Slurry hat exchanger with single piston pump?

[MartinLe]

Did anyone ever build this and can share some experiences?
Recently we discussed feeding (pipe in pipe) heat exchangers with a piston pump for thick slurries, and the possible use of a comparably cheap and simple single piston pump. There's several possible headaches we see, mostly that during one half of the cycle the slurry will stand in the HX and what this means for the heat use. SO this is nothing we will try, I think.

But I'm still curious if anyone ever built such a system and how it behaves, and if maybe, for once, the problem is in practice smaller than in theory.

 

[moltenmetal]

Depends greatly on the nature of the slurry...and design of the HX. Pulsation dampening IS possible in some slurry services too.

 

[tbuelna]

A piston pump is a positive displacement device, so when pumping a liquid (or slurry) it is quite easy for this type of pump to produce very high pressures in the circuit if there is appreciable flow resistance. If the heat exchanger pipes have thin walls, or the header tank/manifold constructions cannot handle high pressures, you might consider adding a high-pressure relief ahead of the heat exchanger to prevent burst failure.