Experiments and simulations are conducted to explore the changing laws of blast furnace raceway morphology and pressure drop with cylindrical particles. Experimental data show that there are five typical stages for the pressure drop during the raceway formation. The closer the aspect ratio (Ar) of particle to 1, the bigger the raceway size and the wider the particle moving band will be. When the raceway is in stable stage, the pressure drop can be ascribed to the cooperative action of the bed height, inlet gas velocity and Ar. Numerical results reveal that the large raceway formation for sphere-like particle is due to the small drag and contact forces. The contact forces in the prolate particle system are very large and thus result in a small raceway. Finally, the influence of particle shape is employed to improve a raceway size predictive correlation which can increase the average calculational accuracy by 3.4%.

This study used a Discrete Element Method (DEM) model to investigate the Jenike shear process of flexible, cylindrical particles with different aspect ratios. The model was validated through experiments and analytical solutions. It was found that particle shape and deformation have a significant impact on friction behavior, affecting particle deformation, contact forces, orientation, and internal friction angle. Results indicate an increase in shear stress with normal load, regardless of particle stiffness or shape. Flexible particles showed higher shear stress and internal friction angles than rigid ones, especially for aspect ratios of 6. With aspect ratios of 4 and 5, flexible particles deform significantly during shear with complex reconfiguration, while aspect ratio 6 particles experience a uniform reconfiguration, indicating a solid packing structure that enhances flow resistance. These findings will aid in improving kinetic theories for granular flow of complex irregular particle flows.