Numerical and Experimental Study of Inner Flow and Hydraulic Performance of the Mixed-Flow Pump With Low Specific Speed

Mixed flow pumps are very suitable for market demand with the rapid development of urbanization, especially for low specific speed mixed flow pumps which has been widely used in various fields [1–3]. In this study, the calculations of the incompressible 3D internal flow of the mixed-flow pump with low specific speed was carried out by using CFD technique based on the N-S equation coupled with the standard k-ε turbulence model at different flow rates. The hydraulic performances of the mixed-flow pump as well as the inner flow were analyzed in comparison with the corresponding experimental data. Meanwhile, the static pressure and relative velocity distribution on blades were studied at low, design as well as large flow rates, respectively. Finally, it can obtain that the predicted pump performance curves based on numerical simulation have a good agreement with the experimental results, which verify the numerical method applied in this work accurate in a certain extent. Furthermore, the results also provide some references to hydraulic forces and pressure fluctuation analysis and the performance improvement for the mixed-flow pump design.