Internal Lobe Pump Design

The subject of this paper is the theoretical analysis of the internal lobe pump which is a particular type of positive displacement rotary pump. The main components of the pump are the rotors: usually the outer one is characterised by lobes with circular shape, while the inner rotor profile is determined as conjugate to the other. For this reason the first topic presented here is the definition of the geometry of the rotors starting from the design parameters. The choice of these parameters is subject to some limitations in order to avoid inner rotor undercutting and to limit the pressure angle between the rotors. Now we will consider the design optimisation. The first step is the determination of the instantaneous flow rate in function of the design parameters. This allows us to calculate two performance indexes commonly used for the study of positive displacement pumps: the flow rate irregularity and the specific flow rate. These indexes are used to optimise the design of the pump and to obtain the sets of optimum design parameters. Finally further considerations are presented regarding the calculation and the use of other performance indexes, the specific slipping and the rotor curvature, which are particularly suitable for giving more elements for the analysis of this case.