Numerical and experimental study of internal flow field for a carbon fiber tow pneumatic spreader

Abstract

In this study, a three-dimensional (3-D) mathematical model of a fiber pneumatic spreader was successfully developed in the physical phenomena of the internal flow field by a far-field treatment at boundary conditions. The 3-D numerical analysis was carried out on incompressible fluid flows in the pneumatic spreader by using finite volume method combined with the k-epsilon turbulence model which solves Reynolds-averaged Naiver-Stokes equations. Characteristics of the flow field in the spreader at different service conditions are investigated by velocity and pressure distributions. Comparisons of numerical results with measured velocity and pressure distributions were made to determine the accuracy of the employed method. A good agreement was found in both qualitative and quantitative analysis. Fibers were spread on 1:1-scale model of the pneumatic spreader at various fiber transporting rates and air flow rates. Photography techniques were simultaneously used to record the procedures of fibers spread. The carbon fiber tow was easily spread out at service conditions. The performance was better than prior studies in one-dimensional orifice formulation. The results revealed details of the fiber spreading processes. Agreement among those results validated the assumptions inherent to the computational calculation and gave confidence to more complex geometries as well as flow fields. In other words, the use of numerical analysis in the internal flow field was useful for the fiber pneumatic spreader design.