Wall pressure fluctuations in the reattachment region of a supersonic free shear layer

The primary aim of this research program was to investigate the mechanisms which cause the unsteady wall-pressure fluctuations in shock wave turbulent shear layer interactions. The secondary aim was to find means to reduce the magnitude of the fluctuating pressure loads by controlling the unsteady shock motion. The particular flow under study is the unsteady shock wave interaction formed in the reattachment zone of a separated supersonic flow. Similar flows are encountered in many practical situations, and they are associated with high levels of fluctuating wall pressure. The free shear layer is formed by the flow over a backward facing step, using an existing model, with the base pressure on the step adjusted so that there is no pressure discontinuity at the lip. The shear layer therefore develops in a zero pressure gradient. The primary advantage of this flow configuration is that the reattachment process can be studied in the absence of a separation shock. The mean flow data, and some preliminary hot-wire measurements of the mass-flux fluctuations were made by Baca and Settles, Baca, Williams and Bogdonoff, who showed that the shear layer became self-similar at about 17 delta(sub 0) downstream of the lip, and that it grew at a rate typical of the observed Mach number difference (about 1/3rd the incompressible growth rate). The turbulence measurements were later extended by Hayakawa, Smits and Bogdonoff under NASA Headquarters support

Scaling the propulsive performance of heaving and pitching foils

Scaling laws for the propulsive performance of rigid foils undergoing oscillatory heaving and pitching motions are presented. Water tunnel experiments on a nominally two-dimensional flow validate the scaling laws, with the scaled data for thrust, power, and efficiency all showing excellent collapse. The analysis indicates that the behaviour of the foils depends on both Strouhal number and reduced frequency, but for motions where the viscous drag is small the thrust closely follows a linear dependence on reduced frequency. The scaling laws are also shown to be consistent with biological data on swimming aquatic animals.Comment: 11 page