Storage tanks with baffles can significantly improve the flow pattern distribution of fluids and reduce the turbulent kinetic energy of disordered vortices in traditional storage tanks by 35% to 60%. According to the requirements of the API 608 standard for industrial pump systems, for cylindrical storage tanks without baffles, when the liquid level is lower than 60%, the pre-rotation energy loss at the impeller inlet can reach 18% of the total power consumption, while the design of 6 vertical baffles can narrow the flow velocity fluctuation range from ±1.2m/s to ±0.3m/s. For example, after a certain chemical enterprise upgraded the 20,000-liter solvent storage tank, the vibration amplitude of the pump body decreased from 8.5mm/s to 2.1mm/s, and the bearing replacement cycle was extended from 6 months to 22 months.
The baffle structure can reduce the cavitation risk probability to 15% of the original working condition. When the viscosity of the liquid is within the range of 50-100cP, four evenly distributed baffles can increase the critical value of NPSH (net positive suction head) by 0.7 meters, avoiding the formation of bubble clusters in the local negative pressure area (<-95 kpa). In the Fuel Pump test of Toyota’s new generation hybrid model, the resin fuel tank with A curved baffle reduced the generation of gasoline vapor by 43%, the cavitation noise of the pump body decreased from 78dB(A) to 65dB(A), and the lifespan of the core components was thus extended by 92%.
The improvement of heat exchange efficiency is another core advantage. The baffle formed a baffle flow channel, which increases the medium residence time by 40%. Under the working condition of a temperature difference of 15℃, the heat transfer coefficient K value can be optimized to 180W/㎡·K, which is 55% higher than that of the storage tank without baffles. The 50℃ syrup storage and transportation system of a certain food enterprise shows that after adding baffles, the single-cycle cooling time was shortened from 45 minutes to 25 minutes, and the annual energy saving reached 127,000kWh. This design can also reduce the power consumption of stirring – in a storage tank with a diameter of 3 meters, a 1.5kW paddle agitator combined with baffles requires only 60% of the power required for the uniformity of mixing (coefficient of variation ≤5%) of the baffle-free system, and the unit energy consumption is reduced by 6.8% when the flow rate is 1m/s.
The reduction in operation and maintenance costs is reflected in many aspects. The baffle prevents over 90% of the sediment from migrating towards the pump port, reducing the frequency of filter replacement by 50%. In the aeration tank renovation of a certain sewage treatment plant, the design of 8 sets of baffles reduced the standard deviation of the sludge concentration distribution from 12% to 3%, and slowed down the wear rate of the pump body’s flow-through components to 0.15mm per year. The factory’s annual maintenance budget was thus saved by $24,000, and the downtime frequency was reduced from 1.8 times per quarter to 0.4 times. Life cycle analysis shows that the initial investment in baffle storage tanks increases by approximately 15%, but the comprehensive return rate within three years can reach 23%.