Design and Structure Optimization of Plenum Chamber with Airfoil Baffle to Improve Its Outlet Velocity Uniformity in Heat Setting Machines

• Published in: 东华大学学报（英文版） Vol. 40; no. 5; pp. 515 - 524
• Main Authors: QIAN Miao, WEI Pengli, LIN Zijie, XIANG Zhong, HU Xudong
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: 31.10.2023
• Subjects: heat setting; airfoil; structure optimization; plenum chamber; numerical simulation; velocity distribution uniformity
• ISSN: 1672-5220
• DOI: 10.19884/j.1672-5220.202209004

TS190.4; The plenum chamber of a heat setting machine is a key structure for distributing hot air to different air channels.Its outlet velocity uniformity directly determines the heating uniformity of textiles,significantly affecting the heat setting performance.In a traditional heat setting machine,the outlet airflow maldistribution of the plenum chamber still exists.In this study,a novel plenum chamber with an airfoil baffle was established to improve the uniformity of the velocity distribution at the outlet in a heat setting machine.The structural influence of the plenum chamber on the velocity distribution was investigated using a computational fluid dynamics program.It was found that a chamber with a smaller outlet partition thickness had a better outlet velocity uniformity.The structural optimization of the plenum chamber was conducted using the particle swarm optimization algorithm.The outlet partition thickness,the transverse distance and the longitudinal distance of the optimized plenum chamber were 20,686.2 and 274.6 mm,respectively.Experiments were carried out.The experimental and simulated results showed that the optimized plenum chamber with an airfoil baffle could improve the outlet velocity uniformity.The air outlet velocity uniformity index of the optimized plenum chamber with an airfoil baffle was 4.75%higher than that of the plenum chamber without an airfoil baffle and 5.98%higher than that of the conventional chamber with a square baffle in a commercial heat setting machine.