Distributed Parameter Pneumatics

Abstract

Pneumatics is a branch of engineering that deals with the use of pressurized air or gases to create mechanical motion. It involves the study and application of systems and components such as air compressors, valves, cylinders, and actuators to control and transmit power through the use of compressed air. For highly dynamic events in pneumatic systems, such as fast switching processes in automation technology, lumped-parameter simulation is not sufficient to correctly calculate the pressure build-up in pipes. The propagation and reflections of different pressure waves and refraction waves cannot be accounted for by the zero-dimensional models provided by the Modelica.Fluid library. Therefore, a method for calculating such events using the finite volume method is presented in this paper. The library presented in this work, uses Gudonov's scheme and an arbitrary Riemann-solver and gas model to calculate the time evolution inside 1D or 2D discretized pneumatic components as well as systems composed of these components.