Coarse graining DEM simulations of a powder die-filling system

Application of numerical simulations are desired to improve the quality of powder products and to optimize the production process in powder die-filling. In the powder die-filling, complex gas-solid interaction should be simulated since the solid particles are significantly influenced by the gas flow under moving wall boundary. The discrete element method (DEM) coupled with computational fluid dynamics (CFD) has been widely utilized in the simulation of gas-solid flows, and the adequacy has been proved through countless studies. On the other hand, the existing DEM-CFD method is extremely difficult to simulate the gas-solid flow where the wall boundary is moving. Besides, in the existing DEM-CFD method, huge number of computational particles cannot be simulated on a single PC. Hence, numerical simulations of the industrial powder die-filling becomes a challenging topic from a viewpoint of evolution of the DEM-CFD method, because modeling of the moving wall boundary as well as modeling of large number of computational particles should be considered simultaneously. Very recently, the authors' group has developed the Integrated DEM-CFD method including the arbitrary shape wall boundary model and the scaling law model. In the Integrated DEM-CFD method, the wall boundary is modeled by the signed distance functions and the immersed boundary method, and besides the coarse graining DEM is employed as the scaling law model. Adequacy of the Integrated DEM-CFD method has been proved through verification tests. In the current study, applicability of the Integrated DEM-CFD method is examined in the powder die-filling. Adequacy of the Integrated DEM-CFD method is shown by agreement between the original particle system and the coarse graining particle system in the powder die-filling. Through the verification tests, macroscopic characteristics of the powder die-filling are shown to be reproduced by the Integrated DEM-CFD method. Consequently, the Integrated DEM-CFD method is illustrated to be effective for the simulation of the industrial powder die-filling systems. (C) 2020 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.