JP Journal of Heat and Mass Transfer

© 2021 Pushpa Publishing House, Prayagraj, India

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http://dx.doi.org/10.17654/HM...
Volume …, Number …, 2021, Pages … ISSN: 0973-5763

THERMAL SIMULATION OF A LIQUID-AIR JET PUMP

Vijay W. Bhatkar
Marathwada Mitra Mandal’s College of Engineering
Pune, M.S., India
e-mail: vijaybhatkar@mmcoe.edu.in

Abstract

Ejector is an important component in the jet refrigeration system. A jet

pump or an ejector uses primary fluid flow as a drive fluid to entrain
secondary fluid. The fluid can be compressible or incompressible fluid
which can be used in either single phase ejector or double phase
ejector. Experimental setup is designed and developed to perform
various trials for different applied pressures. The high-pressure water
is pumped to the ejector to entrain the secondary liquid at atmospheric
condition. Area ratio is kept constant to calculate flow ratio and
pressure ratio. Different loss factors such as diffuser loss factor,
mixing loss factor, primary nozzle loss factor, suction loss factors
are calculated experimentally and validated with computational
fluid dynamics (CFD) simulation results along the ejector. CFD
simulations are performed to understand the flow behaviour and
various performance parameters such as velocity contours, pressure
contours and volume fraction along the ejectors and found in line with
the experimental values.

1. Introduction

Most predominant ejectors are cylindrical with single type nozzle

Received: October 22, 2020; Revised: June 16, 2021; Accepted: July 6, 2021
Keywords and phrases: ejector, nozzle, primary and secondary fluids, flow ratio, pressure
ratio, diffuser and nozzle loss factors.
2 Vijay W. Bhatkar
because of its simplicity and design. The high-pressure liquid stream is
driven to relatively high velocity fluid flow with the help of converging
nozzle. Ejectors with compressible fluid stream are called as supersonic
ejectors where the primary fluid flow is extended to a choked state. Ejectors
are used in industries for creating vacuum or pumping the fluid using the
transfer of momentum. Ejectors may be in single stage or multiple stage
depending on the applications required. Due to its simple construction,
no moving parts and no vibration in the system are needed. Besides less
maintenance is needed. Ejectors are used in buildings for air conditioning,
refrigeration, heating purpose, automotive air conditioning, navy,
aeronautics, space applications, gas turbine, fluid mixing and separation, fuel
cells, natural gas recompression and desalination plants. Primary fluid flow
having high pressure and temperature enters the convergent-divergent nozzle
and develops a low-pressure zone around its outlet and suction of secondary
fluid takes place at lower pressure. In such a state of condition, only primary
nozzle is sensitive towards the inlet conditions; consequently, mass flow
rate for primary fluid flow stream becomes maximum and lowers the exit
static pressure. The primary fluid stream having higher velocity carries the
secondary fluid flow by transferring some parts of energy by momentum
exchange principle. The flow of secondary stream accelerates up to sonic
conditions when inlet and outlet conditions of pressure are favorable while
mixing in the ejector and the flow rate of secondary stream becomes
maximum. The mixing of both primary and secondary fluids should be
completed before the end of mixing chamber of the jet pump. A large
number of shock waves are generated when the mixed fluid stream goes
through the mixing tube and continues till the entrance of the diffuser. At the
entry of the diffuser, the flow becomes subsonic with increase in pressure. In
the diffuser, the flow pressure increases to balance the applied back-pressure
by further deceleration [1, 2]. As both the flow conditions are choked, it is
called as a double choked or an on-design condition. When the back-pressure
becomes higher than the critical value, the secondary flow is no longer
choked (off-design operation) and the flow reduces as the back-pressure
increases up to the ejector failure point [3].
 Thermal Simulation of a Liquid-air Jet Pump 3
2. Literature Survey

Ismagilov et al. [4] worked on the efficiency improvement of liquid jet

ejector by the application of rotating nozzle, diffuser and vertical pipe in a
jet pump. They found that the application of agitator unit increases the
ejector efficiency and reduces the power consumption. The agitation unit
can be used in the existing structure of jet pump and also can be installed
separately. For the different operating conditions, they developed the
procedure to find the performance parameters for various conditions. Neve
[5] investigated the performance of double phase ejector and found the
relation between geometrical parameters with performance parameters and
developed a computer program in BASICA which gives the cross-check
between the prediction by computer and experimental results and showed a
good agreement. Noronha et al. [6] studied the experiment on double phase
model and used linear regression to find different loss factors including
nozzle, throat and diffuser. Cunningham [7] studied the ejector by proposing
the theoretical governing equations for an ejector having liquid as a primary
fluid and liquid-vapor as a secondary fluid. The model used both liquid/
liquid and liquid/gas for operating the ejectors to calculate the overall
efficiency and pressure ratio. Lear et al. [8] developed one-dimensional
mathematical model for a jet pump with a mixing region. Thermodynamic
properties of R134a were determined at various salient points along the
ejector for different input pressure. Balamurugan et al. [9] studied the
hydrodynamic distinctiveness of a jet pump by using air as the suction flow
while water as a primary fluid to be entrained. They performed the
experiment by taking ejector configuration like nozzle diameter varying from
0.004m to 0.012m, throat diameter varying from 0.02m to 0.04m, throat
length from 0.05m to 0.1m, and velocity of nozzle from 27m/s to 210m/s.
Maximum entrainment rate can be obtained for the area ratio of
approximately 10 where pressure drops rapidly. They developed the semi-
empirical model to predict the performance of ejector. The model predicted
gave better results with the investigated results. Huang et al. [10] developed
the empirical correlation for the ejector design by taking 15 ejectors with
4 Vijay W. Bhatkar
R141b. ESDU [11], an advisory institution, releases the documents of
one-dimensional theory for planning and presentation of jet pumps.
Hatzlavramidis [12] proposed a new approach for modeling pumps for
multiphase flow. Chen et al. [13] studied the ejector used in the refrigeration
systems for achieving desired temperature. Ejector refrigeration systems
were classified as conventional ejector refrigeration systems, advanced
refrigeration systems and combined refrigeration systems along with the
most favorable performance of ejectors. Singhal et al. [14] validated the
CFD results for ejector and found the entrainment ratio as 0.57 and
compression ratio 3. Jet ejectors are used in process industries due to reliable
and minimum operating cost but less efficient than compressors. Winoto et
al. [15] developed an efficient ejector to find out the optimum performance
at operating conditions by finding nozzle loss coefficients experimentally.

3. Experimental Setup

An ejector is like a converging-diverging nozzle. Figure 1 shows the

actual experimental setup used in the research work. The data points
collected across the ejector are primary fluid (water) flow rate (Qp),
secondary fluid (air) flow rate (Qs), inlet pressure at the entry of ejector (Pi),
secondary pressure (Ps) and diffuser pressure (Pd), respectively. Ejector and
converging-diverging nozzle design are the main parts of research work.
Water tank is used to store the water, foot valve is used to avoid priming the
pump repeatedly and long bend is used to connect the pipe joint. Centrifugal
pump with high pressure will deliver the water to jet pump. Vacuum gauge is
provided to measure the pump inlet pressure. Globe valve is used to vary the
flow rate and ball valve is used to control the flow. Pressure gauges are used
to measure the gauge pressure across the pump and ejector. Anemometer is
used for measurement of suction air velocity. Reducer is used for joining the
pipe for varying section. Water enters as a primary fluid and mixed with the
air through the suction tube.
 Thermal Simulation of a Liquid-air Jet Pump 5

Figure 1. Actual experimental setup.

In the experiment, the primary flow is independent input parameter

which can be varied from time to time as per our requirement. Bypass valve
is used to control the flow of water. The suction part of the ejector is opened
to atmosphere. In the two-phase flow, air is taken as a suction fluid. A tank
500  500  500mm3  is filled with water. High-pressure pump is used to
deliver the water to the jet pump. Air is sucked in by jet pump and delivered
along with water to the same tank. Non-return foot valve is used to avoid
priming repeatedly. Strainer is attached next to foot valve for the separation
of solid particles or dirt present in the water. Pressure gauges are used at the
inlet and outlet of the centrifugal pump to measure the pressure. At the exit
of pump, a tee joint is provided for the arrangement of bypass line. A ball
valve is used for the safety of the test rig which acts as a flow controller by
varying the valve manually. This bypass line is returned back towards the
tank in which it releases the water. The measurement of actual water flow
rate (Qp) is calculated experimentally using a jar and a stop watch. All the
parameters are noted down thrice for repeatability of results. Anemometer is
used for measurement of the suction velocity. The product of suction
velocity with the diameter of suction tube gives the suction flow rate (Qs).
At the inlet and outlet of jet pump, pressure gauges are used to measure inlet
pressure at the entry of ejector (Pi) and pressure at the exit of diffuser (Pd).
6 Vijay W. Bhatkar
4. Results and Discussion

Suction flow rate (Qs) is the multiplication of area and velocity of flow.
Primary flow rate is calculated as the time taken to fill one litre of water jar.
Flow ratio is the ratio of suction flow rate to the primary flow rate. Mixing
loss factor (Km), suction loss factor (Ks), primary nozzle loss factor (Kp),
diffuser loss factor (Kd), pressure ratio () and flow ratio are calculated for
applied pressure. Ejector efficiency is calculated as the multiplication of
pressure ratio and flow ratio at respective pressure. The geometry of nozzle
is created by using CATIA V5 (R21). After modeling, meshing is done
for CFD simulation as shown in Figure 2. Meshing model is imported in
ANSYS workbench for thermal analysis of jet ejector. First automatic
method of meshing is applied to generate mesh. Meshing errors are
checked before applying solver controls. The mesh obtained initially was
unstructured. Thus, mapped face meshing is done for good quality meshing.
Velocity magnitude contours are shown in Figure 3 which shows maximum
and minimum velocities along the length of nozzle. Static pressure contours
are shown in Figure 4 which shows maximum and minimum static pressures.
Pressures at various positions along the length of nozzle can also be
described by these contours. Volume fraction streamlines are shown in
Figure 5 where mixing of air and water took place. At suction side air enters
and from nozzle entrance water enters into the jet ejector.

Figure 2. Nozzle geometry.

Thermal Simulation of a Liquid-air Jet Pump 7

Figure 3. Velocity contours.

Figure 4. Pressure contours.

Figure 5. Volume fraction streamlines.

8 Vijay W. Bhatkar
5. Conclusion

In the experimental research work, several parameters of the ejector that

affect the performance of the ejector are studied and following conclusions
are made:

(1) The mixing length should be 5 to 10 times of mixing diameter (Dm).

If the mixing length is more, pressure losses will be more and if it is too
short, then proper mixing of both the fluids will not be observed.

(2) Diffuser should have divergence angle (3 to 7) to avoid the
separation of flow.

(3) Experimental values of loss factors calculated are primary nozzle

loss factor (Kp) 0.06, suction loss factor (Ks) 0.04-0.1, mixing loss factor
(Km) 0.07-0.1 and diffuser loss factor (Kd) 0.0289.

(4) Experimental values of loss factors and simulation results calculated

at particular pressure are within 10%.

(5) Velocity and pressure contour profiles are having the same profiles
as the experimental values at various points along the ejector.

Acknowledgements

The author is thankful to Aquachill Systems India Private Limited for

financially supporting the project. The author is also thankful to Mr.
Mukund Ranade, ASHRAE fellow for giving input for conducting
experimentation. The author is thankful to Dassault Systemes La Foundation
for funding the project titled “Virtual design and simulation of
environmentally friendly combined flow evaporative condenser for cold
storage plants”.

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 Thermal Simulation of a Liquid-air Jet Pump 9
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