ChE 201 EXAM I Name______________________

15 – 19 Feb 2017 100 points

This exam is open textbook - Felder & Rousseau (& Bullard), Elementary Principles of
Chemical Processes). You may use your textbook and one sheet of notes (8.5”x11”).
During the exam, you may not access any other resources or discuss with anyone the
exam problems without the approval of Dr. Bowman. Cheating is prohibited and is
grounds for failure in the course.

Use extra sheets of paper for any additional work

(15) 1. A 6.0 inch diameter pipeline carries n-heptane flowing at a volumetric flow
rate of 15 gal/s. Determine:
a) The mass flow rate (in lbm/sec)
b) The molar flow rate (in lb-mol/sec)
c) The average velocity (in ft/sec)

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(25) 2. An instrument for determining the velocity of a fluid is known as a pitot tube.
This instrument is used in many applications, including measuring the air
speed velocity of planes and determining the fluid velocity in process pipe
lines. A schematic of a pitot tube used to measure the flow rate in process
pipelines is shown in Figure 1. As the fluid impacts the pitot tube the pressure
at point Pt increases relative to point Ps (please note that this is static pressure
as there is no flow in the pitot tube). The larger the pressure differential
between Pt and Ps the faster the fluid flow. After calibrating the pitot tube the
pressure differential can be used to estimate the fluid velocity.

A pitot tube, with carbon tetrachloride as the operating fluid, will be used to
measure the flow rate of n-heptane through a pipeline. At the desired flow rate
h1 = 25 cm and h2 = 7.8 cm. Determine the pressure differential (in kPa) for
this flow rate.

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 (60) 3. In the production of sunflower oil, seeds (Stream 1) containing 31.0 wt% oil
and 69.0% solids are ground and fed to a stirred tank (the extractor) along with
a stream of liquid n-hexane, C6H14(l), (Stream 3). The feed ratio entering the
reactor is 4.00 kg hexane/kg seeds. The ground seeds are suspended in the
liquid, and essentially all of the oil in the seeds is extracted into the hexane.
The extractor effluent (Stream 4) passes to a filter where the solids are
collected and form a filter cake (Stream 5). The filter cake contains 80.0 wt%
seed solids and the balance seed oil and hexane, the latter two in the same ratio
in which they emerge from the extractor. The filter cake is discarded and the
liquid filtrate (Stream 6) is fed to a heated evaporator in which the hexane is
vaporized and the oil remains as a liquid (Stream 7). The oil is stored in drums
and shipped. The hexane vapor (Stream 8) is subsequently cooled and
condensed, and the liquid hexane condensate is added to the fresh hexane
(Stream 2) and recycled to the extractor.

a) Why must fresh hexane (Stream 2) be fed into this process?

b) Why is a recycle stream (Stream 8) included in this process?
c) What is the mass fraction of oil in Stream 4?
d) How much oil is lost in the filter cake?
e) How much oil is produced per kg of seeds fed (Stream 7/Stream 1)?
f) How much fresh hexane is fed per kg of seeds fed (Stream 2/Stream 1)?
g) What is the recycle to fresh feed ratio (Stream 8/Stream 2)?

Stream 8

Stream 2 Stream 4 Stream 6

Stream 3
Stream 1 Stream 5 Stream 7

Seeds

Please show work on another sheet of paper. There is not enough room here.

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