B. Hage et J. Werther, THE GUARDED CAPACITANCE PROBE - A TOOL FOR THE MEASUREMENT OF SOLIDS FLOW PATTERNS IN LABORATORY AND INDUSTRIAL FLUIDIZED-BED COMBUSTORS, Powder technology, 93(3), 1997, pp. 235-245
Although fluidized bed reactors at elevated temperatures (up to 1000 d
egrees C) have a wide field of application, there is still a lack of m
easurement techniques for the key entities: local solids volume concen
tration and velocity. In this paper, a measurement technique which rel
ies on the measurement of the local dielectricity is described. Throug
h the application of a guard circuit and specially designed probes, an
extremely high resolution and stability has been achieved. The system
has been successfully operated under high-temperature conditions in a
circulating fluidized bed where the local time-averaged solids volume
concentration was as low as 0.1%. Measurements of local time-averaged
particle velocities and solids volume concentrations in laboratory an
d industrial fluidized bed combustors demonstrate the wide applicabili
ty of the measurement system. (C) 1997 Elsevier Science S.A.