College of Biological and Chemical Engineering

Department of Chemical Engineering

Fluid Machines for Chemical Engineers

Chapter 1 : Introduction
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 Chapter topics to be covered

 1. Introduction

 1.1 Identify objective of this chapter

 1.2 Define fluid Machines & Know types of fluid

Machines in Chemical Process Industries

 1.3 Basic Concepts and Terminologies

 1.4. Application of Fluid Machines

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 1.1 Objectives
 At end of this chapter students’ shall be able to:

Identify the purpose of learning fluid machines and

their applications in process industries,

Recognize the role of chemical engineers with

respect to fluid machines,

Determine the specific work, total head, total

pressure and useful power for fluid machines.

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 1.2 Definition

Fluid Machines: devices that are used to raise, transfer or

compress liquids or gases.
Fluid machines can be pumps, fans, blowers and
compressors.
 Pumps: fluid machines that are used to transport
liquids by increasing the mechanical energy of liquids.

 Fans, blowers and compressors: fluid machines that are

used to transport gases by increasing the mechanical
energy of gases.
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 Cont’d
 Fans: fluid machines that are used in ventilating
working stations, introducing air into reactors or
exhaust gases at low pressure.

 Blowers: machines that are used to compress gases at

low pressure to supply air or exhaust gases.

 Compressor: machines that are used to compress

gases at high pressure to supply air combustion
processes.

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 Fluid Machines in Chemical Process Industries

 In chemical process industries, it is usually

required to increase the mechanical energy of
fluids.

 Mechanical energy includes potential energy,

velocity energy, pressure energy and losses
due to fluid friction.

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 Industrial application of fluid machines
 Pumps are used to transport process and service liquids.

Fans are used in at relatively low pressure

ventilating buildings aerating workstations air-cooled heat exchangers

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The Chemical Engineer is involved in:-
 Selecting Selecting
 Installing
 Testing
 Operating &
Testing Operating
 Maintaining fluid machines V
Maintaining

 To do these effectively the engineer has to know:-

 the system where the fluid machine is to be used
 the operating principles
 capability and limitations of the different types of fluid
machines.
 the properties of fluids that has to be transported.
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1.3 Basic Concepts and Terminologies
 Mechanical Energy: Is the total energy of a flowing fluid that can
be directly converted to work.
It is the sum of potential, kinetic, pressure and friction loss
energies.
 Specific Work, Y:
It is the useful energy (work) that the machine transfers or can
transfer to the flow medium per unit mass of the fluid. The SI unit of
specific energy is J/kg or m2/s2.
 The total head, H:
It is the specific energy transferred to the fluid divided by the
gravitational acceleration.
 is the measure of the amount of useful energy (mechanical energy
or work) of the flow medium.
H= Y/g; Where:- H=Head, Y= Specific Work, g =gravitational acc.
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 Cont’d
 The head of a pump is the specific energy that the pump can
transfer to the flow medium (liquid) under specified condition
divided by the gravitational acceleration.
The Total Pressure: Used for fans and positive displacement
Pt=ρY
 Useful Power, N :- the rate at which useful energy is transferred
to the flow medium. The SI unit of power is kJ/s
The useful power is calculated using Equations:
N  m Y
Since mass flow rate is the product of density and volume flow rate.

N  QY N = QPt

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 Cont’d

Remark: All of them are the measure of the energy.

Specific Work Total Head

Equivalent
Term

Total Pressure
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 Cont’d
 Pulsation:-
The capacity of some fluid machines is not uniform, it
varies with time. Pulsation is this non uniformity of the
capacity fluid machines.
 Priming:-
Some pumps require that the air in the suction line
should be replaced by liquid before they start
pumping. The process of replacing the air in the suction
pipe with liquid is known as priming.
 Loss of Head:
is loss of the useful head of the flow medium due to
fluid friction or the turbulence that occurs when the
fluid passes an obstruction, sudden contraction or
sudden expansion, etc.
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 Pressure
 Absolute pressure (static) of a fluid on a surface is the
normal force exerted by the fluid per unit area of the surface.
 Gauge Pressure is the pressure above the atmospheric
pressure.
 Absolute Pressure = Gauge Pressure + Atmospheric Pressure
 Vacuum Pressure is the pressure below the atmospheric
pressure.
Absolute Pressure = Atmospheric Pressure - Vacuum Pressure

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  Mass balance for a steady state process (no accumulation)
Rate of mass input = Rate of mass output

  1Q1   2Q2 ;
m   1 A1 c1   2 A2 c2
m
For incompressible fluid

A1c1  A2 c2
  mass flow rate(kg/s)
Where :-Q=Volume flow rate [m3/s], m
C = velocity of the flow medium(m/s), A= Flow Area(m2)
A1 A2

Input output
Process

Figure: The continuity equation

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 1.4 Application of Fluid Machines

 it is a common practice to move process liquids and utilities

from one place to another in which different unit operations
are involved in between.
 E.g. In wine production
 fermented wine is moved from tank to tank to separate the
clear wine from the unwanted settled mass.
 Fermented wine from the cellar is filtered and sent to tanks in
the filling room.
 From this temporary storage tank it should be pumped to the
filling machine.
This movement of liquid requires energy at each stage.

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 Pump operation

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 cont’d
 The amount of specific energy required by a flow
medium

where:- Y= The specific energy

P2 - P1= The static pressure difference between the suction
and discharge
c1, c2 = The average flow velocities at point 1 and 2
respectively.
e = the elevation difference between 1 and 2.
F = specific energy loss due to fluid friction
 = Density of the flow medium at the flow condition
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 Cont’d
The energy loss due to fluid friction in simple pipes is the sum of
the friction losses in the straight pipe and minor losses in pipe
fittings like elbows, valves and losses due to sudden contraction and
sudden expansion.

𝒄𝟐
Fmin, pipe= (∑Ki)
𝟐

straight pipe friction loss and the minor losses

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 Fans

 There are various industrial processes that involve movement

of air and other gasses without significant increase in the static
pressure.
 Ventilation and air conditioning, feeding of reactors, removal
of exhaust gases, feeding of drying air are some of these.

 The machines used to transfer mechanical energy to gases at low

discharge pressure are known as fans. The calculation of total
pressure (specific energy requirement) and power requirement of
systems for moving gasses with fans is similar to pumps.

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 Example 1.1
 Water at 200C should be pumped from Tank 1 to Tank 2 at the rate of
120m3/hr. All pipes in the system are with diameter of 0.1541m. The
total length of the straight pipe is 45m. Determine the specific
mechanical energy, head and power that should be transferred to the flow
medium to move the water. (Use water at 200C ρ =998.2 kg/m3 , μ=1.005
*10-3 Pa. s; and pipe roughness, ε=4.6 *10 -5 ,k of 900 elbow =0.64)

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 Example 1.2

 A fan is used to deliver 1300m3/min (measured at the inlet)

of methane. The specific energy requirement of the system is
calculated to be 5.4 kJ/kg. The inlet temperature and
pressure are 12oC and 100 kPa, respectively. Determine the
total pressure and the useful power that should be transferred
to the flow medium.

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 Compressors and blowers
 Compressed air is one of the most common utility in process
industries.
e.g. it is used for most automatic control systems and for cleaning,
pneumatic conveying.
 In liquefaction of gasses and process that depend on them (like
separation) compression is a very important step.
 Various gas phase reactions that take place at high pressures are
also core in some chemical production, like ammonia production.

Types of Ideal
Compression

Isothermal Adiabatic Compression

Compression Heat is not added to the system or
22 T=const removed from the system
 Adiabatic Compression
 The adiabatic compression specific energy for compressing a
gas from a suction temperature T1 and pressure P1 is given by
Equation

Yad= The adiabatic compression specific energy requirement

R= Universal gas constant = 8314.3 J/kg K, T1= The suction temperature
M= Molecular weight of the gas to be compressed, P2= Final pressure
P1=Initial pressure, P1/P2= compression ratio
k=ratio of specific heats( for monatomic gases, its value is essentially constant
at 1.667 and many diatomic gases, including air, have a specific heat ratio of
about 1.4 at room temperature.)

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 Isothermal Compression
carried out under T=const

For the same compression ratio and flow medium,

isothermal compression requires less compression
energy than adiabatic compression.

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 Example 1.3

 It is required to compress 0.02 k mol/s of air from 1 atm

and 250C to 6 atm. Calculate the specific energy
requirement and the compression power.(take Mwt of air
=28.9 kg/kmol

(i) for adiabatic compression

(ii) for isothermal compression.

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