Roughness effects on the Reynolds stress budgets in near-wall turbulence

The physics of the roughness sublayer are studied by direct numerical simulations (DNS) of an open-channel flow with sandgrain roughness. A double-averaging (DA) approach is used to separate the spatial variations of the time-averaged quantities and the turbulent fluctuations. The spatial inhomogeneity of velocity and Reynolds stresses results in an additional production term for the turbulent kinetic energy (TKE) – the ‘wake production’; it is the excess wake kinetic energy (WKE), generated from the work of mean flow against the form drag, that is not directly dissipated into heat, but instead converted into turbulence. The wake production promotes wall-normal turbulent fluctuations and increases the pressure work, which ultimately leads to more homogeneous turbulence in the roughness sublayer, and to the increase of Reynolds shear stress and the drag on the rough wall. In the fully rough regime, roughness directly affects the generation of the wall-normal fluctuations, while in the transitionally rough regime, the region affected by roughness is separated from the region of intense generation of these fluctuations. The budget of the WKE and the connection between the wake and the turbulence suggest strong interactions between the roughness sublayer and the outer layer that are insensitive to the variation of the outer-layer conditions. Furthermore, the present results may have implications for the relationship between the roughness geometry and the flow dynamics in the region directly affected by roughness.

An Effective, Economic, Aspirated Radiation Shield for Air Temperature Observations and Its Spatial Gradients

This paper presents the design and evaluates the performance of a double-walled electrically aspirated radiation shield for thermometers measuring air temperature and its gradients in the atmospheric surface layer. Tests were performed to quantify its solar radiation error and wake production, and to characterize the observer effect of the forced aspiration on vertical temperature gradients in the calm and stable boundary layer. Construction requirements were to design a unit that uses inexpensive off-the-shelf components, to assemble easily, to facilitate reconfiguration to accommodate various sensors, and to reduce power consumption with the goal of reducing costs and enabling use in sensor networks in remote locations. The custom-aspirated shield was evaluated in reference to a triple-walled commercially available model and subjected to rigorous testing in a wind tunnel and field experiments. The relative radiation error of air temperature measurements in the custom-aspirated shield was equal to or smaller than that in the reference shield within ±0.08 K for solar irradiances ≥1000 W m−2 and calm winds. At night, thermal imagery revealed no significant differences in surface temperatures of both shields and the air temperature. Both shields produced significant wake within a ±30° sector of incident flow. Even for weak flows ≤0.7 m s−1, higher-order moments were increased by a factor of 3, while the mean airflow speed was reduced by up to 30% compared to uncontaminated directions. Careful inspection of the spatiotemporal dynamics of air temperatures in a vertical profile showed negligible impact of the forced aspiration on the finescale structure of the observations for the nocturnal and transitional calm surface layers.

Modeling of a One-Equation LES for Plant Canopy Flows

A one-equation-type subgrid-scale (SGS) model was proposed in order to enable the large eddy simulation (LES) of plant canopy flows. The SGS kinetic energy equation was derived from the equations of continuity and Navier-Stokes. This equation was closed by modeling the unknown terms according to the physical meaning of each term in the equation. The wake production term in the SGS kinetic equation could be derived analytically. However, the wake dissipation term did not appear when the SGS kinetic energy equation was derived from the basic equations.

Mean Velocity and Decay Characteristics of the Guidevane and Stator Blade Wake of an Axial Flow Compressor

Pure tone noise, blade row vibrations, and aerodynamic losses are phenomena which are influenced by stator and IGV blade wake production, decay, and interaction in an axial-flow compressor. The objective of this investigation is to develop a better understanding of the nature of stator and IGV blade wakes that are influenced by the presence of centrifugal forces due to flow curvature. A single sensor hot wire probe was employed to determine the three mean velocity components of stator and IGV wakes of a single stage compressor. These wake profiles indicated a varying decay rate of the tangential and axial wake velocity components and a wake profile similarity. An analysis, which predicts this trend, has been developed. The radial velocities are found to be appreciable in both IGV and the stator wakes. This wake data as well as the data from other sources are correlated in this paper. Appreciable static pressure gradient across the wake is found to exist near the trailing edge of both stator and IGV.