Flow and Losses in Regenerative Flow Compressors: Detail CFD analysis using Fluent

Regenerative flow compressors are dynamic machines capable of producing high heads at very low flow rates. With comparable tip speed, they can produce heads equivalent to that of several centrifugal stages from a single rotor. They have found many applications for duties requiring high heads at low flow rates but the compression process is usually with very low efficiency which is their major drawback. Even though there are several factors that can be considered to improve the efficiency of these machines in this book various models will be developed with different blade and flow channel geometries to investigate their effect on performance. Details of CFD analysis on the models of the compressor, using a commercial software ¿FLUENT¿, are presented. And based on simulation results of the different models a blade and channel geometry that gives significant improvement on performance is suggested.