Interface Capturing Wear Model for Wear Simulation of Bead Mills

Abstract

It is important to consider the equipment wear in bead mills to maintain quality and control operational costs. In the conventional wear simulation, mesh deformation is applied using wear laws. There is a problem that the mesh is broken when large mesh deformations occur. We propose the wear simulation model which represents shape deformation by the interface capturing method in this study. The proposed model is robust because the model deforms equipment shape without requiring mesh deformation. Moreover, proposed model reduces computational costs by coupling with IB-DEM (Impulse-Based Discrete Element Method) which allows for a larger time step size than conventional DEM. We demonstrate the wear results when significant shape deformations occur due to collision with beads. We verify the proposed model by comparing the numerical results with actual worn parts by applying to the dry bead mill.