. The water temperature was considered
290.65K in experimental conditions. The entrained air temperature of
the secondary flow was assumed 308.15K based on experiments
conditions.
The entrance of the primary flow was modelled as a velocity inlet
boundary condition because of its incompressibility. Moreover, the
boundary condition of the pressure inlet is a reasonable hypothesis for
the secondary flow, which is considered an ideal gas flow. The pressure
outlet boundary condition is a good choice for the ejector’s outlet sec­
tion, considering two flow mixing and air compressibility. The walls
involved in the flow was assumed thermally insulated because of high
flow velocity. The walls were assumed as non-moving, and the no-slip
condition was applied to the walls.
4. Results and discussion
4.1. CFD results
Grid independence test was conducted to determine the optimal
number of cells. The secondary volume flow rate parameter was selected
to investigate 320452, 1011682, 2032698, 2506451, and 3002543 cells.
Secondary volume flow rates were obtained 0.00545, 0.00412, 0.00367,
0.00319, and 0.00321 m3 s-1, respectively. In order to simulate effi­
ciency and time cost, the medium mesh with grid 2506451 was selected
for simulations.
Some useful information on the velocity and pressure field and the
primary phase volume fraction distribution, from simulations, for the
new proposed geometry are given in the following figures. These figures
show some contours of flow field properties at some cross-sections along
the ejector’s axis.
Contours of velocity magnitude Fig. 5 show the change of velocity
magnitude along the ejector axis. As the flow goes ahead along the
ejector axis, the magnitude of the high-velocity core decreases, instead
its area expands. The local velocity decrement shows that the mo­
mentum moves from this higher momentum zone to another lower
momentum zone. As can be seen in Fig. 6 and Fig. 7, a similar process
occurs about the total pressure and the primary phase volume fraction
fields, respectively. Occurrence of these exchange processes promises a
mixing process with less irreversibility. A better mixing process means
better performance of the ejector.
The profiles of the mixture velocity magnitude together and the
relative total pressure with the primary phase volume fraction along the
ejector’s axis, on lines “AC” and “BD”, have been shown in Fig. 8 and 9.
As can be seen, for the line “AC”, in the beginning, the velocity
magnitude and primary phase volume fraction equal the secondary flow
velocity and volume fractions values. For both lines “AC” and “BD”, the
volume fraction and velocity magnitude approximately have similar
trends, but it seems between points “0” and “1” show different
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International Journal of Refrigeration 139 (2022) 113–127
behaviors. This behavior could be justified as a layer of a secondary fluid
(low primary phase volume fraction and thus low energy fluid flow) has
been sandwiched between two layers of the high primary phase volume
fraction (high energy fluid flow), as expected by the proposed geometry.
This behavior is seen for line “BD” between points “1” and “2”, also. If
the profiles of the primary phase volume fraction of Lines “AD” and “BD”
have been put together, as in Fig. 8, they form a kind of a gradual
damping profile. This occurs for each pair of the alternative arrange­
ment of all five-sets of primary and secondary fluids flow channels and
shows that the mixing process is well distributed around the mixing
section space.
4.2. Experimental validation
Data related to entrainment and efficiency performance of ejectors
with different geometries were compared and analyzed to present useful
information. For this, a model with a rotation angle of 32.4 was inves­
tigated. The results of the conventional ejector compared with these
results. The Geometric dimensions of the models are given in Table 1.
Some parameters, such as entrainment volume flow rate, the motive
flow pressure, and the motive flow volume rate was measured and
recorded in this research. The values of compression ratio, entrainment
ratio, and ejector efficiency were calculated using the recorded data,
then compared by other results at different operating conditions.
The experimental setup was used to conduct the study, and its
schematic has been shown in Fig. 1. The primary flow is powered by a
centrifugal pump and then enters the ejector. The Primary flow enters
the ejector and passes through the primary nozzle, then enters the
mixing chamber. The primary jet entrains the secondary flow from the
suction inlet, and two streams are mixed in the mixing chamber. The
mixed flow of primary and secondary streams leaves the mixing cham­
ber and enters the diffuser. The flow recovers some of its potential en­
ergy as static pressure in the diffuser. The two-phase flow is led to the
primary fluid tank.
An industrial pressure transmitter, made by TraFag Company, was
used to measure the pressure. Its measurement’s accuracy class is
±0.1% FS. The primary flow volume rate was monitored using a mag­
netic flowmeter made by Endress+Hauser. Its measurement’s accuracy
class is ±0.1% FS. The volume rate of secondary flow was measured by a
turbine gas flowmeter made by Fluxi from the 2000TZ series. Its mea­
surement’s accuracy class is ±0.5% FS. Doing an uncertainty analysis,
the maximum standard uncertainty for measuring is as follow entrain­
ment ratio of 4.7% and 7.3% for the ejector efficiency. The above values
were calculated for a set of 8 data at each point. Also, the calculations
were done at a confidence level of 95% with respect to uncertainty
analysis suggested by Coleman and Steele (Coleman and Steele, 2018).
4.3. Experimental results
Ejector structure and its operating conditions are the most important
factors that affect ejector performance. In this research, a new structure
of the ejector has been investigated at various operating conditions. In
Fig. 10, the data from the simulations and the experiments were
compared. One can see that the difference between the simulations re­
sults and the experiment results is well placed in a reasonable band of
±15%. These differences for values of primary flow pressure are even
smaller than that of the entrainment ratio. This fact shows that the
performed simulations for proposed geometry have proper accuracy.
The variation of primary flow pressure vs ejector back-pressure is
given in Fig. 11. As can be seen, at a constant primary flow rate, the
primary flow pressure has low sensitivity to the ejector back-pressure.
However, as expected, an increase in the primary flow volume rate in­
creases the primary flow pressure.
A. Bauzvand et al.
4.4. Entrainment performance
The variation of the entrainment ratio vs the ejector back-pressure
for different primary flow volume rates has been given in Fig. 11. It
can be seen that as the primary flow volume rate increases or the back-
pressure decreases, the entrainment ratio increases. Another point in
Fig. 11 is that the rate of change of the entrainment ratio decreases as the
back-pressure increases. The entrainment ratio vs pressure differential
ratio was compared for conventional and the proposed geometry in
Fig. 12. The pressure differential ratio is defined as follows:
Pm − Ps
κ= (12)
Pd − Ps
Comparing data in Fig. 12 is difficult because of the improper overlap
of curves on the horizontal axis. Thus, it is necessary to replace the
horizontal axis variable in order to make a fair comparison. In the case of
mixed liquid-gas flow, one can use an alternative variable. Thus, the Δ is
defined as the two-phase differential pressure ratio in equation 9. Based
on this new definition, if Ps remains constant and the variation of Pm is
low, then the variation of Δ will be dependent on Pd directly. The
parameter κ was replaced by parameter Δ in Fig. 13. The entrainment
ratio performance of the proposed geometry was compared to those of
the conventional geometry. As can be seen, the better performance of
the proposed geometry is evident.
It is worth mentioning that the data point for the regular geometry
used in this study is the point of maximum efficiency at each primary
volume flow rate. Also, it is observed that the maximum back-pressure
for the proposed geometry is slightly lower than that of the regular ge­
ometry for the same volume flow rate.
4.5. Efficiency performance
The efficiency values for the two geometry types are compared
through the efficiency ratio. The efficiency ratio is the ratio of efficiency
to the maximum efficiency value of the regular geometry in the exper­
iments’ operating conditions. The efficiency performance of two ejectors
was compared in Fig. 14. It can be seen that the efficiency of each ejector
increases as the primary flow volume rate increases. Also, by increasing
the ejector back-pressure, the efficiency increases. As one can see, for the
proposed geometry as the primary flow volume rate remains constant,
the bigger the Δ, the more efficiency, but for the constant back-pressure,
it depends on the value of Δ, and it can be ascendant, constant, or
descendant. For the proposed geometry, as the back-pressure increases,
the increased rate of efficiency becomes greater.
Efficiency variation vs parameter Δ at different primary flow volume
rates was compared for two geometries in Fig. 15 on the Δ-parameter
basis. It is evident that the proposed geometry has more wide operation
range with better efficiency performance than that of conventional ge­
ometry. It can be stated that for the proposed geometry, the sensitivity to
the operating condition is much lower as compared to the conventional
geometry. Also, one can see that the proposed geometry has better ef­
ficiency performance than the conventional geometry.
5. Conclusion
In this research, new geometry for ejectors was proposed and
described. This geometry has the features of multi-nozzle and swirling
flow simultaneously. This geometry can be used for many applications of
ejectors. First, it was applied to a liquid-gas ejector to show its poten­
tials. Then, the flow field parameters, such as velocity and pressure,
were studied by CFD. Also, its effect on efficiency and entrainment
performance was studied by CFD and validated by experiment.
The efficiency and entrainment performance were compared for the
proposed and conventional geometry. The results showed that if the
ejector back-pressure increased, the ejector with the proposed geometry
showed less sensitivity in performance than the conventional geometry.
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International Journal of Refrigeration 139 (2022) 113–127
At the operating condition limits of this research, the proposed geometry
has had better efficiency and entrainment performance than the con­
ventional geometry ejector. This better performance means that more
production is obtained for a definite amount of consumed energy, i.e.,
for more products, less cost is required. This improved cost-production
balance is due to the simultaneous features of the multi-nozzle
(extended shear layer) and swirls effect (faster and laterally distrib­
uted mixing process). The results show that the mixing process com­
pletes in a relatively short distance. Thus, the required mixing section
length becomes less. Thus, the proposed geometry needs a shorter
mixing length than that of the conventional geometry that means the
proposed geometry makes the ejectors more compact. During the ex­
periments, it is observed that the maximum back-pressure for the pro­
posed geometry is slightly lower than that of the regular geometry for
the same volume flow rate. Nevertheless, the dimensions used for the
proposed geometry was a very rough design estimation. Thus, it can be
expected that after a proper design procedure, the back-pressure per­
formance would improve. In this study, the efficiency of the ejector with
new geometry increased up to 158% rather than the conventional ge­
ometry at 116.67 lit.min− 1 primary flow volume rate. It can be expected
that the proposed concept for ejector geometry has good potential for
performance improvement of ejector refrigeration systems.
Declaration of Competing Interest
The authors declare that they have no known competing financial
interests or personal relationships that cdocould have appeared to in­
fluence the work reported in this paper.
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