Powder Technology 384 (2021) 82–99

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Powder Technology

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

Influence of the inlet cross-sectional shape on the performance

of a multi-inlet gas cyclone
Nihan Uygur Babaoğlu a, Farzad Parvaz b, Seyyed Hossein Hosseini c,⁎, Khairy Elsayed d,e,
Goodarz Ahmadi f
a
Department of Environmental Engineering, Kahramanmaras Sutcu Imam University, Kahramanmaras, Turkey
b
Department of Mechanical Engineering, Semnan University, P.O. Box 35131-191, Semnan, Iran
c
Department of Chemical Engineering, Ilam University, Ilam 69315–516, Iran
d
Mechanical Power Engineering Department, Faculty of Engineering at El-Mattaria, Helwan University, Masaken El-Helmia P.O., Cairo 11718, Egypt
e
Mechanical Engineering Department, College of Engineering and Technology-Smart Village Campus, Arab Academy for Science, Technology and Maritime Transport (AASTMT), P.O. Box 12676,
Giza, Egypt
f
Department of Mechanical and Aeronautical Engineering, Clarkson University, Potsdam, NY 13699-5725, USA

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

Article history: The influence of inlet cross-sectional shape on the flow pattern, pressure drop, and cut-off diameter of a gas cy-
Received 9 November 2020 clone was studied using the CFD model. Accordingly, five different inlet cross-sectional shapes, namely, circle, el-
Received in revised form 27 January 2021 lipse, rectangle, square, and trapezoid, for the double-inlet gas cyclone were studied. It was observed that the
Accepted 4 February 2021
maximum tangential velocity was about 1.95 times the corresponding inlet velocity for primary and secondary
Available online 12 February 2021
rectangle inlets. Furthermore, the computed tangential velocity in the cyclone with the primary and secondary
Keywords:
rectangle inlets (R-R) was considerably greater than those obtained by the other inlet shapes. In this case, the
Multi inlet gas cyclone axial gas velocity reached its highest values at the bottom of the vortex finder and the cyclone center. It was
Inlet cross-section shape also determined that the inlet shape significantly affected the cyclone pressure drop. The Circle-Square and the
Pressure drop Rectangle-Ellipse configurations of inlet cross-sectional shape generated, respectively, the lowest pressure
Cut-off diameter drop and the highest efficiency.
Cyclone performance © 2021 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction swirling downwards and an inner (forced) vortex swirling upwards

Air contaminants are categorized into two main groups as particles
and gaseous pollutants. Particles are among the causes of respiratory
and cardiovascular diseases [1–3]. Particles, especially those with a
size of 10 μm or smaller, as air pollutants, can cause human respiratory
diseases [4]. Understanding particle transport, dispersion, and deposi-
tion are of critical interest to the diverse fields of air pollution control,
gas-solid separation, aerosol sampling, and many other industrial pro-
cesses. Gas cyclones as particle separation equipment are widely used
in power stations, food processing plants, cement, mineral, and iron
separation plants, chemical industries, etc. Their working principle is
to separate the solid particles from the gas phase by the centrifugal
forces [5]. Cyclones have a simple structure and are economical devices
for gas cleaning [6]. Nevertheless, the motion of the continuous phase in
cyclones is quite complex and still poorly understood [7,8]. Cyclonic
flows create a dual-vortex to separate the denser particles from the ligh-
ter ones [9]. The gas flow typically consists of an outer (free) vortex
⁎ Corresponding author.
E-mail address: s.h.hosseini@ilam.ac.ir (S.H. Hosseini).
[5]. The swirling motion leads to the radial accelerations, which gener-
ate a strong centrifugal force field inside cyclones resulting in the sepa-
ration of the dense particulate phase from the gas [10,11].
The performance of a cyclone separator includes the two interre-
lated parameters of collection efficiency and pressure drop. The pres-
sure drop is related to energy consumption, and the collection
efficiency shows the separation capability of a cyclone. These parame-
ters are usually given as the objective functions for the cyclone multi-
objective optimization problems [5].
The gas-particle flows in a cyclone can be evaluated using experi-
mental, analytical, statistical, and numerical methods [12]. The experi-
mental methods of Laser Doppler Anemometry (LDA) [13,14] and
Particle Image Velocimetry (PIV) [15–17], analytical and semi-
analytical models [12,18–24], and statistical regression-based models
[25] have been broadly used for evaluating the flow parameters through
cyclones. However, the numerical methods have become more popular
for predicting multiphase flows in cyclones due to the advances in both
solution algorithms and computer hardware. It is now accepted that
computational fluid dynamics (CFD) is a powerful and economical tool
that provides useful information on complex multiphase flows in indus-
trial equipment, including cyclones. CFD has been used for studying the

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.powtec.2021.02.008
0032-5910/© 2021 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
N.U. Babaoğlu, F. Parvaz, S.H. Hosseini et al.
influence of operating conditions and changes of design factors on the
performance of the cyclones [26].
The characteristics of flow behavior in a cyclone can be accurately
determined with the CFD technique in comparison with the theoretical,
semi-empirical, and statistical models [27]. This technique introduces a
new method for modeling cyclone pressure losses [28]. Gimbun et al.
[29] have also successfully used the CFD technique to predict and eval-
uate the effects of temperature and inlet velocity on the pressure drop of
gas cyclones. Consequently, the best case in terms of cyclone perfor-
mance can be determined by the CFD model.
Effects of geometry on cyclone performance and flow field have
been investigated in previous studies, including vortex finder diameter
[10,30–32], cyclone length [33] (that includes the cylinder and cone
lengths), inlet area [6,34,35], and the number of inlets [36–42]. It has
been observed that the different geometries of the dipleg structure of
the cyclone significantly affected the cyclone performance. It was also
reported that the conical dipleg geometry created the highest efficiency,
while the diamond dipleg geometry produced the lowest efficiency
[12]. Although the performance depends on the cyclone geometry, the
vortex finder insertion length [10,30,31] and cone tip diameter [43,44]
did not significantly affect the cyclone performance.
Recently, there have been interests in understanding the influence of
the number of cyclone inlets on cyclone performance. An advantage of
the multi-inlet cyclone to the conventional single-inlet cyclone is that
it procures high dust loaded gas stream with a similar cut-off diameter
[39]. The literature has some correlations and semi-empirical models
to estimate the cut-off diameters and the pressure drops in multi-inlet
geometries [39,45]. Although they are cheaper than experimental and
numerical simulations, some models have less accurate results [46].
Although little works concerning multi-inlet cyclones have been re-
ported in the literature, the influence of the shape of the inlet cross-
section for multi-inlet cyclones has not been studied so far. Moreover,
in almost all earlier studies, the same inlet section geometry was se-
lected. The relevant publications concerning the multi-inlet cyclones
are listed in Table 1, with short descriptions of the work. Accordingly,
several multi-inlet designs have been investigated using experimental
or simulation approaches.
Lim et al. [47] compared the performance of two conventional single
inlet cyclones with different sizes to that of the dual-inlet cyclone and
reported better performance for the latter. Zhao et al. [41] showed a nu-
merical simulation of particle and fluid flow on the conventional single
inlet and spiral double inlet cyclones using the CFD technique. They ob-
served that using a spiral double inlet increases the particle separation
efficiency by increasing the symmetry of the gas flow. Winfield et al.
[48] analyzed the gas flow profile and particle separation efficiency per-
formances using the CFD modeling, including the RSM. As the pressure
drops were decreased, a better performance was found using the triple-
inlet cyclone structure. Liu et al. [49] designed a miniature quadru-inlet
mini cyclone to solve the sample stream direction problem in a single
inlet cyclone. Calibration experiments were also carried out to deter-
mine the pressure losses that are a function of particle cut-off diameter
and gas rate in the cyclone.
Safikhani et al. [37] solved Reynolds Averaged Navier-Stokes (RANS)
equations with RSM by using finite elements on the SIMPLE pressure
correction algorithm for studying the performance of one, two, and
three tangential inlet cyclones. It was reported that three inlet cyclone
has better collection efficiency, less pressure drops, and less turbulence
distribution than the other inlet cyclones.
Le and Yoon [36] compared the performances of single-inlet and
four-inlet cyclones using the Discrete Phase Model (DPM) for particles
and RSM for the gas phase. While the smallest average cut-off diameter
was determined for a four-inlet cyclone, the lowest average Euler num-
ber was obtained for the single inlet cyclone.
Brar and Elsayed [5] presented sensitivity analysis followed by
multi-objective optimization. The different locations of the main inlet
top surface with respect to the secondary inlet top surface, different
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Powder Technology 384 (2021) 82–99
Table 1
Literature table.
Author(s) Year Comments
Winfield et al. 2013 Winfield et al. showed that the single inlet cyclone has a
lower cut-off diameter than multi inlet (triple inlet)
cyclone, but because of have a more stable vortex air
core, lower pressure drops occur in the multi inlet
cyclone.
Siadaty et al. 2017 Double inlet cyclone has higher pressure drop and
particle separation efficiency than single inlet. While
collection efficiency and pressure drop increase with
inlet velocity, decrease with temperature.
Brar and Elsayed 2017 Euler Number, cut-off diameter and collection efficiency
have been found out in 30 different combinations of
independent variables via Large Eddy Simulations. Then,
they performed single objective and multi-objective
optimization studies using genetic algorithm. They
reported that the ratio of the inlet cross-sectional areas
and flow rates are very important factors in determining
the performance in two-inlet cyclones.
Safikhani et al. 2018 Safikhani et al. Reynolds Averaged Navier-Stokes
(RANS) equations with Reynolds Stress Turbulence
Model (RSM) solved by using finite elements on the
SIMPLE pressure correction algorithm for the
performance of one, two and three tangential inlet
cyclones. They reported that triple inlet cyclone has
smaller cut-off diameter and pressure drop than other.
In addition, the triple inlet cyclone has less turbulent
kinetic energy distribution, which will result in less
noise in the cyclone and pipes.
Le and Yoon 2020 Le and Yoon compared the performances of single-inlet
and two four-inlet cyclones using RSM and Discrete
Phase Model (DPM) for turbulent flow and particle
tracking, respectively. They reported that while the
conventional four inlet cyclone has smaller cut-off
diameter, the conventional single inlet cyclone has
smaller Euler number. They also said that the four inlet
cyclones are better performance than single inlet
cyclones.
heights of secondary inlet duck with square cross-section shape, and
different volume flow rates for the secondary inlet were examined in
the scope of multi-objective optimization. Euler Numbers, cut-off diam-
eters, and collection efficiencies were determined for 30 different condi-
tions by using numerical simulations with Large Eddy Simulations. Their
CFD simulations provided the new findings for the flow pattern in both
the inlet and dustbin sections in the multi-inlet cyclone. The impact of
using the apex cone at the inlet of the dust box on the performance of
the gas-cyclones was studied by experiments and CFD simulations
[50,51]. It was found that the presence of an apex cone leads to an in-
crease in collection efficiency.
The present study considered the effects of inlet cross-sectional
shapes in double-inlet cyclones using different primary and secondary
inlet shapes. The effects of five different inlet cross-sectional shapes, in-
cluding circle, ellipse, rectangle, square, trapezoid, are studied for
double-inlet gas cyclones using CFD with the RSM. The computational
grids consist of hexahedral elements. In this study, for all cases, the
apex cone was embedded in the dust box as a useful internal part in
terms of cyclone performance [50,51]. In addition, the inlet cross-
section has been found to have an effect on the pressure drops and
the collection efficiencies.
2. CFD modeling
As pointed out before, the CFD technique has been widely used
to assess the effects of cyclone geometry on gas flow behavior
[6,10,30,43,52]. In this study, RSM combines with the Reynolds average
Navier-Stokes (RANS) has been used for flow simulation in the
cyclone [6,10,32,33,42,43,46,52–63] due to its high precision and low
computational cost.
N.U. Babaoğlu, F. Parvaz, S.H. Hosseini et al. Powder Technology 384 (2021) 82–99

Fig. 1. (a) General view of gas cyclone [7], (b) cyclone dimensions, (c) computational grid.

Table 2
Dimensions of cyclone geometries.

Dimension Length (m) Dimension ratio (dimension/D)

Circle Ellipse Rectangle Square Trapezoid Circle Ellipse Rectangle Square Trapezoid

Body diameter, D 0.07200 1.00000

Gas outlet diameter, Dv 0.03200 0.44444
Cone tip diameter, Df 0.01850 0.25694
Dust bin diameter, Db 0.10000 1.38889
Apex cone diameter, Dc 0.03600 0.50000
Inlet height of main inlet, Hm 0.02791 0.03319 0.03600 0.02474 0.02857 0.38769 0.46103 0.50000 0.34360 0.39675
Inlet width of main inlet, Wm 0.02791 0.02347 0.01700 0.02474 0.02857 0.38769 0.32600 0.23611 0.34360 0.39675
Inlet height of secondary inlet, Hs 0.00733 0.00872 0.00946 0.00650 0.00750 0.10184 0.12110 0.13133 0.09025 0.10422
Inlet width of secondary inlet, Ws 0.00733 0.00617 0.00447 0.00650 0.00750 0.10184 0.08563 0.06203 0.09025 0.10422
Body length, L 0.15500 2.15278
Gas outlet length, Lv 0.10000 1.38889
Dust bin length, Lb 0.20000 2.77778
Length of top of main inlet to cyclone roof, Lt 0.00554 0.07700
Cone tip height, Hf 0.20000 2.77778
Apex cone height, Hc 0.03120 0.43333

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N.U. Babaoğlu, F. Parvaz, S.H. Hosseini et al. Powder Technology 384 (2021) 82–99

Fig. 2. View of inlets cross-sectional shapes.

Table 3
Grid independent test.

Total number of cells Static pressure drop Total pressure drop

575,857 1092.90 952.09

658,555 1083.24 948.99
764,020 1087.15 930.37
954,508 1113.82 963.67
Difference (%)a 2.75 3.46
a
The percentage difference between the coarsest and the finest grid.

Table 4
The position of stations of cyclones.

Station S1 S2 S3 S4 S5 S6 S7 S8 S9

Z/Da 0.75 1.0 1.25 1.5 1.75 2 2.25 2.5 2.75

a
Measured from cyclone roof.

2.1. Gas phase

Here the gas is air with a density of ρ = 1.225 kg/m3 and dynamic
Fig. 3. Tangential velocity profiles at station S4 for four different grids.
viscosity of 1.7894 × 10−5 kg/(m. s). The airflow in the cyclone is typi-
cally in the turbulent regime. The continuity and Reynolds Averaged
Navier Stokes equations for the airflow analysis are expressed as,
empirical constants σk, C1, and C2 in Eq. (3) are, respectively, 1, 1.8,
∂ui and 0.6.
¼0 ð1Þ
∂xi The transport equation for the dissipation rate is given as,

∂ui ∂u 1 ∂P ∂ ui ∂
2 "
 # !
þ uj i ¼ − þv − Rij ð2Þ ∂ε ! ∂ε ∂ ν t ∂ε ε ∂u ε2
∂t ∂xj ρ ∂xi ∂xj ∂xj ∂xj þ uj ¼ νþ ε
−Cε1 Rij i −Cε2 ð5Þ
∂t ∂xj ∂xj σ ∂xj k ∂xj k

where xi, ui , P, ν and Rij are, respectively, position vector, mean velocity
vector, mean pressure, gas kinematic viscosity, and Reynolds shear
stress. However, the effect of gas turbulence was taken into account in In this equation, k ¼ 12 u0i u0i is the turbulence kinetic energy, and the
the analysis with the discrete random walk (DRW) model. constants σε, Cε1 and Cε2, respectively, are 1.3, 1.44, and 1.92.

2.2. Turbulence model

2.3. Discrete phase model

The RSM is used to evaluate turbulent stresses [36]. That is,

The particles used in this study are assumed to follow the Rosin-

   Rammler distribution. The particle size ranges from 0.01 to 12 μm
∂ ∂ ∂ vt ∂ ∂u j ∂ui
Rij þ uk Rij ¼ R ij − R ik þ R jk were defined in a hundred diameter bins. The particle density is 2800
∂t ∂xk ∂xk σ k ∂xk ∂xk ∂xk
    ð3Þ kg/m3. These particles were injected normal to the inlet surface through
ε 2 2 2
−C 1 Rij − δij K −C 2 P ij − δij P − δij ε the cyclone inlet at the same velocity as the gas. Because of the possibil-
K 3 3 3 ity of particles escaping out of the dustbin, only the boundary conditions
of the bottom surface were chosen as traps. The tangential component
Here Pij is the turbulence production given as, of the reflection coefficient of walls is equal to the normal component
  [5,6,10,30,43,52]. For the tracking of the particles, the maximum num-
∂uj ∂u 1 ber of step number is 109, the step length is 5 mm and the scheme is
P ij ¼ − Rik þ Rjk i , P ¼ P ii ð4Þ
∂xk ∂xk 2 trapezoidal.
Simulations for particle tracking were carried out with the Lagrang-
In these expressions, P and vt are the turbulence kinetic energy pro- ian approach. Based on Newton's Second Law, the particle equations of
duction and the turbulence eddy viscosity. The numerical values of the motion are given as,

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N.U. Babaoğlu, F. Parvaz, S.H. Hosseini et al. Powder Technology 384 (2021) 82–99

Fig. 4. A comparison between CFD simulation results and experimental data of [65,66] for the continuous and discrete phases.

In this statement, the particle Reynolds number can be expressed as,

dxpi
¼ upi ð6Þ ! !
dt ρdp ∣u −u p ∣
Rep ¼ ð9Þ
 μ
dupi 18μ CD Re p   gi ρp −ρ
¼ ui −upi þ ð7Þ
dt 2
ρp dp 24 ρp Particle dispersion caused by turbulence in the gas phase was esti-
mated by the discrete random walk (DRW) model. The instantaneous
where, ui, upi, gi, and CD are the instantaneous gas velocity, the instanta- gas phase velocity and is expressed as,
neous particle velocity, the gravitational acceleration, and the drag coef-
ui ¼ ui þ u0i ð10Þ
ficient, respectively. The drag coefficient for spherical particles as given
by Schiller and Naumann [64] is, qffiffiffiffiffiffiffi
8 ui ¼ ς u0i 2 ð11Þ
> 24
>
> Rep ≤1
>
> Rep where, ς is a zero mean normally distributed random number with unit
< 
CD ¼ 24 1 þ 0:15 Rep 0:687 ð8Þ variance, selected after the eddy lifetime, which is expressed as,
>
> 1 < Rep ≤1000
>
>
>
: Rep T e ¼ 2T L ð12Þ
0:44 Rep > 1000

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N.U. Babaoğlu, F. Parvaz, S.H. Hosseini et al. Powder Technology 384 (2021) 82–99

Fig. 5. Tangential gas velocity profiles for the main inlet shape of (a) circle, (b) ellipse, (c) rectangle, (d) square, (e) trapezoid for different secondary inlet shapes on S4 (V = 19.5 m/s).

Fig. 6. Tangential gas velocity profiles for the secondary inlet shape of (a) circle, (b) ellipse, (c) rectangle, (d) square, (e) for trapezoid different main inlet shapes on S4 (V = 19.5 m/s).

87
N.U. Babaoğlu, F. Parvaz, S.H. Hosseini et al.
Fig. 7. Contour plots of tangential velocity for the main inlet shape of a circle and secondary inlet shapes of (a) circle, (b) ellipse, (c) rectangle, (d) square, (e) trapezoid (V = 19.5 m/s).
k cross-sectional areas for different shapes shown in Fig. 2 were consid-
T L ¼ CL
ε ered the same for both primary and secondary inlets.
where TL and CL are, respectively, the fluid Lagrangian integral time
and eddy lifetime constant.
2.4. Configurations of cyclone separators
Twenty-five different cyclone geometries were generated using var-
ious shapes of inlet cross-section, including circle, elliptical rectangle,
square, and trapezoid. Then, the CFD simulations are used, and the ef-
fects of inlet cross-sectional shape on the cyclone performance is stud-
ied. Earlier, Brar and Elsayed [5] investigated the performance of a
double-inlet cyclone with a secondary inlet cross-section area smaller
than the main inlet. In the present study, the inlet flow rates and the
inlet cross-sectional areas were determined based on the multi-inlets
gas cyclone used by Brar and Elsayed [5]. The ratio of the secondary
inlet flow rate to the primary inlet is 0.064, and the ratio of the
cross-sectional areas of the secondary inlet to the main inlet is 0.069.
Therefore, the gas velocities at the primary and secondary inlets were
set, respectively, to 19.50 and 18.09 m/s. The schematic of the cyclone
used here is shown in Fig. 1. The cyclone dimensions are presented in
Fig. 1 and Table 2. It should be noted that to fairly evaluate the effect
of the inlet cross-section shape on the CFD results of gas-cyclone, the
Powder Technology 384 (2021) 82–99
ð13Þ
Moreover, the ratio of the long side to the short side of the rectangle
inlet shape was selected from the early study of Brar and Elsayed [5].
The trapezoid inlet case was considered as an isosceles trapezoid at
which the length of the top edge is one-half of the bottom edge, and
its height is equal to the bottom edge's length. The ellipse cross-
section was an ellipse with vertical foci so that the distance between
foci is equal to the width of the ellipse.
2.5. Grid generation
One of the most critical parameters that determine the accuracy of
numerical simulations is the mesh size and element type. The
hexahedral structured grid used in the computational domain is
shown in Fig. 1. The grid-independent test is carried out using four
levels of the grid, namely, very fine, fine, medium, and coarse meshes
with the number of cells of 954,508, 764,020, 658,555, and 575,857, re-
spectively. The corresponding static and total pressure drop values are
presented in Table 3 for the different mesh sizes with an inlet gas veloc-
ity of 19.5 m/s. The tangential velocity profiles at position S4 defined in
Table 4 are presented in Fig. 3. These results show that there is a varia-
tion of 2.75% for different mesh sizes. In order to ensure the accuracy of
the results, the medium grid (with 658,555 cells) is selected for
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N.U. Babaoğlu, F. Parvaz, S.H. Hosseini et al.
Fig. 8. Contour plots of tangential velocity for the main inlet shape of an ellipse and secondary inlets of (a) circle, (b) ellipse, (c) rectangle, (d) square, (e) trapezoid (V = 19.5 m/s).
performing the subsequent simulations. In many earlier CFD studies, the
hexahedral mesh has been selected for simulating turbulent flows with
similar mesh density and was shown to lead to reasonably accurate re-
sults [5,12,36].
2.6. Solver setting and boundary conditions
Pressure-Implicit with Splitting of Operators (PISO) algorithm is
used for analyzing the coupling of pressure-velocity coupling. PRESTO!
and QUICK interpolation schemes are used in the discretization of pres-
sure and momentum, respectively. The second-order upwind scheme
was selected for discretizing the convective terms of the transport equa-
tions, including the turbulence dissipation rate, and the first-order up-
wind scheme was selected for Reynolds stresses. Convergence criteria
are set to 10−5 for the scaled residual components.
The velocity magnitude at the main inlet and secondary inlet sur-
faces is set to 19.5 and 18.09 m/s, respectively. The turbulence intensity
and equivalent length of the inlet surfaces are set to 5% and 0.00287 m,
respectively. The boundary condition at the outlet section is set as out-
flow, and all surfaces except inlets and outlet are considered as walls
with non-slip boundary condition. Fluid flow is modeled using en-
hanced wall function.
The flow residence time depends on the cyclone volume and the gas
flow rate and is calculated as,
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Powder Technology 384 (2021) 82–99
V
t res ¼ ð14Þ
Q
In this study, time steps were selected as 0.0001 s for all transient
simulations. The volume of all cyclone geometries and volumetric flow
rates are 0.002657 m3 and 0.01269 m3/s, respectively and tres time is cal-
culated as 0.21 s.
3. Result and discussion
3.1. Model validation
To validate the computational model, the cyclones operated by
Hoekstra [65] and Zhao [66] are simulated, and the CFD results are com-
pared with corresponding measured data. At section S1 (Z = 0.75D) de-
fined in Table 4 and Fig. 1 (b), the CFD predictions of tangential velocity,
axial velocity, and pressure drops for different inlet velocities are com-
pared with the corresponding measured data shown in Fig. 4. This figure
shows that the present computation model is capable of predicting hy-
drodynamics of the gas cyclones and the experimental data of Hoekstra
[65], including tangential velocity, axial velocity, pressure drops, and
collection efficiency with reasonable accuracy.
N.U. Babaoğlu, F. Parvaz, S.H. Hosseini et al.
Fig. 9. Contour plots of tangential velocity for the main inlet shape of a rectangle and secondary inlet shape of (a) circle, (b) ellipse, (c) rectangle, (d) square, (e) trapezoid (V = 19.5 m/s).
3.2. Tangential velocity
In a cyclone, the tangential velocity generates the centrifugal force
that caused the particles to move towards the cyclone wall and are sep-
arated from the gas. Therefore, the tangential velocity has an important
effect on the cut-off diameters of the separated particles. As the tangen-
tial velocity in the body of the cyclone increases, the cut-off diameter re-
duces [67]. The tangential velocity profile is composed of the inside
(forced) vortex and the outside (free) vortex. The tangential velocity
in the forced vortex approaches with the radius and reaches its maxi-
mum value and then decreases towards the cyclone wall in the free vor-
tex. The predicted tangential velocity profiles at different cyclone
sections (S1–S9) are similar to the letter M [6,66–68]. The tangential ve-
locity profiles on section S4 and tangential velocity contour for different
geometries used in this study are presented, respectively, in Figs. 5 and
6.
The tangential velocity profiles normalized by the inlet velocity ver-
sus the radius divided by the cyclone radius are presented in these fig-
ures. It is seen that the normalized velocities are in the range of
1–1.95 for all geometries studied. In addition, Figs. 5 and 6 reveals that
the effect of the secondary inlet shape on the results is smaller than
that of the main inlet geometry shape. It is also found that the highest
and lowest maximum values of tangential velocities are obtained, re-
spectively, for the rectangle and circle main inlet shapes. It should be
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Powder Technology 384 (2021) 82–99
noted that the tangential velocity affects the collection efficiency
significantly.
The tangential velocity contour plots on the plane Y = 0 for all ge-
ometries are shown in Figs. 7–11. From the central region towards the
cyclone wall, the tangential velocity increases along the radius to its
maximum and then decreases. Although the tangential velocity distri-
butions in the lower part of the cone section and dustbin are quite dif-
ferent, slight variations are observed in the upper region of the cone
and cylindrical portion of the cyclone for the twenty-five different
geometries. In summary, these figures show that the inlet cross-
sectional shape markedly affects the tangential velocity, and conse-
quently, the cyclone performance.
In the cases when the main inlet shape is trapezoid and circle, the
central vortex shape is relatively straight along the axis; however, the
vortex shape is spiral in the cone portion of the cyclone for the cases
of the rectangle, ellipse, and square main inlet shapes. This fact can af-
fect the cyclone pressure drop and also the behavior of particles, thereby
the cyclone performance.
3.3. Axial velocity
The other important parameter affecting the movement of particles
in the cyclone is the axial gas velocity. The axial velocity is a component
of the swirling flow that also affect particle separation [69]. The axial
N.U. Babaoğlu, F. Parvaz, S.H. Hosseini et al.
Fig. 10. Contour plots of tangential velocity for the main inlet shape of a square and secondary inlet shape of (a) circle, (b) ellipse, (c) rectangle, (d) square, (e) trapezoid (V = 19.5 m/s).
flow in a cyclone has two main trends. The velocity is downward close
to the cyclone wall, and it is upward near the cyclone center. The oper-
ating conditions of the cyclone and the geometric factors, such as the cy-
clone configuration and the cyclone inlet velocity, are important
parameters affecting the axial velocity in the cyclone [69].
The axial velocity profiles of the different gas inlet geometries on the
section S4 shown in Table 4 are presented in Figs. 12–13. Fig. 13 also
shows that the maximum axial velocity occurs for the Trapezoid-
Ellipse (T-E) configuration for main and secondary inlets, among all
combinations considered. It is interesting to note that the highest axial
velocity leads to the lowest cyclone efficiency. Therefore, it may be con-
cluded that the shape of the main and secondary inlets affects the cy-
clone performance, as explained hereafter.
3.4. Static pressure, pressure drop, and collection efficiency
Static pressure profiles at the section S4 reported in Table 4 are
shown in Figs. 14–15 for different inlet geometries. As was reported in
previous work [70], the lowest static pressure is observed at the center
of the cyclone, where the highest axial velocity appears, whereas the
highest static pressure occurs near the wall at which the lowest axial ve-
locity is found. These figures also show that the main and secondary
inlet shapes have a noticeable effect on the static pressure.
91
Powder Technology 384 (2021) 82–99
The contour plots of tangential velocity, axial velocity, and static
pressure at the inlet section shown in Fig. 16 are presented in Fig. 17
for the twenty-five different design geometries. When all inlet cross-
section shapes in Fig. 2 are examined, the inlet ducts are tangent to
the cyclone body. In the geometries with circle, ellipse, and trapezoid
inlet, this tangency is at a point, while for square and rectangle, the tan-
gency is along the edge. However, the circle and ellipse are tangent to
the center point; the trapezoid is tangent to the lower corner point
that causes an appearance of non- tangential in the case of the trapezoid
shape of the inlet.
When these contours are examined, it is seen that the contours for
the trapezoid inlets are not tangent; this is due to the bottom corner
of the trapezoid inlet is tangent to the cyclone body. The tangential ve-
locity contour values in the case of R-E on the plane crossing the inlets
shown in Fig. 16 has noticeable differences with the other cases. As ob-
served in this figure, the highest tangential velocity occurs in the cases
of E-R and R-T for the main and secondary inlets of the cyclone,
respectively.
In addition, the contour plots of axial velocity on the same plane are
quite different for various cases. However, the highest values of axial ve-
locity for the main and secondary inlets are obtained in the cases of E-S
and R-T, respectively. Regarding static pressure, though the highest
static pressure is observed near the cyclone wall regions, the lowest
one appears in the central axis. It should be noted that the static
N.U. Babaoğlu, F. Parvaz, S.H. Hosseini et al. Powder Technology 384 (2021) 82–99

Fig. 11. Contour plots of tangential velocity for the main inlet shape of a trapezoid and secondary inlet shape of (a) circle, (b) ellipse, (c) rectangle, (d) square, (e) trapezoid (V = 19.5 m/s).

pressure reaches its highest value in the case of R-T geometry for the Here ΔPt is the pressure drop, ρg is the gas density and Uin is the gas
main and secondary inlets. Overall, the contour plots of the static pres- inlet velocity.
sure for different cases present almost the same trends. The Stokes number is defined as,
As an important result from Fig. 17, the main and secondary inlets af-
fect the tangential velocity, axial velocity, and the static pressure. 2
ρp dp U in
The collection efficiency and pressure drop are two main functions Stk ¼ ð18Þ
in the design of cyclones that should be optimized together [71]. Pres- 18μ g D
sure drop, which is an important parameter in determining the perfor-
mance of cyclones, is calculated with the following equation for multi
where dmean is the particle cut size, ρp is the particle density, μg is the gas
inlet cyclones,
viscosity, and D is the cyclone diameter.
1 n : The Stokes number represents the dimensionless particle diameter.
Δpt ¼ : ∑ minðiÞ ⁎pt,inðiÞ −pt,out ð15Þ When the cut-off diameter is used, the corresponding Stokes number
mout i¼1
becomes an important performance parameter of the cyclone. The cal-
: :
where mout , minðiÞ , pt, out, pt, in(i) are mass flow rates at the outlet and inlet culated Euler number and Stokes number based on the CFD results are
i, total pressures at outlet, and inlet i, respectively. The continuity equa- shown in Fig. 18 and Table 5 for twenty-five geometries. As can be
tion requires, seen in Fig. 18, the lowest Euler and Stokes numbers are related to C-S
: :
and R-E geometries, respectively. It should be noted that with a de-
∑i minðiÞ ¼ mout ð16Þ crease of Euler number, the pressure drop decreases; while, with a de-
crease of Stokes number, the collection efficiency increases. In general,
The Euler number (dimensionless pressure drop) is defined as, the rectangle main inlet results in the low Stokes number and the
high Euler number, while the main inlet with the shape of circle leads
ΔP t to the opposite results compared to the rectangle one.
Eu ¼ 1 2
ð17Þ
2 ρg U in The separation efficiency of a cyclone is related to the collection effi-
ciency that is defined as,

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N.U. Babaoğlu, F. Parvaz, S.H. Hosseini et al. Powder Technology 384 (2021) 82–99

Fig. 12. Axial gas velocity profiles for the main inlet shape of (a) circle, (b) ellipse, (c) rectangle, (d) square, (e) trapezoid for different secondary inlet shapes on S4 (V = 19.5 m/s).

Fig. 13. Axial gas velocity profiles for the secondary inlet shape of (a) circle, (b) ellipse, (c) rectangle, (d) square, (e) trapezoid for different main inlet shapes on S4 (V = 19.5 m/s).

93
N.U. Babaoğlu, F. Parvaz, S.H. Hosseini et al. Powder Technology 384 (2021) 82–99

Fig. 14. Static pressure for the main inlet shape of (a) circle, (b) ellipse, (c) rectangle, (d) square, (e) trapezoid for different secondary inlet shapes on S4 (V = 19.5 m/s).

Fig. 15. Static pressure for the secondary inlet shape of (a) circle, (b) ellipse, (c) rectangle, (d) square, (e) trapezoid for different main inlet shapes on S4.

94
N.U. Babaoğlu, F. Parvaz, S.H. Hosseini et al. Powder Technology 384 (2021) 82–99

Fig. 16. View of the plane of the across trapezoid inlet section.

Fig. 17. Contour plots across the inlet sections at the plane defined in Fig. 16 for gas velocity of V = 19.5 m/s.

The mass of the trapped particles
Collection efficiency ¼
The total mass of injected particles
The collection efficiencies for different inlet shapes are evaluated,
and the results are shown in Fig. 19. The CFD results reveal that the
highest collection efficiency with the value of 93.27 % , is obtained in cy-
clone with the Rectangle-Ellipse (R-E) inlet geometry.
4. Conclusions
ð20Þ
The cyclone structures have been widely used to separate particles
from gas in many industrial applications. In the present study, different
inlet cross-sectional shapes of the multi-inlet gas cyclone were studied
by a validated CFD model. Twenty-five different cyclone geometries
were created in a double inlet cyclone with five different inlet cross-
sectional shapes, namely, circle, ellipse, rectangle, square, and trapezoid.

95
N.U. Babaoğlu, F. Parvaz, S.H. Hosseini et al. Powder Technology 384 (2021) 82–99

Fig. 17 (continued).

Fig. 17 (continued).

96
N.U. Babaoğlu, F. Parvaz, S.H. Hosseini et al. Powder Technology 384 (2021) 82–99

Fig. 17 (continued).

After evaluating the CFD results, the following main findings were
obtained, Table 5
The Euler and Stokes Numbers of cyclones.
• It was observed that the inlet cross-sectional shape affects the tangen-
Main inlet Secondary inlet Abbreviation Euler Stokes
tial velocity, axial velocity, and static pressure, and consequently, the cross cross section number number
cyclone performance. section shape shape (x103)

Circle Circle C-C 5.665 2.688

Circle Ellipse C-E 5.701 2.889
Circle Rectangle C-R 5.784 2.555
Circle Square C-S 5.638a 3.054
Circle Trapezoid C-T 5.706 2.772
Ellipse Circle E-C 6.473 1.383
Ellipse Ellipse E-E 6.502 1.279
Ellipse Rectangle E-R 6.515 1.016
Ellipse Square E-S 6.464 1.005
Ellipse Trapezoid E-T 6.486 1.064
Rectangle Circle R-C 6.848 0.762
Rectangle Ellipse R-E 6.798 0.689a
Rectangle Rectangle R-R 6.816 0.759
Rectangle Square R-S 6.825 0.731
Rectangle Trapezoid R-T 6.895 0.750
Square Circle S-C 5.974 1.318
Square Ellipse S-E 5.997 1.278
Square Rectangle S-R 6.020 1.504
Square Square S-S 5.976 1.633
Square Trapezoid S-T 5.997 1.738
Trapezoid Circle T-C 5.755 1.964
Trapezoid Ellipse T-E 5.717 2.139
Trapezoid Rectangle T-R 5.812 1.811
Trapezoid Square T-S 5.785 2.204
Trapezoid Trapezoid T-T 5.825 1.927
a
Fig. 18. Graph of cyclone Euler and Stokes numbers. The best values of each column.

97
N.U. Babaoğlu, F. Parvaz, S.H. Hosseini et al.
Fig. 19. Graph of collection efficiencies.
• The CFD results showed that the highest tangential velocity could be
found in the cyclone with the Rectangle-Rectangle (R-R) inlets.
• The lowest Stokes number was found with the value of 6.89 × 10−4 for
the Rectangle-Ellipse (R-E) configuration. This means that the highest
collection efficiency was obtained by the Ellipse (R-E) configuration.
• The lowest Euler number was obtained with a value of 5.638 for the
Circle-Square (C–S) configuration, i.e. the lowest pressure drop was
obtained by the Circle-Square (C–S) configuration.
• The circle main inlet shape leads to the lower and higher values of
Euler and Stokes numbers, respectively, compared to the other config-
urations.
• The rectangle main inlet shape leads to the higher and lower values of
Euler and Stokes numbers, respectively, compared to the configura-
tions.
• The dimensions of the inlet shapes used in the present study can affect
the CFD results; thus, an optimization study by considering different
side ratios for the inlet shapes is suggested for a future study.
Declaration of Competing Interest
The authors declare that they have no known competing financial
interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influ-
ence the work reported in this paper.
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