Hostname: page-component-7c8c6479df-8mjnm Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-03-27T06:59:45.436Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Transition to turbulence in the free convection boundary layers on an inclined heated plate

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 March 2006

D. J. Tritton
Affiliation:
Department of Aeronautical Engineering, Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore

Abstract

An experimental study has been made of transition to turbulence in the free convective flows on a heated plate. Observations have been made with the plate vertical and inclined at angles up to about 50° to the vertical, both above and below the plate. A fibre anemometer was used to survey the region of intermittent turbulence. Information has thus been obtained about the range of Grashof numbers over which transition takes place. Even when the plate is vertical the region of intermittent turbulence is long. When it is inclined, this region becomes still longer in the flow below the plate as a result of the stabilizing stratification, a Richardson number effect. It is possible to have a whole flow such that it should be described as transitional, not laminar or turbulent. It was noticed that in this flow and the vertical plate one, the velocity during the laminar periods could be either of two characteristic values, one of them close to zero. The behaviour above an inclined plate could be interpreted largely as a trend towards the behaviour described in a preceding paper.

The observations on the stably stratified flow help to explain a feature of glacier winds.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
© 1963 Cambridge University Press

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Bayley, F. J. 1955 Proc. Inst. Mech. Engrs, 169, 361.
Chandrasekhar, S. 1961 Hydrodynamic and Hydromagnetic Stability. Oxford University Press.
Dhawan, S. & Narasimha, R. 1958 J. Fluid Mech. 3, 418.
Eckert, E. R. G. & Jackson, T. W. 1951 Nat. Adv. Comm. Aero., Wash., Tech. Rep. no. 1015.
Eckert, E. R. G., Soehngen, E. & Schneider, P. J. 1955 50 Jahre Grenzschichtforschung, p. 407 (ed. by Görtler & Tollmein). Vieweg.
Ekhart, E. 1934 Beitr. Phys. Frei. Atmos, 21, 245.
Ellison, T. H. 1957 J. Fluid Mech. 2, 456.
Ellison, T. H. & Turner, J. S. 1959 J. Fluid Mech. 6, 423.
Ellison, T. H. & Turner, J. S. 1960 J. Fluid Mech. 8, 529.
Emmons, H. W. 1951 J. Aero. Sci. 18, 490.
Fujii, T. 1959 Bull. Japan Soc. Mech. Engrs, 2, 551.
Griffiths, E. & Davis, A. H. 1922 Special Rep. no. 9, Food Investigation Board, D.S.I.R.
Hermann, R. 1936 VDI Forschungsheft 379 (translated as Nat. Adv. Comm. Aero., Wash., Tech. Mem. no. 1366.)
Kraus, W. 1955 Messungen des Temperatur- und Geschwindigkeitsfeldes bei freier Konvektion. Karlsruhe: Braun.
Kurtz, E. F. & Crandall, S. H. 1962 J. Math. Phys. 41, 264.
Lin, C. C. 1945 Quart. Appl. Math. 3, 218.
Michev, M. A. 1947 Izv. Akad. Nauk. SSSR, Otd. tekh. Nauk. no. 10.
Narasimha, R. 1957 J. Aero. Sci. 24, 711.
Ostrach, S. 1953 Nat. Adv. Comm. Aero., Wash., Tech. Rep. no. 1111.
Plapp, J. E. 1957 J. Aero. Sci. 24, 318.
Prandtl, L. 1952 Essentials of Fluid Dynamics. London: Blackie.
Rayleigh, Lord 1880 Proc. Lond. Math. Soc. 11, 57.
Rich, B. R. 1953 Trans. Amer. Soc. Mech. Engrs, 75, 489.
Richardson, L. F. 1920 Proc. Roy. Soc. A, 97, 354.
Saunders, O. A. 1936 Proc. Roy. Soc. A, 157, 278.
Saunders, O. A. 1939 Proc. Roy. Soc. A, 172, 55.
Schlichting, H. 1935 Z. angew. Math. Mech. 15, 313.
Schlichting, H. 1955 Boundary Layer Theory. London: Pergamon.
Schmidt, H. 1932 Forsch. Geb. IngWes. 3, 181.
Schmidt, E. & Beckmann, W. 1930 Tech. Mech. Thermodynam, 1, 341, 391.
Squire, H. B. 1953 Chap. XIV of Modern Developments in Fluid Mechanics, High Speed Flow (ed. by L. Howarth). Oxford University Press.
Szewczyk, A. A. 1962 Internat. J. Heat Mass Transfer, 5, 903.
Tollner, H. 1931 Met. Z. 48, 414.
Townsend, A. A. 1956 The Structure of Turbulent Shear Flow. Cambridge University Press.
Townsend, A. A. 1958 J. Fluid Mech. 3, 361.
Tritton, D. J. 1959 J. Fluid Mech. 6, 547.
Tritton, D. J. 1960 Ph.D. thesis, University of Cambridge.
Tritton, D. J. 1963a J. Fluid Mech. 16, 259.
Tritton, D. J. 1963b J. Fluid Mech. 16, 272.