Analysis of Cavitation Flow Performance in Centrifugal Pump Using OpenFOAM

Abstract

Abstract In order to explore the cavitation mechanism and cavitation cloud development process of centrifugal pump, OpenFOAM7.0 open-source software was used to simulate the unsteady cavitation gas-liquid two-phase flow of IS125 centrifugal pump under different flow conditions. Based on the flow field simulation results, the relationship between the flow rate of the centrifugal pump and the NPSHr was predicted and compared with the experimental data. The comparison showed that it is feasible to use OpenFOAM software to simulate the cavitation flow of centrifugal pump under design condition. Under the design condition, when NPSHa was different, the distribution of cavitation clouds in each blade channel was asymmetric. With the decrease of NPSHa, cavitation clouds continue to develop downstream in the impeller channel and appear on the blade pressure surface. Regardless of whether cavitation occurred in the centrifugal pump, the pressure coefficient showed periodic pulsation, and the pulsation number of the impeller in a rotation cycle was equal to the number of blades of the impeller. The research results can provide an effective open-source software calculation method for centrifugal pump performance prediction.