Chemical Engineering & Technology, Vol.29, No.1, 124-129, 2006
Study on evaporating characteristics of a coaxial two impinging-stream concentrator
Based on the coaxial two impinging-streams principle, a new device for solution concentration was built and studied theoretically and experimentally. The experimental study focused on the effects of inlet air temperature, inlet air flow rate, and accelerating pipe length on the volumetric evaporative coefficient of the impinging-stream concentrator (ISC). The results show that the ISC has a relatively high volumetric evaporative coefficient, which increases with higher inlet air flow rates and higher inlet air temperature, and the ISC with a shorter accelerating pipe is more efficient. A theoretical model was suggested based on the consideration of mass, heat, and momentum transfers between liquid droplets and hot air. The concentration Process of a sucrose solution in the ISC was simulated using the model and the results were compared with the experimental results, which indicated that the suggested model is reliable with a maximum relative error of less than 6.6%.