Date of Award:

5-2012

Document Type:

Thesis

Degree Name:

Master of Science (MS)

Department:

Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering

Committee Chair(s)

Robert E. Spall

Committee

Robert E. Spall

Committee

Michael C. Johnson

Committee

Aaron Katz

Abstract

Butterfly valves are commonly used to control fluid flow inside of piping systems. A butterfly valve typically consists of a metal disc formed around a central shaft, which acts as its axis of rotation. As a butterfly valve is rotated open, fluid is able to more readily flow past the valve. A butterfly valve’s design is important to understand and is commonly characterized by its own performance factors. How a butterfly valve will perform, while in operation at different opening angles and under different types of flow, is critical information for individuals planning and installing piping systems involving the valve.

Performance factors common to a butterfly valve include the following: pressure drop, hydrodynamic torque, flow coefficient, loss coefficient, and torque coefficient. While these values can usually be obtained experimentally, it is sometimes not feasible or possible to calculate the performance factors of some butterfly valves. Another method wherein butterfly valve performance factors can be obtained is by using Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) software to simulate the physics of fluid flow in a piping system around a butterfly valve. This study sought to compare experimental and simulated CFD performance factors of a 48-inch diameter butterfly valve for various valve openings and flow conditions in order to determine the validity of using CFD to predict butterfly valve performance factors.

It was found that for mid-open butterfly valve positions (30-60 degrees), CFD was able to appropriately predict common performance factors for butterfly valves. For lower valve angle cases (10-20 degrees), CFD simulations failed to predict those same values, while higher valve angles (70-90 degrees) gave mixed results.

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43980af0ef6e1ab7f1e5805f90365e5a

Comments

This work made publicly available electronically on February 20, 2013.

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