Experimental Investigation of Degree of Premixing on Isothermal Air-Water Two-Phase Flow Through Minichannel

The study on the effect of degree of premixing on isothermal gas-liquid two-phase flow pattern and flow pattern maps in microscale channels is inadequate. The present paper discusses the experimental investigation on air-water two-phase flow through 2.15 mm horizontal circular minichannel. Two type of inlet channel geometry, T-junction (TJ) and Y-junction (YJ), are considered. Six different flow patterns are observed and flow pattern maps are developed. The developed flow pattern maps for TJ and YJ channels are compared with the maps available in the literature. The surface tension dominated region is found to have major effect of inlet channel geometry. The results obtained for minichannel can be guidelines to analyze and design diverse two-phase microfluidic applications.