Experimental Study and Analysis on Wear Characteristics of Mining Pumps Transporting Solid-Liquid Two-Phase Flows

Abstract

The use of mining pumps to transport solid-liquid two-phase flows results in solid particles causing varying degrees of wear in the flow-passing components of the pump. In this study, a computational fluid dynamics analysis was performed employing SST k-ω turbulence and discrete phase models to predict the wear characteristics of small two-stage mining pumps. The wear rates of the flow-passing components (first- and second-stage impellers and guide vanes) of the pump were simulated considering three solid-particle sizes under three flow conditions (low flow, rated flow, and high flow), with the highest wear rate occurring on the surfaces of the first-stage guide vane in the low-flow condition. Subsequently, a pump wear experiment was performed using an experimental pump with parameters and structure similar to the numerical model at the pump’s rated flow. The experimental results were compared to numerical results obtained using the same numerical method and wear model. The wear characteristics shown in the numerical and experimental results were consistent with each other. Thus, the numerical method used in this study can accurately predict the wear of flow-passing components in a mining pump, and the method was found to be suitable for the prediction of wear characteristics in mining pumps.