Effect of temperature and apparent liquid viscosity on the hydrodynamics of liquid-solid tapered inverse fluidized bed: experimental studies compared with empirical models

In the present work, immersed heater to bed heat transfer coefficient and related hydrodynamics were determined along with different angles (7.85 and 6.8) of the tapered inversed fluidized bed. Carboxyl methylcellulose was used to change the water viscosity by using a power-law model. The hydrodynamics was compared for two different angles of beds. Furthermore, minimum fluidization velocities were carried out for different liquid apparent viscosities and different angles of beds and compared with previous models. The heat transfer coefficient was found to be increasing with liquid velocity and bed voidage, respectively, and it was also found that the bed voidage is high for a high diameter of particles. The correlation was developed between the bed expansion ratio and independent parameters by response surface methodology in design expert software v.9.