An investigation of forces on a representative surface in a pulp flow through rotating and non-rotating grooves

Softwood pulp flow in rotating and non-rotating grooves is numerically simulated in the present study to investigate the fluid flow and the forces acting on a representative surface mounted in the groove. The viscosity of softwood pulp with various consistencies is available from the measurements reported in the literature providing the opportunity to examine the effects of fiber consistency on the velocity and pressure distribution within the groove. The simulations are carried out in OpenFOAM for different values of gap thickness, angular velocity and radial positions from which the pressure coefficient and shear forces values are obtained. It is found that the shear forces within the gap increase linearly with the angular velocity for all fiber consistencies investigated and in both grooves. Also, this behavior can be successfully predicted by modeling the gap flow as a Couette flow in a two-dimensional channel. Meanwhile, a more detailed analysis of the flow kinetic energy close to the stagnation point using Bernoulli’s principle is carried out to provide a better understanding of the pressure coefficient variation with angular velocity in the non-rotating groove. A comparison of pressure coefficients obtained numerically with those calculated by considering the compression effects revealed that the comparison effects are dominating in the pulp flow within the groove.