Experimental study on liquid spreading characteristics in a trickle bed

Abstract The performance of a trickle bed reactor (TBR) is primarily determined by liquid spreading in the reactor. The radial spreading will be weakened under the uniform liquid inlet conditions. To elucidate liquid spreading characteristics, particularly radial dispersion, the non‐uniform liquid inlet condition is investigated in trickle bed reactor. It is found that the liquid spreading characteristics are mainly determined by the governing forces on the liquid. Therefore, dimensionless numbers including the Weber number (We) and the AB number (AB) are introduced to quantify the impact of governing forces. The results show that gravity is the primary governing force under the experiment conditions. Nevertheless, inertial forces and capillary forces show gradually more significant effects with enhanced gas–liquid flow rates and aspect ratios. Gravity and gas‐phase inertial forces promote axial liquid spreading, while capillary forces and liquid‐phase inertial forces promote radial liquid spreading. Finally, an empirical correlation considering the governing forces is established to predict the liquid spreading uniformity.