Avoid Cavitation in Centrifugal Pumps Whether you are threatened with low NPSH or have to pump a liquid containing

dissolved gases, consider measures at the pump as well as within its process setting Mouafak A. Zaher, UNITEC Applied Technology Institute The importance of adequate fluid pressure at the suction side of a centrifugal pump is well known, as is the complication posed by dissolved gas in the process fluid. Less widely known are some of the practical steps that the user can take to avoid problems, when writing the pump specification and when laying out the system of which the pump is an element. A quick review of centrifugal pump design and operation is a helpful starting point. The purpose of a centrifugal pump is to convert the energy of the motor or other prime mover, first into the kinetic energy (velocity) of the fluid being pumped and then into pressure energy. The velocity is developed in the rotating impeller, whereas the conversion to pressure takes place within the stationary diffuser. A centrifugal pump is one of the simplest (and most ubiquitous) pieces equipment in a typical chemical-process plant. On the other hand, the fluid motions inside the pump are complex. The velocity vectors are not parallel to the walls of the fluid passages, and appreciable secondary motions occur near the impeller discharge and in the diffusing section. The details of the true fluid motions are still not well understood. The process liquid enters the pump near the impeller axis, and the rotating impeller sweeps the liquid out the ends of the impeller blades at high velocity. As liquid leaves the impeller eye, a low-pressure area is created, causing more liquid to flow toward the inlet. Because the blades are curved, the fluid is pushed in a tangential and radial direction by the centrifugal force. Figure 1 is a simplified cutaway view of a centrifugal pump, showing the liquid movement. In high-pressure pumps, a number of impellers may be used in series, and the diffusers following each impeller may contain guide vanes to gradually reduce the liquid velocity. For lower-pressure pumps, the diffuser is generally a spiral passage, known as a volute, with its cross-sectional area increasing gradually to reduce the velocity efficiently. The volute constitutes the casing of the pump. The amount of energy given to the liquid is proportional to the velocity at the tips of the impeller vanes. The faster or bigger the impeller, the higher will be the velocity of liquid at the tip and consequently the greater the energy imparted to the liquid. The kinetic energy of the liquid is then harnessed by creating resistance to the flow. The volute decelerates the liquid, and its velocity is converted to pressure according to Bernoullis principle.

In terms of their head, power and throughput, centrifugal pumps are designed to operate at a point of best efficiency. The head, power, and throughput at best efficiency, often called the nominal values, are expressed in terms of a pump characteristic (or performance) curve. Such a curve is generated by tests performed by the pump manufacturer. Sometimes a pump may operate continuously at a throughput slightly above or below nominal. In such cases, the actual operating point is called the rated or guarantee point if the manufacturer specifies this throughput in the guarantee. In a given process setting, by plotting the process head curve and pump curve together, we can determine where the pump will operate on its curve, and what changes will occur if the head curve or the pump performance curve changes. It is unusual to operate a pump continuously at a capacity at which the efficiency is much below the optimal value. Apart from the unfavorable economics, the pump may be severely damaged by continued offdesign operation. Many manufacturers issue pump selection charts, which show performance data for their commercial line of pumps. If pumping requirements can be met by one of these, there is usually a considerable saving over the cost of a custom-designed unit. Two things necessary To assure troublefree operation and long service life of centrifugal pumps, two conditions are necessary: A specified minimum continuous flow must always be maintained during operation The pump must not cavitate (see below) over its entire operating range When a pump is operated at an inadequate flowrate, a number of unfavorable conditions can occur, separately or simultaneously. They include leakage from the casing or seals or stuffing box, reduced motor efficiency, excessive hydraulic (radial) thrusts, shaft deflection, excessive temperature rise in the pumping fluid, internal recirculation, bearing failure or product quality degradation. Aside from selecting a pump of the right size, avoiding these problems by assuring a minimum continuous flow is a largely casespecific task, which is outside the scope of this article. The principles for avoiding cavitation are far more wide ranging, as discussed below. Cavitation consists of the formation and subsequent collapse of gas-phase cavities (bubbles) in a liquid due to dynamic action. The local pressure must be at or below the vapor pressure of the liquid for cavitation to begin, and the cavities must encounter a region of pressure higher than the vapor pressure in order to collapse. Cavitation is an abnormal condition that can result in loss of production and equipment damage, as detailed below. Vapor or dissolved gas The bubbles that form inside the liquid are vapor bubbles, gas bubbles, or a mixture of both.

Vapor bubbles are formed due to the vaporization of the liquid being pumped, at a point inside the pump where the local static pressure is less than the vapor pressure of the liquid. A cavitation condition induced by formation and collapse of vapor bubbles is commonly referred to as vapor cavitation. Gas bubbles, by contrast, are formed due to the presence of dissolved gases in the liquid that is being pumped. In many situations, the gas dissolved is air. Vapor cavitation: This situation, commonly found in process plants, is usually due to insufficiency of the available net positive suction head (NPSH; the difference between the fluid pressure at the pump suction and the vapor pressure of the fluid). It manifests itself in the form of reduced pump performance, excessive noise and vibration, and wear of pump parts. The extent of the vapor cavitation damage can range from a relatively minor amount of pitting after years of service to catastrophic failure in a relatively short period of time. Vapor-cavitation bubbles get carried in the liquid as it flows from the impeller eye to the impeller tip, along the trailing edge of the blade. Due to the rotation of the impeller, the bubbles first attain very high velocity, then reach the regions of higher pressure. The pressure around the bubbles begins to increase until they collapse. This process is an implosion (inward bursting). Hundreds of bubbles implode at approximately the same point on each impeller blade. Most of the bubbles collapse on the surface of the impeller blades and some escape to collapse inside the casing (volute). The bubbles collapse non-symmetrically, in such a way that the surrounding liquid rushes to fill the void, forming a liquid micro-jet. The micro-jet subsequently ruptures the bubbles with such force that a hammering action occurs. After bubbles collapse, a choke wave emanates outward from the point of collapse. This choke wave is what we actually hear, and call cavitation. The collapse of the bubbles also ejects destructive micro-jets of extremely high velocity, causing extreme erosion of the pump parts, particularly impellers. The resulting cavitation erosion or pitting occurs mainly by fatigue fracture, due to repeated bubble implosions on the cavitating surface, with an effect quite similar to that of sand blasting. The most sensitive areas where cavitation erosion takes place are the low-pressure sides of the impeller blades near the inlet edge. Pitting has also been observed on impeller tips. Apart from erosion of pump parts, cavitation can also result in imbalance of radial and axial thrusts on the impeller, due to lack of symmetry in the bubble formation and collapse. And because bubbles (unlike liquid) are readily compressible, the head developed by the pump can diminish drastically because energy has to be expended to increase the velocity of the liquid used to fill up the cavities, as the bubbles collapse.

In many cases, cavitation also encourages corrosion. The implosion of bubbles destroys protective layers on the metal surface, making the metal permanently activated for the chemical attack. In some process situations, low NPSH is a necessary evil. One major example is in batch operations when the function of the pump is to empty a tank. The pump is bound to cavitate towards the end of the batch, where the NPSH steadily decreases below the value required by the impeller for satisfactory operation. Gas bubbles: This condition, which amounts to two-phase pumping, occurs when any gas (most commonly air) enters a centrifugal pump along with liquid. Unlike vapor cavitation, gas bubbles seldom cause damage to the impeller or casing. Instead, their main effects are surge and choke phenomena that cause deterioration of pump head and capacity. The main mechanisms that seem to govern these effects in two-phase flow are: separation of the gas phase from the liquid phase, accompanied by a tendency of the gas to coalesce in large pockets at the impeller blade entry; and a sonic-choke effect. The various pressure fields that prevail inside the impeller play critical roles in those two mechanisms. Basically, pressure fields are generated by (a) centrifugal and Coriolis forces, (b) aerodynamic or blade forces, and (c) inertial forces that are associated with the acceleration or deceleration of the fluid particles in the stream direction. When free gas is present in a liquid being pumped, the head, power and efficiency of centrifugal pumps all decrease. The decrease in head is greater than that which can be attributed to the decrease in average density of the liquid-gas mixture. The decrease in efficiency suggests that some additional loss mechanism arises when gassy liquids are pumped. The pump performance decreases continuously as the gas volume increases, until at a certain critical gas content the pump loses prime. Experiments confirm that as the gas content becomes high, the range of capacities over which the pump can operate continuously decreases. This operating range appears to be limited by two phenomena: gas choking above the best-efficiency-point capacity; and instability in the head-capacity curve, which causes surge. Remedies at the pump As regards vapor cavitation, the pump cavitates when the NPSH required by the impeller is greater than the NPSH being made available from the system in which it operates. So, to stop or prevent vapor cavitation, either (or both) of two strategies is available: decrease the NPSH required by the pump, or increase the NPSH available from the system. We focus initially upon remedies at the pump (which, in practice, the chemical engineer would implement during his or her writing of the pump specification).

Use other pumps: The NPSH required by a centrifugal pump is a function of the hydraulic design of the eye area of the impeller; increasing that area can reduce the level of NPSH needed. However, this approach can make the impeller more susceptible to suction recirculation, which shows almost the same symptoms as cavitation. So, the pump manufacturer should certainly be consulted before adopting this strategy. Some manufacturers may have an alternative impeller available with a lower NPSH requirement. Other pump-related choices are available for reducing the NPSH requirement. For example: A lower-speed pump requires less NPSH, although it requires a larger impeller to handle a given pumping task As a result of its two eye areas, a double-suction impeller design needs only two-thirds as much NPSH as a similarly rated single-suction design A vertical canned pump can have additional static suction head built into its column length A number of lower-flow pumps operating in parallel will also need less NPSH Another solution is the use of a booster pump upstream of the main pump. The booster unit must operate over the same capacity range, but it can develop a lower head. In this arrangement, it needs to develop only the amount of head needed to meet the NPSH requirement of the main pump. It can, therefore, be a low-head and/or low-speed pump, both of which need less NPSH. Add a bleed system: An effective method to suppress cavitation in centrifugal pumps is to bleed some of the high-pressure fluid from the pump discharge back to the suction side, through essentially tangential-entry nozzles that give the fluid a rotating motion before entry into the impeller eye (Figure 2). In the absence of friction, a fluid particle on a pump rotor will accelerate down the gradient of reduced static pressure. Gradients of reduced static pressure are what drive the formation of the fluid flow ahead of an impeller. These gradients are introduced by either curvature of streamlines in the relative frame provided by the moving rotor, or by acceleration. Streamline curvature in a centrifugal impeller is introduced by the effect of: flow acceleration from nozzles, the 90-deg bend from axial flow to radial flow, and the curvature of the blades themselves. The forces, associated with acceleration, are introduced into the flow by the blade loading. If bleeding as described above is applied, both the nozzle effect and the meridional bend (the approximately 90-deg bend from flow along the inlet axis to flow along the blades) influence the early part of the flow. The effect of flow created in this way is similar to the effect of an impeller, unlike the case with other obstacles or devices that are sometimes placed upstream of the impeller on the pump suction side.

Tests on a bleed system confirm that cavitation, erosion and vibration are absent, and that the pump can operate under partially cavitating conditions while still supplying sufficient head to the impeller. The graphs in Figure 3 contrast the performance of a given pump, at a given specific speed, with (red) and without (blue) a bleed system. The bleed concept can be applied in a wide variety of centrifugal-pump services, including those (for instance, in petroleum refineries) that handle hot volatile liquids. The concept can also be useful when applied to centrifugal fans and blowers. As for improving the performance of pumps handling dissolved gases, better two-phase handling is possible by enlarging the passages between the blades; in other words, decreasing the number of blades. And just as with vapor cavitation, use of a bleed system with suitably designed nozzle unit placed at the impeller is also useful. Figure 4, showing test data, confirms that the pump head does not degrade appreciably as the suction void fraction increases. The tests confirm the ability of centrifugal pumps modified as just summarized, (with redesign of impeller blades and reduction of their number, as well as introduction of the bleeding-system provision) to handle two-phase products with a high air void fraction. With this kind of design the centrifugal pump can now replace a host of equipment currently utilized to separate gas from liquid, compress the gas and pump the liquid. Remedies for the system Having discussed various changes at the pump itself, we now focus attention on the process system, as simplified in Figure 5, of which the pump is a part. The NPSH available from a system depends on these factors: The static head over the impeller center-line (Hs) The pressure on the surface of the liquid (Ha) The friction losses in the suction line (Hf) The vapor pressure of the liquid Obviously, the effective improvements in available NPSH are those that increase the first two factors or decrease the last two. Static head: Lowering the pump or raising the suction tank, or raising the level of the liquid inside that tank, can increase head. While the physical movement of the tank or pump would often be an expensive proposition, the raising of the tank levels may be relatively less expensive and simpler. However, lowering the pump can be more economical when taken together with any other changes that are being effected if more than one problem is being corrected. Keep in mind that from the point of view of the pump, the reduction in local static pressure at any point inside the pump can occur under two conditions:

The actual pressure drop in the external suction system is greater than that considered during design. As a result, the pressure available at the pump suction is not sufficiently high enough to overcome the design pressure drop inside the pump. The actual pressure drop inside the pump is greater than that considered during the pump design. Surface pressure: In some process situations, it may be possible to enclose a fabricated tank and pressurize it. This remedy, however, might not be consistent with the dictates of the operating system. For instance, increasing the pressure inside a deaerator would defeat the whole function of that vessel. Even so, a surface pressure increase is worthy of some consideration in certain installations. Vapor pressure: One way to reduce the vapor pressure of a liquid is to reduce its temperature. Although a significant temperature change is usually needed to affect the available NPSH meaningfully, this option may be acceptable in some process situations. Friction losses: In many chemical-process installations worldwide, pump inlet piping leaves a great deal to be desired, and significant rises in available NPSH can be achieved by making changes. But beware the tendency to shorten the length of suction piping simply to reduce friction losses while that goal might be attained, the flowpath of the liquid into the impeller eye might be compromised. The result might be turbulence and air-entrainment difficulties that create the same symptoms as cavitation. To avoid this risk, the pump should be provided with a straight run of suction line in a length equivalent to five to ten times the diameter of the pipe. The smaller multiplier should be used on the larger pipe diameter, and vice versa. Another effective way of reducing the friction losses on the suction side is to increase the size of the line. Of course, changing the pipe size also changes the size of all valves and fittings. Alternatively, do not change the line size, but look for opportunities to use largerather than small-radius elbows, and to use lower-DP valves and/or fewer of them. Finally, do not overlook the presence of the strainer in the suction line. Strainers are commonly included in commissioning stages of a new plant, to catch debris within the piping. Unfortunately, the presence of the strainer may become forgotten, and increased blockage in the strainer basket during operation may raise the friction loss to an unacceptable level. If a strainer is required in a system on a continuing basis, it should be located downstream of the pump, and the pump should be of a type that can handle the solid particles expected. Obviously there are limitations to this strategy, but it can be used more frequently than current practice would have us believe. In summary The most-effective cure for cavitation is the one that is both economically and practically viable. It is important to consider both the capital outlay as well as the time value of money. Each subsystem in a plant, such as pumping arrangement, must be subject to the same economic rules, which apply to the entire project.

From my experience in plants, it has become evident that many pumps are cavitating because of the lack of merely 1 or 2 m of NPSH. As a result of this, I have found that relatively simple solutions, such as the addition of a bleeding system back to the suction side of the pump, to be extremely effective and economical cures. Edited by Nicholas P. Chopey