Motion and orientation of cylindrical and cubic particles in pipe flow with high concentration and high particle to pipe size ratio

Lattice Boltzmann method was used to numerically investigate the motion and orientation distribution of cylindrical and cubic particles in pipe flow with high concentration and high particle to pipe size ratio. The transient impulse model of 3D collisions between particles and between particle and wall is proposed. The numerical results are qualitatively in agreement with and quantitatively comparable to the experiment data. The results show that the increases of both the cylindrical particle to pipe size ratio and the particle aspect ratio decrease the rotation about all axes. All rotations of cubic particles decrease with increasing the particle concentration. The cubic particles, rotating more drastically in the flow with large Reynolds number, rotate faster than the cylindrical particles with the same size. The cylindrical particles align with the flow direction more obviously with decreasing Reynolds numbers. However, the orientations of cubic particles are spread all over the range with no significant difference in magnitude, and the Reynolds numbers have no obvious effect on the orientations of cubic particles.