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The CFD Simulation of Cyclone Separator without and with the Counter-
cone in the Gasification Process
To cite this article: H Saputro et al 2018 IOP Conf. Ser.: Mater. Sci. Eng. 288 012142

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The 2nd Annual Applied Science and Engineering Conference (AASEC 2017) IOP Publishing
IOP Conf. Series: Materials Science and Engineering 288 (2017) 012142 doi:10.1088/1757-899X/288/1/012142
1234567890

The CFD Simulation of Cyclone Separator without and with

the Counter-cone in the Gasification Process

H Saputro*, T Firdani, R Muslim, Y Estriyanto, D S Wijayanto, S Lasmini and

Khaniffudin
Department of Mechanical Engineering Education, Universitas Sebelas Maret, Jl.
Ahmad Yani No.200, Pabelan, Surakarta, Indonesia.

*[email protected]

Abstract. The performance of cyclone separator as the ash trapper in the gasification system
was studied through the Computational Fluid Dynamic (CFD) using the finite volume method.
The ash trapper system is important part due to the effect on the gasification process, in
particular on the quality of Syngas (Synthesis Gas). Therefore, the aim of this study is to find
the suitable of the cyclone separator in the gasification apparatus that can separate the syngas
and particulates. The CFD simulation was performed to determine the effect of adding the
counter-cone in the cyclone separator to the trend of the efficiency of ash separation, speed
profile, and pressure drop in the gasification process. The Reynold Stress Model (RSM) was
employed for the for swirl flows modelling accuracy. The efficiency of ash separation was
predicted by using the flow velocity in the cyclone separator and the pressure drop in the
vortex finder. Discrete Phase Model (DPM)-one-way coupling was used to predict the
efficiency of collection. The results of this simulation show that by adding the counter-cone in
the cyclone separator increasing the number of particulates trapped and the distribution
efficiency of particle diameter. The cyclone separator with the counter-cone can trap the
particle diameter less than 1 micro meter (μm) while the cyclone separator without the counter-
cone cannot.

1. Introduction
In the laboratory of Mechanical Engineering Education, Universitas Sebelas Maret (UNS) was
developed the small-scale gasifier for study the energy recovery of palm starch waste at home industry
center in Jawa Tengan province. The palm starch waste has processed as the RDF 5 (Refuse Derived
Fuel) by pelletization process. The RDF 5 of palm starch waste was used as the biomass fuel in the
gasifier. However, the Syngas quality (gasification product of RDF 5 of palm starch waste) by using
the small-scale gasifier in the laboratory of Mechanical Engineering Education shown the impurity.
This is due to the other products of gasification process such as tars, particulates (char-ash and soot)
and water content of gas. Therefore, the aim of this study is to find the suitable of the cyclone
separator in the gasification apparatus that can separate the syngas and particulates.
Gasification is an old technology that still exists today. This technology was developed in France
and England in 1798, and 1920 gasification technology crossed the Atlantic (United States) and
successfully supplied gas to the resident in American towns [1]. In Indonesia during the Dutch
occupation period, gasification technology was developed to produce city gas in several big cities such

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The 2nd Annual Applied Science and Engineering Conference (AASEC 2017) IOP Publishing
IOP Conf. Series: Materials Science and Engineering 288 (2017) 012142 doi:10.1088/1757-899X/288/1/012142
1234567890

as Jakarta, Bogor, Bandung, Semarang, and Surabaya. However, the gas factories ceased operating in
the early 1970s due to the low price of natural gas compared to gasified synthetic gas. Currently,
natural gas prices are increasing steadily due to declining natural gas reserves. Therefore, the
gasification technology is being developed again as the alternative solution. The gasification was
designed as the gas production from coal and biomass. Recently, there has been increased interest in
biomass as a renewable energy source. In the last few years, some individuals and groups have built
versions of small downdraft gasifiers and have operated them as demonstration units.
In this study focuses on the purification system of Syngas from particulates (char-ash and soot) that
proper with the characteristic of palm starch waste by using the cyclone separators. Cyclones separator
is a device to separate the particulates from the gas though the centrifugal force. This device is widely
used in industry where there is a need to remove particles from a gas stream due to the simple design
and low costs investment. The operating principle of the cyclone in gasification system i.e. the gas
consists of particles enters tangentially into cyclone and forcing the flow into a spiral movement. The
centrifugal force appears because of circular flow throws the particulates toward the wall of the
cyclone and finally, the particles fall into a hopper located underneath [2]. However, the deficiency of
cyclone separator is difficulty trapped the particle diameter lower than 10 microns [3] or low
separation efficiency [4].
An additional element in the form of a counter-cone was employed to increasing the separation
effectiveness of cyclone separator. This counter-cone is suitable for all type of cyclones. Counter-cone
also called a Chinese hat, a vortex stabilizer or an apex cone [5]. The investigation of the effect of
apex cone shape (400-800 range) on fine particle classification by experiment and CFD studies [6].
They reported that the effect of the apex cone angle on particle separation performance decreases
under high inlet velocity conditions, because most particles are moving in the area away from the apex
cone. The CFD calculation of large cyclone equipped with a counter-cone in large coal-fired boilers
application [7]. This study used the Reynolds-averaged Navier–Stokes equations with the Reynolds
Stress Turbulence model (RSM) in the analysis. He concluded that placing the counter-cone below the
conical part is more beneficial, as it helps increase separation efficiency. The possibility of optimizing
the structure of cyclone separators through the application of an additional compartment in the form of
a counter-cone [5]. This study was applied in cement clinker burning. He reported that application of a
counter-cone in each of the studied geometrical variants led to an increase in solid particle separation
and the apex angle of the counter-cone also plays a significant role. Apex angle of counter-cone in
cyclone separators of cement clinker burning should be 850 [5]. The apex angle 1200 of counter-cone
in coal-fired boilers application [7].
Therefore, to improve the quality of Syngas from the particulates impurity in gasification process
of palm starch waste, counter-cone could be applied to the cyclone separator. This study has compared
the separation efficiency of cyclone separator without (existing cyclone separator in the laboratory of
Mechanical Engineering Education-UNS) and with counter-cone through the Computational Fluid
Dynamic (CFD) method. The efficiency of particulate separation was predicted by using the flow
velocity in the cyclone separator and the pressure drop in the vortex finder. The input parameter of
simulation was used the gasification experimental data from the palm starch waste gasification in
laboratory of Mechanical Engineering Education-UNS. By using the numerical simulation, the
efficiency of cyclone separator without and with counter-cone was investigated. The results of this
simulation will be used as the basic design of replacement the existing cyclone separator in the
laboratory of Mechanical Engineering Education-UNS).

2. Numerical model description

This study simulated the three type of geometry (A, B and C) of the cyclone separator. Geometry A is
geometry cyclone separator without counter-cone (existing cyclone separator type in the laboratory of
Mechanical Engineering Education-UNS) (Fig. 1). Geometry B is cyclone separator with counter-cone
and apex angle 900 (Fig. 2). Geometry C is cyclone separator with counter-cone and apex angle 1200

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The 2nd Annual Applied Science and Engineering Conference (AASEC 2017) IOP Publishing
IOP Conf. Series: Materials Science and Engineering 288 (2017) 012142 doi:10.1088/1757-899X/288/1/012142
1234567890

(Fig. 3). The properties of the solid body of cyclone shown in Table 1. The study was conducted based
on CFD using the finite volume method with the Ansys Fluent 16.2 Academic package.

Figure 1. Cyclone separator without counter-cone (Geometry A)

Figure 2. Cyclone separator with counter-cone 900 (Geometry B)

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The 2nd Annual Applied Science and Engineering Conference (AASEC 2017) IOP Publishing
IOP Conf. Series: Materials Science and Engineering 288 (2017) 012142 doi:10.1088/1757-899X/288/1/012142
1234567890

Figure 3. Cyclone separator with counter-cone 1200 (Geometry C)

Table 1. The properties of the solid body of cyclone

Properties Unit
Thickness 2 mm
Roughness 0.046
Density 1643 kg/m3

2.1. Experiment data of palm starch waste gasification

The input parameter of simulation was used the gasification experimental data from the palm starch
waste gasification in laboratory of Mechanical Engineering Education-UNS. The detail of properties
of the gas (Syngas) and the properties of ash solid was shown in Table 2 and 3.

Table 2. The detail of properties of gas (Syngas)

Gas properties unit
Act. Vol. flowrate (Q) 0.1434 m3/s
Velocity of gas 48.95 m/s
Density 0.1116 kg/m3
CP (dynamic viscosity) 2.612 x10-5 kg/ms
Thermal conductivity 0.2641 W/mK
CSt (kinematic viscosity ) 2.341 x10-4 m2/s
Temperature 330,4 K
Specific heat 3.524 Kj/mole kg C

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The 2nd Annual Applied Science and Engineering Conference (AASEC 2017) IOP Publishing
IOP Conf. Series: Materials Science and Engineering 288 (2017) 012142 doi:10.1088/1757-899X/288/1/012142
1234567890

Table 3. The properties of ash solid

Gas properties unit
Velocity of ash solid 48.95 m/s
Density 1643 kg/m3
Particle diameter -
Number of particle -

2.2. CFD simulation

The simulation of cyclone separator used the tetrahedral meshing for complex geometry. The total
number of elements and skewness ratio was shown in Table 4. The simulation was conducted based on
Reynolds Averaged Navier Stokes (RANS) as the turbulent approach. The type of RANS used the
Reynolds stresses Model (RSM). The standard wall function was used to solve turbulent flow
problems in the wall regions. The detail of CFD setting was described in Table 5. The fluid phase of
Syngas and particulates was simulated as dispersion model. Discrete Phase Model (DPM) with one-
way coupling was used for the description of the dispersed phase.

Table 4. The total number of elements and skewness ratio

Geometry A Geometry B Geometry C
Number Of Element 495,000 cell 470,000 cell 470,000 cell
Quality Mesh Average 0.28 0.29 0.29

Table 5. CFD setting

Details of Setting :
Type Pressure based
Turbulence model: RANS RSM, The standard walls function
Trajectory (LPT) Lagrangian Discrete phase model One-way coupling
particle track Max. number of steps 1e-06
Step length factor 5
Solution method Pressure-Velocity Coupling SIMPLE
Terms of convergence: 10-3
Spatial discretization: Pressure Momentum: second order upwind
Turbulent kinetic energy, Turbulent
dissipation rate, Reynolds stresses: first order
upwind (low order scheme)

The equation of particle motion is based on the following assumptions: 1) The particles are perfectly
spherical in shape, 2) The volume fraction of the dispersed phase in the continuous region is negligible,
and thus no influence was due to the presence of the particles, 3) With the dilute particle flow in
continuous flow, there are zero inter-particle interactions and 4) Collisions between particles and the
wall are assumed to be perfectly elastic [8]. Under these assumptions, the particle trajectories are
obtained by integrating the force balance on the particle [5,7,8] and [9]. The fractional efficiency was
calculated based on equation (1).

𝑡𝑟𝑎𝑝𝑝𝑒𝑑 (1)
𝐸𝑓𝑓𝑖𝑐𝑖𝑒𝑛𝑐𝑦 =
𝑛𝑢𝑚𝑏𝑒𝑟 𝑜𝑓 𝑡𝑟𝑎𝑐𝑘𝑒𝑑 − 𝑖𝑛𝑐𝑜𝑚𝑝𝑙𝑒𝑡𝑒

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IOP Conf. Series: Materials Science and Engineering 288 (2017) 012142 doi:10.1088/1757-899X/288/1/012142
1234567890

3. Results and discussion

Based on the experiment results and characteristic of gasification of palm starch waste, the particle
size 0.1 μm to 20 μm was simulated by using the three type of cyclone sparator geometry. Figure 4
shows the simulation results of the fractional efficiency of cyclone separator without and with the
counter-cone. The additional of counter-cone in the cyclone separator has affected the number of
particles trapped and the distribution efficiency of particle diameter. This results are in line with the
cyclone separator in coal-fired boilers application [10] and in cyclone separators of cement clinker
burning [5] . The geometry type C (cyclone separator with counter-cone 1200) showed the higher
efficiency comparing the geometry B. This is means that the apex angle of counter-cone has affected
the efficiency of particulates trapping in the cyclone separator. The apex angle of counter-cone also
affected the efficiency of particulates diameter distribution that could be trapped by the cyclone
separator. Where is the geometry type C could trap the gas particulate of palm starch waste
gasification 0.1 μm with efficiency 0.16. On the other hand, the cyclone separator without the counter-
cone could not trap the particle in Syngas less than 1 μm. This is due to the decreasing of turbulence at
the end of the vortex (upper of counter-cone position) as the effect of the addition of counter-cone in
the cyclone separator. Therefore, the particle that had trapped in the hopper could not get back into the
vortex. The additional of counter-cone in the cyclone separator was good way to decrease the
turbulence at the end of the vortex [10]. This argumentation was strengthened by the profile of
velocity in the body of the cyclone separator as shown in Figure 5.

1
Geometry A without counter-cone
0.9
Geometry B with counter-cone 900
0.8 Geometry C with counter-cone 1200

0.7

0.6
Eficiency

0.5

0.4

0.3

0.2

0.1

0
0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.7 0.8 0.9 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 20
Particel diameter (µm)

Figure 4. Fractional efficiency of cyclone separator without and with the counter-cone

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The 2nd Annual Applied Science and Engineering Conference (AASEC 2017) IOP Publishing
IOP Conf. Series: Materials Science and Engineering 288 (2017) 012142 doi:10.1088/1757-899X/288/1/012142
1234567890

Figure 5a. Profile vector velocity close vortex finder (Cyclone separator without counter-cone
(Geometry A))

Figure 5b. Profile vector velocity close vortex finder (Cyclone separator with counter-cone 900
(Geometry B))

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The 2nd Annual Applied Science and Engineering Conference (AASEC 2017) IOP Publishing
IOP Conf. Series: Materials Science and Engineering 288 (2017) 012142 doi:10.1088/1757-899X/288/1/012142
1234567890

Figure 5c. Profile vector velocity close vortex finder (Cyclone separator with counter-cone 1200
(Geometry C))

Figure 6 shows the velocity vectors near the counter-cone, the velocity was dominated by the axial
velocity than the radial or tangential velocity. Therefore, the Syngas direction in the inner vortex of the
cyclone separator rotates to the upwards the vortex finder and the small (lighter) particle was sucked
into the vortex finder. In order to investigate the pressure drop in the cyclone separator without and
with counter-cone, the pressure analysis was conducted in several point of cyclone separator as shown
in Fig. 6.

Figure 6. The detail position of pressure investigation

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The 2nd Annual Applied Science and Engineering Conference (AASEC 2017) IOP Publishing
IOP Conf. Series: Materials Science and Engineering 288 (2017) 012142 doi:10.1088/1757-899X/288/1/012142
1234567890

(a) Cyclone separator Geometry A (b) Cyclone separator Geometry B

(c) Cyclone separator Geometry C

Figure 7. Pressure Graphs

Figure 7 performed the pressure analysis in different position of cyclone (A-A, B-B, C-C and D-D).
When the syngas entrances the cyclone separator, the cyclone wall pressure is higher than the center of
the axis (Z). Pressure losses significantly affect the efficiency of collection [7]. Pressure losses derived
from the difference between the inlet and the outlet of cyclone and can be used as an indicator of
improved efficiency. Table 6 was shown the comparison of pressure loss cyclone separator geometry
type A, B, and C. When the value of pressure loss is higher, the cyclone efficiency increase. Pressure

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The 2nd Annual Applied Science and Engineering Conference (AASEC 2017) IOP Publishing
IOP Conf. Series: Materials Science and Engineering 288 (2017) 012142 doi:10.1088/1757-899X/288/1/012142
1234567890

loss can be extracted from the area weighted average based on the inlet and outlet cyclone.
Furthermore, the pressure losses could be used as an indicator of efficiency. The cyclone separator
geometry type C shown the higher value of pressure loss comparing to the other. This result is
strengthened the particulates efficiency Fig. 4 that the geometry type C has the higher efficiency.

Table 6. Pressure Losses

Model Pressure losses
Geometry type A 195.30 Pa
Geometry type B 196.01 Pa
Geometry type C 202.65 Pa

4. Conclusion
In order to improve the quality of Syngas from the particulates impurity in gasification process of
palm starch waste, counter-cone could be applied to the cyclone separator. The results of this
simulation show that by adding the counter-cone in the cyclone separator increasing the number of
particulates trapped and the distribution efficiency of particle diameter. The additional of counter-cone
in the cyclone separator was good way to decrease the turbulence at the end of the vortex the geometry
of the cyclone separator type C show the best efficiency compared with geometry A and geometry B.
Therefore, the geometry type C (Cyclone separator with counter-cone 1200) is suitable to the
characteristic of gasification process of palm starch waste.

Acknowledgements
This research was partly subsidized by Grant of Hibah Unggulan research PNPB Universitas Sebelas
Maret 2017. The researchers gratefully acknowledge financial support from the LPPM Universitas
Sebelas Maret, Surakarta, Indonesia.

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