Prediction of pressure drop for turbulent fluid flow in 90° bends

The pressure drop for turbulent single-phase fluid flow around sharp 90degrees pipe bends has proven to be difficult to predict owing to the complexity of the flow arising from frictional and separation effects. Existing models accurately predict the frictional effects, but no precise models are available to predict the flow due to separation. It is the purpose of this work to propose a model capable of such prediction. The proposed model is presented and added to an existing model to predict pressure losses over the turbulent Reynolds number range up to 3 x 10(5). The predicted data is within a spread of +3 to -2 per cent of existing experimental data. Future work will validate this model experimentally and computationally.