Effect and optimization of bed properties on water-in-oil emulsion separation

What is it about?

Three different coalescing materials (PP, PTFE and glass fibers) and stainless-steel were weaved into packing to test the capacity of water-in-oil emulsion separation in the same coalescer structure. By the glass fiber as material, orthogonal design method was used to optimize the fibrous bed length, the porosity and the settlement length to improve coalescer performance, and the optimized results were assessed by the range analysis and variance analysis to understand the impact of various factors on the separation performance and their inherent rules. These rules can provide necessary help for the design and optimization of coalescer.

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Why is it important?

There was a stable point in the separation process, at which point the change in flow velocity had little effect on the separation efficiency and the fibrous bed coalescer can maintain high separation efficiency. In the bed properties, the length of the fibrous bed had a significant effect on separation efficiency and flow velocity at the stable point, while the porosity only had a significant effect on flow velocity at the stable point. The settlement length had no significant effect on both. The optimal conditions for using glass fibrous bed in experiment were as follows: the bed length of 400mm, the porosity of 0.77 and the settlement length of 360mm. And its separation efficiency was 77% and the stable point flow velocity was 30m/h at the stable point.

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