Cavitation Model Verification and Validation for Water and Liquid Nitrogen in an Inducer

Cavitation is the formation of vapor bubbles within a liquid where flow dynamics cause the local static pressure to drop below the saturation pressure. Compared to the water, cavitation in cryogens is more complex due to the thermodynamic effects of cryogens. Existing Computational fluid dynamics (CFD) methods for water may not simulate the cryogens accurately. This paper presents the steady CFD results of cavitation in water and liquid nitrogen flow through a rotating inducer with four different cavitation models, and the experimental results are displayed to compare with the CFD results to verify the cavitation models’ applicability in water and the liquid nitrogen. The four cavitation models could simulate the cavitation flow in water, and the simulation result presents a consistent trend, which is stable in the high σ regime and drop down suddenly due to the blockage in blade passages caused by vapor as the cavitation number decreases. The “Zwart-Gerber-Belamri model” and the “Schnerr & Sauer model” have better performance on simulating the cavitation flow in water compared with the other two models, and the simulation results are close to the experimental one. The full cavitation model is applicable for cavitation prediction in liquid nitrogen, and the results of other three models are not satisfactory in liquid nitrogen.