Hilbert-Huang transform based electrostatic signal analysis for characterization of dilute gas-solid two-phase flow

Online measurement of the particulate flow plays a significant role in the monitoring and controlling process of the industrial application. Due to the simple structure and non-intrusive character, the electrostatic sensor is widely used in industrial applications. The electrostatic signal from ring-shape electrostatic sensor was used in this paper to investigate the flow dynamics. Because of the advantages of Hilbert-Huang Transform, it was utilized to characterize the flow dynamics from the electrostatic signal of dilute gas-solid two-phase flow in the horizontal pipeline. A new method was introduced to eliminate the noise component of the electrostatic signal. The filtered electrostatic signal was then analyzed to find the relationship between the average fluctuation frequency and air flow rate. Besides, it can be concluded that the energy of the selected intrinsic mode functions can be a useful parameter to characterize the solid-phase concentration.