Numerical Simulation Investigation of Vortex Finder Depth Effects on Flow Field and Performance of Desanding Mini-Hydrocyclones

Abstract

Sand has significant side effects on oil production and offshore platform processing system. Mini-hydrocyclones is a very important component to desanding operation system. However, even a slight modification on the structural parameter of hydrocylone might result in a significant influence on its flow field and separation efficiency. So, analysis on flow field characteristics and separation efficiency of the mini-hydrocyclones can help to optimize its structural parameters. In this work, five mini-hydrocycloness were designed, and flow patterns and particle separation ability of a mini-hydrocyclones with various vortex finder depths were investigated through Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) simulation method. The research shows that vortex finder depth has a significant influence on the separation function partition of mini-hydrocyclones. The deeper the vortex finder depth is, the larger the volume of pre-separation area, the smaller the volume of the main separation area and the bigger the energy consumption are. These characteristics are disadvantage to improve separation performance of hydrocyclone. Ratio (L0/D) of vortex finder depth (L0) to the hydrocyclone cylinder diameter (D) is about 1.0.