Statistical Analysis of Turbulent Two-Phase Pipe Flow

Abstract

The statistical characteristics of turbulent two-phase pipe flow have been evaluated. In particular, the autocorrelation functions and the power spectral density functions of the axial turbulence fluctuations in the liquid phase were determined. The high frequency content of the power spectrum in bubbly two-phase pipe flow was found to be significantly larger than in single-phase pipe flow and, in agreement with previous studies of homogeneous two-phase flows (Lance et al., 1983), diminished asymptotically with a characteristic −8/3 slope at high frequency. The power spectrum and the autocorrelation functions in two-phase pipe flow, although distinctively different from those in single-phase pipe flow, were insensitive to the local void fraction and the mean liquid velocity when plotted against wave number and spatial separation, respectively. Finally, the dissipation scale, determined from the shape of the autocorrelation function, indicated that the turbulent dissipation rate in two-phase pipe flow was significantly greater than that in single-phase pipe flow.