A Soft-Measuring Method to Predict Turbulence Parameters in Fluid Delivery Systems

A convective heat transfer problem is solved for estimation of unknown turbulence parameters in a fully developed turbulent circular pipe flow based on temperature measurements obtained at several radial locations in the stream. The problem of turbulent forced convection for solid-liquid two phase fluid is simplified as a quasi-single-phase model, and the turbulent Prandtl number at chosen positions in the single-phase heat transfer equation is modified and used as the estimated parameter for the parameter-estimation problem. The solid content in the pipe can be determined through the relationship between solid particles and turbulent Prandtl number eventually. Comparisons between the estimated values and experimental data showed that this method was reliable for predicting components in solid-liquid fluid delivery systems, the maximum relative error of solid holdup can be limited within 8%.