5.

0 Discussion
5.1 Discussion of Trends
Figure 4.1 describes the experimental results and theoretical results from
the Wen and Yu equation. The plot in Figure 4.1 shows that the pressure
drop was increasing rapidly until the superficial velocity was approximately
0.06m/s. Beyond 0.07m/s, the pressure drop in the experimental results is
fluctuating between 0kPa and 0.2kPa. The increase in pressure drop
before the 0.06m/s is due to the bed achieving fluidization.
Figure 4.2 describes the experimental results and theoretical results based
on the Richardson-Zaki equation. The change in bed height is small when
the water flow rate was increased from 1.35 litre per minute to 6.05 litre
per minute. Within this range of water flow rate, the bed remained in
packed bed form. Beyond 6.05 litre per minute, the both the graphs show
that bed height increased with the water flow rate. At this region, the bed
is fluidized and the large increase in bed height is due to the random
motion of beads. The maximum experimental bed height is 170cm at the
water flowrate of 12.05 litre per minute.

5.1 Comparison with theoretical values

The theoretical data is shown in Figure 4.1, which has been calculated
based on Ergun equation. Both the experimental and theoretical data
shows a similar trend, whereby the pressure drop increases until a peak
and then decreases. The experimental pressure drop peaks at 0.165kPa,
whereas the theoretical pressure drop peaks at 1.813kPa. The
discrepancies in results are large because Ergun equation does not
consider wall friction and adhesive forces between the bed and distributor.
Besides that, experimental error, which is discussed in Part 5.2 could
contribute to the large discrepancy.
The theoretical pressure drop in the fluidized region is constant at
0.992kPa, whereas the experimental pressure drop in the fluidized region
ranges from 0.0812kPa to 0.1118kPa. The experimental result shows a
fluctuating trend in pressure drop after the peak whereas theoretical
results show a relatively constant pressure drop after the peak. This
deviation could be due to the fact that Ergun equation can not be applied
to the fluidized region.
Table 4.3 displays the comparison between the experimental incipient
velocity with the theoretical incipient velocity. The incipient velocity based
on Ergun equation has a larger discrepancy than the incipient velocity
based on Wen and Yu equation.
Figure 4.2 describes the relationship between water flow rate and bed
height. The theoretical result shows a slight increase of 21cm from
1.35liter per minute to 5.05 liter per minute. The experimental results
displays a constant bed height for the water flowrate of 1.35liter per

minute to 5.05 liter per minute. Above 5.05 liter per minute, both plots
show similar increasing trends. The discrepancy between bed height from
experimental and theoretical results are shown in Table XXX. The
discrepancy in results above the fluidization velocity increases with water
flow rate. The assumption of sphericity of particles is the main contribution
to the large deviation in results. Since it is assumed that the sphericity is
1, the Reynolds number value obtained from the CD-Rep graph is greatly
affected. This will affect subsequent calculations. Another contributing
factor is because Richardson-Zaki equation is not applicable for bubbling
fluidization (Holdich, R.G. ,2002). However, there was bubbling in the
packed bed region of this experiment.

5.2 Difficulties and Improvements

Inaccuracy of results may be due to the fluctuation of pressure drop
readings. This can be improved by using the average values of the
fluctuating values or by using apparatus of better quality. There was
difficulty in reading of beads positions as well. The changing position of
the beads may cause inaccuracy of readings when finding the maximum
fluidized bed height. Thus, an average of two sets of measurements were
used to obtain the data.
Besides that, some of the beads in the experiment were stuck at the
bottom of the bed. This hinders the fluidization of the other beads. This
scenario could be caused by non-uniformity in beads shape. In order to
avoid this, the experiment can be improved by ensuring uniformity in
beads shapes and size. Non-uniformity also affects the calculation,
whereby the beads were assumed to have uniform size and shape. In
order to avoid this error in calculation, the size distribution of beads should
be conducted to find the surface volume diameter of the beads.
REFERENCES
Holdich,R.(2002).Fundamentalsofparticletechnology.Shepshed:MidlandInformationTechnology
andPub.