EFFECT OF MESH SIZE AND COLLISION MODELING OVER EULERIAN-LAGRANGIAN LIQUID FLUIDIZED BED HYDRODYNAMICS

Fluidized beds have many applications, and CFD-DEM
simulations are powerful tools to understand particle-fluid interactions at a
smaller scale. The present work aimed to evaluate the soft sphere and MP-PIC
algorithms’ effectiveness at simulating a bi-dimensional liquid fluidized bed with
different mesh refinements. First, simulations without particles were proceeded
to find the optimal mesh refinement to represent the fluid. Then, in simulations
with particles, the solving algorithm was varied for each mesh, then bed porosity
was estimated and compared Richardson-Zaki equation (R-Z). Results showed
that fluid is best represented when the element of the mesh is about the size of
the particle, while bed porosity best results are with element size between 2.0
and 2.7 times the particle size.