Solid particle erosion is a challenging problem in the oil and gas industry. Erosion is a complex process, especially with the presence of small particles and in complex geometries such as elbows in series. Erosion due to the solid particle is affected by different parameters, such as particle size, particle trajectories, superficial gas and liquid velocity, and flow structure. The majority of the erosion experiments that have been published were on a single elbow where the flow is fully developed flow before entering the first elbow. However, the flow is not fully developed when the flow exits the first elbow, especially when the distance between the two elbows is short. Thus, the particle trajectory, particle impact angle, and speed change, which changes the erosion magnitude and pattern. In order to evaluate these changes, experimental data is needed which is not available currently in the literature for solid particle erosion in elbows fitted in series. The purpose of this study is to investigate the effect of particle size in 3-inch (76.2 mm) pipe diameter elbows in series with curvature radius to pipe diameter ratio (r/D) equal to 1.5. Two different test configurations were created with a distance between the elbows to the pipe diameter ratio (L/D) equal to 2 and 12. The presented erosion experiments were conducted with 300, 75, and 25&nbsp;µm particle sizes in gas-liquid-sand annular flow. The wall thickness loss of the elbows has been measured using state of the art non-intrusive fix-mounted, temperature compensated, ultrasonic transducers. Experimental results showed the maximum erosion magnitude in the second elbow was less than the first elbow by one order of magnitude compared to the first elbow with 75 and 25&nbsp;µm particle sizes and 2D distance between the two elbows. In addition, the experimental results showed that higher erosion was obtained with 300&nbsp;µm particle size where the erosion in the second elbow is lower than the first elbow with the 12D distance. With respect to the maximum erosion ratio of the second elbow to the first elbow, the results showed that the ratio decreases with increasing the particle size. A higher ratio was obtained with 25&nbsp;µm compared to 300 and 75&nbsp;µm particle sizes with the 12D distance between the two elbows. The reason for this result is that the erosion in the first and second elbow is approximately similar as smaller particles are more affected by turbulence of the gas core becoming more dispersed than the larger particles.&nbsp;Keywords: Solid particle erosion; Multiphase flow; Elbows in series; Particle size effect

Experimental Study of the Effect of Particle Size on Erosion of Elbows in Series for Annular Gas-Liquid Flows

Paper Proceedings: https://asmedigitalcollection.asme.org/FEDSM/FEDSM2021/volume/85284

ASME 2021 Fluids Engineering Division Summer Meeting (FEDSM2021)

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