Understanding Net Positive Suction Head - Short notes for

GATE Mechanical Engineering

HIMANSHU VASISTHA FLUID MECHANICS POSTED: 10 MONTHS AGO

In this article, we will look at the basic understanding of Net Positive Suction
Head or NPSH. This topic is rather a di cult one to grasp for most of the
students who are preparing for GATE Mechanical Engineering or UPSC ESE
Mechanical Engineering exams. Let us begin by understanding Atmospheric
Air.

Atmospheric Air:

As de ned by Italian scientist, Evangelista Torricelli in 17th century, we live

submerged at the bottom of an ocean of air. The weight of this ocean of air
exerts a force on Earth's surface which is called barometric pressure. After
this Torricelli created the mercury barometer, which uses a complete vacuum
at the top of a glass tube to draw mercury up the tube. The weight of the
mercury column is equal to the weight of the air outside the tube. For this
reason, we measure the atmospheric pressure in mm Hg or inHg.
Pump operation:

If you don't understand how a pump functions then you will always struggle at
the problems involving pump calculations. Pumps work by creating a low
pressure at inlet which allows the liquid to be pushed into the pump by
atmospheric or head pressure (i.e. the pressure due to the liquid's surface
being above the centreline of the pump).

Consider, you have a pump at the top of the mercury barometer, which is
shown in the gure above. Even if there is perfect vacuum at the pump inlet,
atmospheric pressure limits how high the pump can lift the liquid. With liquids
lighter than mercury, this lift can increase, but there is still a physical limit to
the pump operation based on the pressure external to the pump. This limit is
the key to understanding NPSH.

Net Positive Suction Head (NPSH):

NPSH can be de ned in two ways, as given below;

1) NPSH Available ( ): The absolute pressure at the suction port of the

pump.

AND

2) NPSH Required ( ): It is the minimum pressure required at the

suction port of the pump to keep the pump from cavitating.

is a function of your system and must be calculated, on the other

hand is a function of the pump and must be provided by the pump
manufacturer. For the pump to operate without cavitating, .
To understand this in simpler words, you must have more suction side
pressure available than the pump requires.
Calculating :

It is critical to get the value of from the pump manufacturer and

ensure that your pressure is adequate to cover the requirement. The
formula to calculate is given below:

Where,

= The absolute pressure on the surface of the liquid in the supply tank.
This is typically atmospheric pressure (vented supply tank), but can be
di erent for closed tanks. It is always positive.

= The vertical distance between the surface of the liquid in the supply tank
and the centreline of the pump. It can be positive when the liquid level is
above the centreline of the pump, static head. It can be negative when the
liquid level is below the centreline of the pump, suction lift. Always use the
lowest liquid level allowed in the tank.

= Friction lossed in the suction piping.

=Velocity head at the pump suction port

= Absolute vapor pressure of the liquid at the pumping temperature. It is

usually subtracted at the end to make sure that the inlet pressure stays above
the vapor pressure. As the temperature goes up, so does the vapor pressure.

VIEWS: 625 COMMENTS 4 8

Comments

Natrajan

Please share some questions on this topic. Thanks

1
 Bharat Sharma

Good one.

Sankalp Sharma

Can you share some questions to work on NPSH. How frequently is this topic asked
in GATE Mechanical paper?

Chetan Dhawan

Thanks for this. Helped me in understanding the basics of NPSH concept.