Effect of vertical vibration and particle size on the solids hold-up and mean bubble behavior in a pseudo-2D fluidized bed

The solids hold-up and mean bubble behavior in a vertically-vibrated fluidized bed are experimentally studied in the present work by Means of Digital Image Analysis (DIA) for four different powders with Geldart classifications A, B and A/B. The bed has a small thickness (i.e. pseudo-2D bed) and operates in bubbling regime subject to a wide range of gas superficial velocities, vibration frequencies and vibration amplitudes. Mean parameters of the bed and the bubbles, such as solids hold-up, bubble fraction, bubble number density and bubble diameter and velocity, are characterized here by averaging the results over time and space. The results reveal that vibration of the bed promotes a confinement of the bubble path to the central section of the bed. This bubble confinement is more intense for the smallest particles tested and for high vibration strengths and creates two different bubble regimes in the bed. In particular, close to the distributor, the bubble velocity decreases when increasing the vibration amplitude of the bed vessel because bubbles are smaller and less confined, and they behave like isolated bubbles. The behavior of bubbles changes when they are far from the distributor, where the interaction between bubbles becomes greater due to their bigger size and the confinement of bubbles induced by vibration. This confinement promotes coalescence of bubbles. It is shown that consideration of these two different regimes of bubble dynamics allows to shed light on understanding the apparently contradictory results encountered in the literature regarding bubble behavior in bubbling vibrated fluidized beds. (C) 2016 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.