Capture envelopes of rectangular hoods in cross drafts

Simulations of dust dynamics around a cone hood in updraft conditions

A cone hood is an efficient device for capturing dust releases generated by a variety of process equipment. For stationary airflow conditions, a circular cone hood with a round flange is the most efficient design. The goal of this article is to determine the effect that inflow velocity, suction velocity, and terminal settling velocity of dust particles have on the aspiration coefficient in combination with hood length and inclination angle. No studies have yet addressed the efficiency of an exhaust hood facing an updraft flow of air with suspended dust particles. To simulate the moving fluid, we used the discrete vortices method accounting for flow separation at sharp edges of the cone hood. A custom test bench was built to validate the velocity field distribution around the exhaust hood. To evaluate capture efficiency, we determined the aspiration coefficient using plotted limiting trajectories of dust particles by solving equations of particle dynamics numerically in view of gravity and streamlining airflow patterns. In order to validate our estimate of the aspiration coefficient, we compared our findings with regularities identified by earlier researchers for a simpler problem of dust-air mixture approaching a circular exhaust opening. The following conditions were considered: the ratio of updraft velocity to the exhaust hood suction velocity varying between 0.01 and 0.5; the ratio of dust particle terminal velocity to the suction velocity varying between 0.000625 and 0.2; flange angle varying between 0° and 90°; and the ratio of flange length to the exhaust opening radius varying between 1 and 4. Using regularities discovered by us, exhaust hood designs can be tailored to a variety of application conditions in terms of dust release capture efficiency.

Orthogonal design on range hood with air curtain and its effects on kitchen environment

Conventional range hoods cannot effectively prevent the oil fumes containing cooking-induced harmful material from escaping into the kitchen Air curtains and guide plates have been used in range hoods to reduce the escape of airborne emissions and heat, thereby improving the kitchen environment and the cook's degree of comfort. In this article, numerical simulations are used to study the effects of the jet velocity of an air curtain, the jet angle of the air curtain, the width of the jet slot, the area of the guide plate, and the exhaust rate of the range hood on the perceived temperature, the perceived concentration of oil fumes, the release temperature of oil fumes, and the concentration of escaped oil fumes in a kitchen. The orthogonal experiment results show that the exhaust rate of the range hood is the main factor influencing the fumes concentration and the temperature distribution in the kitchen. For the range hood examined in the present study, the optimum values of the exhaust rate, the jet velocity of the air curtain, the jet angle of the air curtain, the width of the jet slot, and the area of the guide plate are 10.5 m(3)/min, 1.5 m/s, -5°, 4 mm, and 0.22 m(2), respectively, based on the results of the parametric study. In addition, the velocity field, temperature field, and oil fumes concentration field in the kitchen using the proposed range hood with the air curtain and guide plate are analyzed for those parameters. The study's results provide significant information needed for improving the kitchen environment.

Flow characteristics and spillage mechanisms of wall-mounted and jet-isolated range hoods subject to influence from cross draft

The effects of draft on the flow and spillage characteristics of wall-mounted and jet-isolated range hoods were investigated. A specially designed draft generator that could supply low-swirl air current was used to provide "cross draft" from three directions, lateral (θ = 0(o)), oblique (θ = 45(o)), and front (θ = 90(o)), with respect to the center point of the range hoods. Flow characteristics of oil mist were inspected through visualization of smoke flows with light scattering (laser light sheet-assisted visualization of smoke flow). The leakage mechanisms, which were closely related to the flow features, were studied by examining both movies and still pictures showing smoke-flow evolution. The sulfur hexafluoride tracer gas concentration detection method was employed to measure the capture indices. The results showed that the lateral draft pushed the pollutants generated under the hood in the opposite direction and induced serious spillage. The oblique draft pushed the pollutants toward both the rear wall and opposite side and induced more serious spillage than did the lateral draft. The frontal draft forced the pollutants to bifurcate into streams moving toward the left and the right, and induced the most serious pollutant spillage among the three tested drafts. Pollutant spillage became critically significant as the cross draft velocity was increased to greater than 0.2 m/sec. Spillage of pollutants increased as the velocity of the cross draft was increased. Increasing the suction flow rate of the range hood may increase resistance to the draft, but the benefits were limited at draft velocities greater than 0.2 m/sec. Both range hoods had a similarly low capture index under the influence of the lateral draft. For the oblique and frontal drafts, the jet-isolated range hood demonstrated a higher capture index than did the wall-mounted range hood.

Flow characteristics and spillage mechanisms of wall-mounted and jet-isolated range hoods

The flow characteristics and oil mist spillages of wall-mounted and jet-isolated range hoods were studied experimentally. Flow patterns were examined using a laser-light, sheet-assisted, smoke flow visualization technique. Spillages were diagnosed by the locally averaged tracer gas concentration test method. Tracer gas concentration test results correlated well with those of flow visualizations. For the wall-mounted hood, primary leakages occur around the region near the front edge of a countertop due to boundary layer separation, as well as the region just below the lower edge of the side panels of the hood due to the expansion effect of plumes. Increasing the suction flow rate above some critical values may help to reduce leakages out of the lateral planes but would increase spillages around the front edge of the countertop. For the jet-isolated range hood, oil mists spread widely and present unsteady motions with a high degree of turbulence because insufficient free air is allowed to enter the space enclosed by the jets and rear wall. Spillages across the jets into the environment due to turbulent dispersion become significant. Increasing the suction flow rate above some critical values may help to reduce spillages, while increasing the jet velocity would increase turbulent dispersion and thus lead to larger leakages.

Development and characterization of a wake-controlled exterior hood

A wake-controlled exterior hood was developed to overcome the negative influence of cross draft on an exterior hood and avoid the operation inconvenience caused by the enclosure of an airflow capture booth. This new type of local exterior hood used the hood suction flow to stabilize the dynamic vortex shedding that was induced when a crossflow passed over a blockage plate, and therefore formed a hydrodynamics-stabilized local isolation area for efficient removing of the contaminant. The development process was performed in a test section of an open-circuit wind tunnel. The blockage plate and the exterior hood model were placed in a wind-tunnel test section so that the crossflow could be freely supplied by the airstream of the wind tunnel. The laser light sheet flow visualization method and the laser Doppler velocimeter were employed to reveal the characteristics of the flow field. Primary influential parameters were factored out of the measured velocity results so that a design procedure was proposed. Experiments using hot-wire type alcohol sensors to measure the toluene vapor concentration distributions showed that the capture efficiency of this type of actively controlled hood was remarkably higher than that of an uncontrolled hood.

Effects of flange size on dividing streamlines of exterior hoods in cross drafts

Effects of flange size on the flow patterns of an exterior circular hood subject to the influence of various uniform cross drafts were studied in an apparatus consisting of hood-model/wind-tunnel assembly. The cross draft to suction velocity ratio covered the range from 0.056 to 0.792. The flange width to hood diameter ratio spanned from 1.2 to 3.0. The hood equipped without flange was also probed. A two-component laser Doppler anemometer was used to measure the velocity field on the symmetry plane. The streamline patterns were obtained from the measured velocity data. The cross draft caused a capture envelope. The boundary of the envelope was described by a dividing streamline. It was found that the flange width presented complex effects on the capture envelope and the dividing streamline. Corresponding to a cross draft to suction velocity ratio, a critical flange width existed. If the flange width was smaller than the critical value, the dividing streamline would terminate at the downstream tip of the flange. The behaviors of the capture envelope and the dividing streamline of the hood in cross draft under different flange widths are presented and discussed.