Atomization of liquids with high viscosity is always a challenge, especially when small diameter droplets and high liquid flow rates are simultaneously required. In the present research, the performance of a Venturi-vortex twin-fluid swirl nozzle is examined, attending to its capabilities to generate droplets with diameters below 20 mu m when atomizing pure glycerin at room temperature. In this nozzle, air is injected tangentially in a central convergent section, and discharges suctioning the liquid fed to a coaxial chamber, here using a gear pump. The resulting spray is visualized and analyzed. Droplet size distributions are measured with a laser diffractometer. As expected, droplet diameter increases with liquid flow rate, and quickly diminishes when air flow rate is increased. Sauter mean diameters (SMD) below 15 pm can be obtained even when atomizing pure glycerin. However, these values are obtained for relatively low glycerin flow rates (similar to 51/h), and with rather wide distributions. For 101/h and an air-to-liquid mass flow rate ratio (ALR) of 13.7 more than 26% of the glycerin volume is atomized in droplets smaller than 20 gm. Liquid ligaments are observed near the nozzle exit, but they tend to break up while moving downstream. (C) 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.