Air injection evaluation in open steam discharge pipes based on ejector equipment theory

The paper starts from the finding that the calculation method proposed by ANSI B31.1 for open steam discharge pipes (normative 'ANSI/ASMF B31.1-1980 appendix II Non-Mandatory rules for the design of safety valve installation') shows an air injection in steam system without making a quantitative evaluation of this process of air injection in the exhaust steam. For this it is proposed an assimilation of process with an ejection process in which either steam or air is the ejected fluid. The reason of using opened exhaust systems instead of closed exhaust systems is the fact that expansions and especially shock load from discharge valves and especially in exhaust elbow, are not conducted over the pipe system (ventilation tube). In order to estimate the quantity of air flow which enters through the ejection effect the present paper makes use of gas-gas ejectors. The interest for optimal operating of the system is that the air mixture have a value low in comparison with steam flow (i.e. 2-3% or upmost 5-7%). These percents of mixture lead to properly choosing of the ratio of the two pipe diameters (ventilation tube D/ exhaust elbow d). The results show that optimum ratio is between D/d = 1.10 to 1.15 and in extreme cases 1.20. A lower value of ratio is not acceptable because the pipes come in direct contact when expansion and/or hydraulic hammer occur and stresses from exhaust elbow of safety valve are propagated towards ventilation tube. A higher value of the ratio D/d leads to great air injection in ventilation tube and so to an unjustified large diameter of ventilation tube. It must be mention that the optimal ratio is obtained at sub critical flow of ejected air with Mach number lower then unity, at a static pressure between 0.6 to 1.0 bar in mixture zone of the two fluids. (authors)