Numerical Analysis of Flow Field Characteristics in Three-Z-shaped Ultrasonic Flowmeter

摘要

The flow field characteristics in U-typed bend has been extensively studied for transit time ultrasonic flowmeters designing, but for the flowmeter with three-Z-shaped round pipe there is still lack of corresponding research.This paper presents a computational fluid dynamics (CFD) approach for modeling of the three-Z-shaped ultrasonic flowmeter and studying of internal fluid field characteristics based on Reynolds stress model (RSM).The fluid velocity profile in the three ultrasound path is obtained using CFD and secondary flow in cross section also is analyzed.The simulation results show that the internal flow fields in the flowmeter are not fully developed turbulence with asymmetric axial velocity distribution and dramatic changes along the flow direction, and there are obvious secondary cross flows on theirs cross-sections.The CFD simulations provide useful insights into the flow field associated with ultrasonic flowmeters design.