Charge Distribution Reconstruction in a Bubbling Fluidized Bed Using a Wire-Mesh Electrostatic Sensor

The presence of electrostatic charge in a bubbling fluidized bed influences the operation of the bed. In order to maintain an effective operation, the electrostatic charges in different positions of the bed should be monitored. In this paper a wire-mesh electrostatic sensor is introduced to reconstruct the charge distribution in a bubbling fluidized bed. The wire-mesh sensor is fabricated by two mutually perpendicular strands of insulated wires. A Finite Element Model is built to analyze the sensing characteristics of the sensor. The sensitivity distributions of each wire electrode and the whole sensor are obtained from the model, which proves that wire-mesh electrostatic sensor has a higher and more uniform sensitivity distribution than single wire sensors. Experiments were conducted in a gravity drop test rig to validate the reconstruction method. Experimental results show that the charge distribution can be reconstructed when sand particles pass through the cross section of the sensor.