Recent advancement in slurry erosion test rigs and its parametric influences – A review

Abstract

Erosion is the most prominent issue in several engineering applications such as hydropower plants, steam/jet turbines, aircraft engines and chemical processing equipment. Solid particle erosion limits the working span of the slurry handling components. Therefore, it is very crucial to determine critical factors for design, selection and operation of the hydraulic conveying system. Engineering interest is to estimate the working life of slurry handling equipment subjected to slurry erosion and to investigate the possibilities of enhancement of their service life. Therefore, in the present review, a brief description is provided in terms of various types of slurry erosion test rig used to stimulate the actual condition of slurry handling equipment by several researchers. On the other hand, the influence of tribological operating factors such as impact angle, solid particle velocity and erodent concentration on solid particle erosion wear is also described. Finally, it was summarized that most of the researchers were used slurry jet apparatus (47%) followed by slurry pot (35%), high energy slurry pot (11%) and coriolis apparatus (7%). It was also concluded that impingement angle and impact velocity is the most significant tribological parameters for the erosion wear. The conclusions drawn from this review will help a new researcher in the scope of slurry erosion wear.