The Flow Dynamics of an Air-Driven Hydraulic Pump

Air-driven hydraulic pumps are widely used to pump high-pressure oil for small hydraulic systems, where it is uneconomic to set up a conventional hydraulic power pack. To obtain good performance of a small hydraulic system, input air flow and output oil flow characteristics of the air-driven hydraulic pump should be properly understood. In this paper, based on a mathematical model which has been experimentally verified, the model of an air-driven hydraulic pump is proposed. Using the software MATLAB/Simulink for simulation, the dynamic characteristics of the pumps are obtained. To set a foundation for the optimization of the pump, the influence of key parameters on the output characteristics of the pump was studied. Through analysis, it can be obtained that, firstly, with an increase in the input air pressure, output oil pressure and area ratio, the ratio of output to input volume flow rate decrease approximately linearly. Moreover, when the output oil pressure was fixed, an energy-saving method to enhance the output oil flow is to enlarge the area ratio of the pump. Furthermore, the output oil flow can be increased rapidly through increasing the input air pressure, but that may result in an increase in compressed air consumption. This research is of use in the performance and design optimization of air-driven hydraulic pumps.