CASE STUDY TYPES OF FLOW

TABLES OF CONTENT

1) THEORY OF STEADY AND UNSTEADY

FLOW
2) THEORY OF LAMINAR AND
TURBELANT FLOW
3) IMAGES FOR STEADY AND UNSTEADY
FLOW
4) IMAGES FOR LAMINAR AND
TURBELANT FLOW
5) EXAMPLE OF APPLICATION LAMINAR
AND TURBELANT FLOW (CANDLE
SMOKE)
6) EXAMPLE OF APPLICATION LAMINAR
AND TURBELANT FLOW ( BLOOD
VESSEL)

THEORY OF STEADY AND UNSTEADY FLOW

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Hydrodynamics simulation of the RayleighTaylor instability

steady: A steady flow is one in which the conditions (velocity, pressure and crosssection) may differ from point to point but DO NOT change with time.
unsteady: If at any point in the fluid, the conditions change with time, the flow is

described as

unsteady. (In practise there is always slight variations in velocity and

pressure, but if the average values are constant, the flow is considered steady.
When all the time derivatives of a flow field vanish, the flow is considered to be
a steady flow. Steady-state flow refers to the condition where the fluid properties at a point in
the system do not change over time. Otherwise, flow is called unsteady (also called transient).
Whether a particular flow is steady or unsteady, can depend on the chosen frame of reference.
For instance, laminar flow over a sphere is steady in the frame of reference that is stationary
with respect to the sphere. In a frame of reference that is stationary with respect to a
background flow, the flow is unsteady.
Turbulent flows are unsteady by definition. A turbulent flow can, however,
be statistically stationary. According to Pope.The random field U(x,t) is statistically stationary
if all statistics are invariant under a shift in time.
This roughly means that all statistical properties are constant in time. Often, the mean
field is the object of interest, and this is constant too in a statistically stationary flow.
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Steady flows are often more tractable than otherwise similar unsteady flows. The
governing equations of a steady problem have one dimension fewer (time) than the governing
equations of the same problem without taking advantage of the steadiness of the flow field.

THEORY OF LAMINAR AND TURBELANT FLOW

Turbulence is flow characterized by recirculation, eddies, and apparent randomness.
Flow in which turbulence is not exhibited is called laminar. It should be noted, however, that
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the presence of eddies or recirculation alone does not necessarily indicate turbulent flow
these phenomena may be present in laminar flow as well. Mathematically, turbulent flow is
often represented via a Reynolds decomposition, in which the flow is broken down into the
sum of an average component and a perturbation component.
It is believed that turbulent flows can be described well through the use of the Navier
Stokes equations. Direct numerical simulation (DNS), based on the NavierStokes equations,
makes it possible to simulate turbulent flows at moderate Reynolds numbers. Restrictions
depend on the power of the computer used and the efficiency of the solution algorithm. The
results of DNS have been found to agree well with experimental data for some flows.
Most flows of interest have Reynolds numbers much too high for DNS to be a viable
option, given the state of computational power for the next few decades. Any flight vehicle
large enough to carry a human (L > 3 m), moving faster than 72 km/h (20 m/s) is well beyond
the limit of DNS simulation (Re = 4 million). Transport aircraft wings (such as on anAirbus
A300 or Boeing 747) have Reynolds numbers of 40 million (based on the wing chord). In
order to solve these real-life flow problems, turbulence models will be a necessity for the
foreseeable

future. Reynolds-averaged

NavierStokes

equations (RANS)

combined

with turbulence modelling provides a model of the effects of the turbulent flow. Such a
modelling mainly provides the additional momentum transfer by the Reynolds stresses,
although the turbulence also enhances the heat and mass transfer. Another promising
methodology is large eddy simulation (LES), especially in the guise of detached eddy
simulation (DES)which is a combination of RANS turbulence modelling and large eddy
simulation.
From the standpoint of analysis of fluid flow, the distinction between laminar and
turbulent is one of the most important. With the power of present-day computers essentially
any laminar flow can be predicted with better accuracy than can be achieved with laboratory
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measurements. But for turbulent flow this is not the case. At present, except for the very
simplest of flow situations, it is not possible to predict details of turbulent fluid motion. In
fact, it is sometimes said that we do not even actually know what turbulence is. But certainly,
at least from a qualitative perspective,we can readily recognize it, and on this basis it is clear
that most flows of engineering importance are turbulent. It is our purpose in the present
section to provide some examples that will help in developing intuition regarding the
differences between laminar and turbulent flows. Probably our most common experience with
the distinction between laminar and turbulent flow comes from observing the flow of water
from a faucet as we increase the flow rate. We depict this in Fig. 2.19. Part (a) of the figure
displays a laminar (and steady) relatively low-speed flow in which the trajectories followed
by fluid parcels are very regular and smooth; furthermore, there is no indication that these
trajectories might exhibit drastic changes in direction. In part (b) of the figure we present a
flow that is still laminar, but one that results as we open the faucet more than in the previous
case, permitting a higher flow speed. In such a case the surface of the stream of water begins
to exhibit waves, and these will change in time (basically in a periodic way). Thus the flow
has become time dependent, but there is still no apparent intermingling of trajectories.
Finally, in part (c) of the figure we show a turbulent flow corresponding to much higher flow
speed.We see that the paths followed by fluid parcels are now quite complicated and
entangled indicating a high degree of mixing (in this case only of momentum). Such flows
are three dimensional and time dependent, and very difficult to predict in detail.The most
important single point to observe from the above figures and discussion is that as flow speed
increases, details of the flow become more complicated and ultimately there is a transition

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from laminar to turbulent flow.Identification of turbulence as a class of fluid flow was first
made by Leonardo da Vinci more than 500 years ago as indicated by his now famous
sketches, one of which we present here in Fig. 2.20. In fact, da Vinci was evidently the first to
use the word turbulence to describe this type of flow behavior. Despite this early
recognition of turbulence, little formal investigation wascarried out until the late 19th
Century when experimental facilities were first becoming sufficiently sophisticated to permit
such studies. The work of Osbourne Reynolds in the 1880s and 1890s is still widely used
today, and in some sense little progress has been made over the past 100 years. In Fig.2.21 we
display a rendition of Reynolds original experiments that indicated in a semi-quantitative
way the transition to turbulence of flow in a pipe as the flow speed is increased. What is
evident from this figure is analogous to what we have already seen with flow from a faucet,
but now in the context of an actual experiment; namely, as long as the flow speed is low the
flow will be laminar, but as soon as it is fast enough turbulent flow will occur. Details as to
how and why this happens are not completely understood and still constitute a major area of
research in fluid dynamics, despite the fact that the problem has been recognized for five
centuries and has been the subject of intense investigation for the past 120 years.

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Figure 2.20: da Vinci sketch depicting turbulent flow.

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IMAGES FOR STEADY AND UNSTEADY

IMAGES FOR LAMINAR AND TURBELANT

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EXAMPLE OF APPLICATION LAMINAR AND TURBELANT FLOW (CANDLE

SMOKE)
If you have been around smokers, you probably noticed that the cigarette smoke rises in a
smooth plume for the first few centimeters and then starts fluctuating randomly in all
directions as it continues its rise. Other plumes behave similarly in below figure The flow
regime in the first case is said to be laminar, characterized by smooth streamlines and highly
ordered motion, and turbulent in the second case, where it is characterized by velocity
fluctuations and highly disordered motion.

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EXAMPLE OF APPLICATION LAMINAR AND TURBELANT FLOW (BLOOD

VESSEL)
LAMINAR FLOW
Laminar flow is the normal condition for blood flow throughout most of the
circulatory system. It is characterized by concentric layers of blood moving in parallel down
the length of a blood vessel. The highest velocity (Vmax) is found in the center of the vessel.
The lowest velocity (V=0) is found along the vessel wall. The flow profile is parabolic
once laminar flow is fully developed. This occurs in long, straight blood vessels, under steady
flow conditions. One practical implication of parabolic, laminar flow is that when flow
velocity is measured using a Doppler flowmeter, the velocity value represents the average
velocity of a cross-section of the vessel, not the maximal velocity found in the center of the
flow stream.

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TURBELANT FLOW
Generally in the body, blood flow is laminar. However, under conditions of high flow,
particularly in the ascending aorta, laminar flow can be disrupted and become turbulent.
When this occurs, blood does not flow linearly and smoothly in adjacent layers, but instead
the flow can be described as being chaotic.The Turbulent flow also occurs in large arteries at
branch points, in diseased and narrowed (stenotic) arteries (see figure below). Turbulence
increases the energy required to drive blood flow because turbulence increases the loss of
energy in the form of friction, which generates heat. Turbulence does not begin to occur until
the velocity of flow becomes high enough that the flow lamina break apart. Therefore, as
blood flow velocity increases in a blood vessel or across a heart valve, there is not a gradual
increase in turbulence. Instead, turbulence occurs when a critical Reynolds number (Re) is
exceeded.

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