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 in industrial applications to control the internal flow of both compressible and incompressible fluids. A butterfly valve typically consists of a metal disc formed around a central shaft, which acts as its axis of rotation. As the valve's opening angle is increased from 0 degrees (fully closed) to 90 degrees (fully open), fluid is able to more readily flow past the valve. Characterizing a valve's performance factors, such as pressure drop, hydrodynamic torque, flow coefficient, loss coefficient, and torque coefficient, is necessary for fluid system designers to account for system requirements to properly operate the valve and prevent permanent damage from occurring. This comparison study of a 48-inch butterfly valve's experimental performance factors using Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) in an incompressible fluid at Reynolds numbers ranging approximately between 105 to 106 found that for mid-open 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. (152 pages)
Checksum
43980af0ef6e1ab7f1e5805f90365e5a
Recommended Citation
Del Toro, Adam, "Computational Fluid Dynamics Analysis of Butterfly Valve Performance Factors" (2012). All Graduate Theses and Dissertations. 1456.
https://digitalcommons.usu.edu/etd/1456
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Comments
This work made publicly available electronically on February 20, 2013.