Design Of The General Simulation Platform And Viscosity Impact On Rotameter

Rotameter is a kind of typical variable area flow meter, which has been widelyused in the field of flow measurement in industry. It has the advantages such as simplestructure, scale intuitive, high reliability, easy operation and maintenance, as well aslow pressure loss. It is the key point that many scholars have been focus on anefficient way to search for the law of viscosity influence on rotameter and optimizethe transducer structure of rotameter in order to improve its performance. The abovetwo aspects were studied in the paper.Three research methods were presented of viscosity impact on rotameter. Firstly,from the perspective of industrial application, the variable viscosity experimentalresearch of orifice rotameter was carried out in the variable viscosity flow experimentdevice. The experimental research method of viscosity impact on orifice rotameterwas proposed—polynomial fitting density and viscosity correction based on theexperimental data. The general correction formula of DN50orifice rotameter wasgiven. Secondly, through the analysis of fluid mechanics theory, the computationalmodel of orifice rotameter in viscous flow field was set up. The theoretical calculationmethod of viscosity impact on orifice rotameter was proposed—viscous medium flowcalculation based on the similar model equivalent rule. Thirdly, the simulationresearch was conducted after verified the accuracy of CFD model which explored theviscosity impact mechanism from the perspective of flow field. By the contrast of thethree methods in viscosity impact on orifice rotameter, the applicable condition ofeach method was given.Through the analysis of working principle of orifice rotameter, the simulationand design platform based on CFD was developed. After completion of a largenumber of real flow experiments and two dimensional simulations, the numericalsimulation model for different diameter sensors were defined. On this basis, thedesign was completed under the use of Visual Basic software and Microsoft Accessdatabase. The platform could be used to achieve the existing sensor structureoptimization and design of the new flow range sensor structure.The research methods in this paper could be extended to the research of othertypes of flow meters.