Design of a novel flat-cloth airway in powder tank based on Taguchi optimization

Abstract

The fluidized bed is a key structure in the field of material transportation and is widely used in special automobile and construction powder transportation. A novel flat-cloth airway structure for powder unloading was proposed based on the traditional fluidized bed in this study. To analyze the uniformity of the velocity distribution ( Vu) in the fluidized bed and clarify the interaction mechanism between the geometric structure of the fluidized bed and airflow, 16 geometric structures of the fluidized bed for powder unloading were designed. Different schemes of the fluidized bed were numerically calculated by computational fluid dynamics, and the advantages of each scheme were analyzed by the Taguchi method and multiple regression. The length of the annular vortexes at the inlet of the airways becomes shorter than before as the number of airways increases. Airway height ( H), airway angle ( θ) and airway arc length ( L) exert statistically significant effects. Specifically, H (Delta = 6.45 rank =1) has the greatest effect on signal-to-noise ratios, L (Delta = 2.60 rank =2) has the second greatest effect and θ (Delta = 1.82 rank =3) has the least effect. The optimal combination of geometrical parameters of the fluidized bed is 15 mm H, 51° θ and 200 mm L.