EXPERIMENTAL STUDY ON TWO-PHASE FLOW IN A HORIZONTAL IMPACTING T-JUNCTION

The present work reports the results of an experimental study that has been carried out at Dipartimento Energia of Politecnico di Torino on a horizontal impacting T-junction, with aligned outlet pipes, which are perpendicular to the inlet pipe (impacting T); the inner diameter of all the pipes is 10 mm. Single-phase flows of air and water as well as two-phase flow at ambient temperature and pressure up to 2.4 bar have been investigated: the maximum tested air and water mass flux in the inlet pipe was 64 kg/(s m2) and 3500 kg/(s m2) respectively, with different splitting of flow rates in the two outlet branches. The experimental study consists of two steps: in the first one the single-phase flow in the junction has been studied, the pressure drops have been measured while varying the splitting of the flow rate through the two branches and the pressure loss coefficients in the junction have been evaluated; the second step concerns the two-phase flow through the impacting junction at different inlet mass flow rates and qualities and for different splitting of the flow rates in the branches. The two-phase flow patterns occurring in the inlet and branch pipes have also been observed and the phase separation phenomena have been analyzed.