Characteristics of bubble rise in water and non-newtonian fluids

The characteristics of bubble rise phenomenon in three liquids were studied in a newly designed rig and are reported here. The experimental rig consists of two transparent cylindrical columns – one a polycarbonate tube of 125 mm diameter and the other an acrylic tube of 400 mm diameter. The rig also consists of a lifting device designed to hold a video camera for taking bubble images. Water and two non-Newtonian fluids (0.025% and 0.045% by weight of polyacrylamide solutions) were used in this study. The smaller polycarbonate tube was used to study the bubble rise characteristics namely, the velocity and the drag coefficient under vacuum. The bigger acrylic tube was used to study the influence of the size of bubbles. Keywords: vacuum pan, rising velocity, massecuite, rheology, polymeric liquids.