Preliminary measurements of an enlarged blood pump model

The centrifugal blood pump with a magnetically suspended impeller has shown its superiority over other artificial hearts. However, there is still insufficient understanding of fluid mechanics related issues in the clearance gap. The design requires sufficient washout in the clearance between the impeller and stationary surfaces. As the gap is only 0.2mm in width, it is very difficult to conduct measurements with present instrumentation. A 5:1 enlarged pump model was thus designed and constructed according to specifications. Flow characteristics and gap pressure measurements of the model are very close to the prototype. (C) 1998 Elsevier Science Ltd