Volume-3, Issue-6, December-2013, ISSN No.

: 2250-0758
International Journal of Engineering and Management Research
Available at: www.ijemr.net
Page Number: 15-20

Effect of Float Design on the Performance of Rotameter using

Computational Fluid Mechanics
Rakesh Joshi1, S.S.Jolly2, Bikram Jit Singh3
1,2,3
Maharishi Markandeshwar University, Sadopur- Ambal, Haryana, INDIA

ABSTRACT float remain same with small change in input. And reason of
The objective of present work is to study the Effect this by changing mass flow rate up to small range, it all just
of Rotameter float design on the performance characteristics because of Drag force offered by the float inside the
of Rotameter. For this Study Analysis were made on Rotameter. Computational fluid dynamics help to visualized
Rotameter using fluid visualization technique called drag force offered by the fluid.
computational fluid dynamics. Gambit and Fluent software
were used for geometry modeling and analysis of Rotameter. Keywords; Rotameter, CFD, Drag force, Flow
Experiments were conducted to know the behavior of float visualization.
inside the Rotameter by changing mass flow rate. After
conducting the experimental it is concluded that position of

I. INTRODUCTION
It is very well known that Variable-Area type flow
meter, or Rota meter, is one of the most cost-effective and
reliable flow measurement instruments. Due to its quality
to withstand high pressure, temperature .Because of its
simple principle of operation, it can be used for flow
measurement, for both gas and liquid.
The first variable area meter with rotating float was
invented by Karl Kueppers in Aachen in 1908. This is
described in the German patent 215225.A Rotameter
consists of tapered tube made up of glass with a 'float’, as
shown in figure (1). The design of float may be very
depending upon the application. The flow enters from the
bottom against the gravity. Float inside the glass tube; try to that, it is easy to see that any changes in the fluid
to moves in downward direction Due to its weight, but the properties caused by temperature or pressure will affect the
liquid entering from bottom ends tries to move the float in float's position. This is particularly true for compressible
upward direction. As float try to move downward so gases.
equilibrium of forces set up inside the glass tube. And The performance of Rotameter can enhance by
arrow marked in float inside the glass tube gives stable optimizing drag force offered by float inside the glass tube.
reading and an indication is obtained, by the graduated Drag force is sometimes called ‘Air Resistance’ or ‘fluid
scale attached parallel to axis of glass tube. resistance ‘which act in the direction opposite to the
There are many factors influencing Rotameter, direction of flow. This drag force is responsible to slow
performance are easily understand by example, by down the motion of body against the direction of flow. For
decreasing the density of fluid and weight of float then it example if discharge at the inlet to the to the direction of
will required less flow rate to move the liquid against fluid flow. Suppose mass flow rate inside the Rotameter
gravity and vice versa. In addition vary from 15m3/sec to 17 m3/sec and float do not moves
upward ‘means zero change in float pointer’ then given

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system is failed, for required operating condition. that
means Float position is same for different mass flow rate.
What is the reason behind this .three might me different
reason, high density of fluid, weight of float is more, or
drag force is more. Weight and density cannot be changed
for given case, but drag force can be reduced by varying
float design. Similarly if discharge change from 15m3/sec
to 16 m3/sec and float starts to move up and down very
quickly and giving unstable reading then again it is
problem for observer to read down the reading.
CFD, Gambit and Fluent code can be used for this
study.CFD is a computational technique used to determine
the characteristic of fluid flow inside the geometry.
Sometime it is very difficult to visualize the flow inside
the pipe or complex geometry.cfd is helpful to visualize
velocity and pressure inside each and every point in the
geometry.cfd is widely used in many engineering
application.
The present case study involves analysis of
Rotameter using Gambit and Fluent software for creating
mesh and analysis, and making calculation of drag force
experienced by different float design, and compare the
CFD result with experimental data. Experiments done on
Rotameter and reported in the literature are used for
validation.
The following subsections describe present study
in more details. First, a summary of other research work in
the field of drag force analysis related to Rotameter design,
is presented to put this study into perspective with the
other work available in the open literature.
bluff body using plasma actuators”aim is to remove the
drag of simplified car geometry using surface dielectric
barrier discharge actuators. Experiments were conducted
in a wind tunnel for a low Reynolds number (6.7*105) with
the Ahmed body reference (rear slant angle of 25°, zero
yaw angle). pulsed actuation).
There were no articles in the literature found regarding
the use of CFD software to analyze the rotameter, what are
the various factor responsible
for the performance of rotameter? However, there has been
work done some researcher to use cfd for visualizing the
flow and calculate the forces velocity distribution inside
the flow.
The scientific contributions of the paper are:
• CFD Modeling of Rota meter.
• Analyzing the configuration and compare analyzing result
with experimental result.
• Compare pressure, velocity, streamline distribution and
drag force results with for different operating condition.
• Visualize the flow inside the rotameter.
III. EXPERIMENTAL SET UP
Experimental set up consists of cad model of and
setup of rotameter as shown in Figure: 3 assembled in
coiling tower. All the experimental work is done with this
setup with different flow rate and

II. PREVIOUS RESEARCH &

EXPERIMENTS
A lot of research work has been performed on drag
force calculation of different bodies. According to Fu-
Hung Hsu, Roger L. Davis in 2010, conducted study on
“New drag reduction design for tractor-trailers using CFD”
and concluded that tractor have a higher drag coefficient
then other vehicle due to their bluff body shape .In this
study researcher investigates new add-on device in the
form of humps to reduce the base-drag of tractor-trailers
by using different ADD on device invented to reduce the
drag. From this study it has been clear that drag force
directly depends upon the shape of the object. This is the
theory used for validation in this part.
In 2010, Len Malinin, Alexey Borovkov conducted a
study that 60% of freight energy use in the US,
aerodynamic drag is responsible for 65% of the total
Discharge is calculated by measuring the volume of
energy expenditure for a heavy truck at 70 miles per hour.
measuring tank per unit time. and after conducting the
Reducing the aerodynamic resistance of a heavy truck can
study it has been concluded that shape of the float inside
significantly improve its fuel economy, and concluded that
rotameter directly depends upon the performance of
efficiency of truck affected by changing the design of
rotameter.
body.
And during the experimental study it is concluded
According to study conducted by V. Boucinha, R.
that shape of float directly affect the performance of
Weber, A. Kourta In 2011,on “Drag reduction of a 3D
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rotameter. Then cfd analysis is used For analyzing drag
force using CFD modeling software, gambit is used for
designing the fluid inside the rotameter.
A two dimension model of rotameter is designed
using Gambit and boundary conditions were applied to the
geometry after meshing the geometry for this project.
Simulations of the rotameter are carried out using fluent as
analysis software

4.1 Geometry
Figure: 4 show the 2 dimensional model of
rotameter. In this section model of rotameter is made using
gambit as modeling tool by considering appropriate
coordinates, domain size, and type of commercial code.
After modeling the two dimensional model of Rota meter
all the boundary and flow condition are applied to the
model.
The input parameter like velocity and density is
given to ratameter input. These input parameter are then
used for calculating relevant performance such as pressure
drop, velocity distribution, drag force contour of velocity
and pressure

IV. METHODOLOGY ADOPTED

CFD methodology is adopted for calculating drag
force offered by the fluid inside the rotameter Figure:4
shows the stepwise procedure of Computational fluid
dynamics.

4.2 Physics
After modeling the model flow condition and
fluid properties are applied to the Geometry. This phase is
covered in this Figure: 6 shows that different boundary
condition and operating condition applied to the model.
Table 1 implies the different boundary condition applied to
the rotamter .Purple colour is the inlet of flow, red is outlet
of flow and white represents the boundary wall of
rotameter and float.
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 4.4 Solve
After applying the entire boundary and operating
condition, file is converted, and send to analysis phase. In
this phase of analysis, different solver and model is used to
analysis the result of Rotameter. Checking of convergence,
calculation and result is generated in this phase. Figure: 7
as shown in implies that after applying all the boundary
condition and operating condition to the model during
analysis phase. all the solution checking and convergence
of solution is done in this phase.
All the reports and graph generation are done in this phase.

V. OBSERVATION TABLE FOR

CALCULATING VARIOUS FORCE
4.3 Mesh OFFERED BY FLOAT INSIDE
After modeling all the model in gambit Mesh can ROTAMETER
be generated by selecting any commercial codes from the
group of different code (Gridgen, Gambit, etc.) Figure: 6
implies the two dimensional modeling of Rota meter with
given float design and mesh of Rotameter.

Table 2 shows the magnitude of various forces

offered by the float inside the rotameter for given model.
Along with force different coefficient can be easily solve
in this phase.
4.6 Post-processing

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 In this phase all the work of visualization done,
(for example Contour, animation of fluid).
Figure 9 and 10 shows the variation of pressure
and velocity of the fluid inside Float geometry. The value
at the lower end described the range of pressure and
velocity.
Figure: 11 implies the experimental result ,doted
arrow marked in graph, represent that, there were no
change in the float position by varying discharge
from 11 to 12,similarly second and third arrow represent
that, position of float remain same in second and third
arrow, by changing the discharge from 14 to 16 and from
22 to 25.
5.1 EXPERIMENTAL RESULT
So from experimental data it is concluded that
sensitivity i.e. (change in output by small change in output)
of Rotameter depends upon the position of float by
changing input of flow.
So it is question always in the mind why there is no change
in output by changing input? From experimental data
following result comes.
Drag force offer by the float: it means that, if float inside
the does not move by changing discharge, means it offer
large drag force i.e. (resistance force offer by the
float).drag force is responsible for slowing down the
movement of float inside Rotameter.
Shape of the float. Shape of the float affects the drag
force, higher drag force, less movements of float inside the
float. Aerodynamic shaped body offer less drag force as
compare to other one.
5.2 CFD RESULT
From the cfd simulation of rotmeter drag force
offer by the float inside the rotameter is calculated using
different float design.
Figure 9, 10 Represents the pressure, velocity
and, streamline contour of fluid inside rotameter.colour
intensity inside the fluid of rotameter.
Table 2 represents the fluent’s calculation of drag force
and all type of force offer by the float inside the rotameter.
VI. CONCLUSION
Drag force inside the rotameter directly affects
the sensitivity of the rotameter.
From Experimental work it has been concluded
that accuracy of rotameter depends upon the float design.
Flow characteristics, like velocity pressure has been
analyzed inside the rotameter.
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 To improve the sensitivity of rotameter, float having less
drag force can be selected.

VII. FUCTURE SCOPE

• Drag force for different liquid medium can be calculated
using above methodology.
• Sensitivity can be improved by changing different float
design.

REFERENCES
[1] Fu-Hung Hsu, Roger L. Davis, “New drag reduction
design for tractor-trailers using CFD”Int. J. of
Aerodynamics, 2010 Vol.1, No.2, pp.192 – 205
[2] Len Malinin, Alexey Borovkov, Igor Voynov,
Bronislav Pyak, Vyacheslav Pyak” : Modelling of
efficiency of aerodynamic devices on a tractor-trailer” Int.
J. of Aerodynamics, 2010 Vol.1, No.2, pp.206 – 219.
[3] V. Boucinha, R. Weber, A. Kourta”Drag reduction of a
3D bluff body using plasma actuators” Int. J. of
Aerodynamics, 2011 Vol.1, No.3/4, pp.262 - 281
[4] E. Bideaux, P. Bobillier, E. Fournier, P. Gillieron, M.
El Hajem, J.Y. Champagne, P. Gilotte, A. Kourta ”Drag
reduction by pulsed jets on strongly unstructured wake:
towards the square back control” Int. J. of Aerodynamics,
2011 Vol.1, No.3/4, pp.282 – 298.

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