A NUMERICAL STUDY OF CAKE FORMATION IN 2-D CROSS-FLOW FILTRATION

The dewatering of an accelerating fibrous suspension is studied here i n a curved converging channel with moving walls; the upper wall is con sidered permeable to the fluid phase only. Interphase momentum transfe r is expressed by Forchheimer's formula to account for inertial effect s. Two different models for the particulate stress of the fibre phase have been investigated, namely power-law and fluid-like descriptions. The volume-average two-phase flow equations were solved using a commer cially available flow solver A number of simulations were conducted in which the velocity of the walls were varied from 10-13 m/s at a fixed inlet suspension velocity of IO m/s. The fluid-like model predicted i ncreasing web solidity for increasing wall-to-inlet suspension speed d ifference, this is qualitatively similar to the experimental results r eported in the literature. The power-law model was insensitive to thes e changes.