Prediction of Wall Friction for Fluids at Supercritical Pressure with CFD Models

Abstract

In this paper, the STAR-CCM+ CFD code is used in the attempt to reproduce the values of friction factor observed in experimental data at supercritical pressures at various operating conditions. A short survey of available data and correlations for smooth pipe friction in circular pipes puts the basis for the discussion, reporting observed trends of friction factor in the liquid- like and the gas-like regions and within the transitional region around the pseudo-critical temperature. For smooth pipes, a general decrease of the friction factor in the transitional region is reported, constituting one of the relevant effects to be predicted by the computational fluid- dynamic models. A limited number of low-Reynolds number models is adopted, making use of refined near-wall discretisations as required by the constraint y+ < 1 at the wall. In particular, the Lien k-E and the SST k-W models are considered. The values of the wall shear stress calculated by the code are then post-processed on the basis of bulk fluid properties to obtain the Fanning and then the Darcy-Weisbach friction factors, basing on their classical definitions. The obtained values are compared with those provided by experimental tests and correlations, finding a reasonable qualitative agreement. Expectedly, the agreement is better in the gas-like and liquid-like regions, where fluid property changes are moderate, than in the transitional region, where the trends provided by available correlations are reproduced only in a qualitative way