Effect of valve plate silencing grooves on flow and pressure fluctuation in fixed displacement radial piston pump

This study focuses on the flow and pressure fluctuations of a fixed displacement radial piston pump with a valve plate with silencing grooves, and the effect of the number of pistons (5, 6, and 7) is investigated. Over the manifolds of the pump, valve plate silencing grooves are regarded as Top Dead Center and Bottom Dead Center. The mathematical modeling is run in MATLAB Simulink. Analyzing the flow characteristics and volumetric efficiency of the pump with and without silencing groove valve plate configuration of the pump is done. The opening and closing area pattern of the kidney port is also analyzed. The percentage reduction of flow and pressure fluctuation with the silencing groove is 19% and 16.16%, respectively, for Z = 7, as compared to the model without silencing groove valve plate. The volumetric efficiency of the model with silencing groove valve plate is improved from 1% to 2% as compared to the model without silencing groove valve plate. The lower the flow and pressure fluctuation coefficients, the higher the flow rate and volumetric efficiency of the pump for the model with silencing groove valve plate.