AIR FLOW AND ENVIRONMENTAL WIND VISUALIZATION USING A CW DIODE PUMPED FREQUENCY DOUBLED Nd:YAG Laser

Abstract

Preliminary results obtained in developing a visualisation technique for non-invasive analysis of air flow inside INCAS subsonic wind tunnel and its appendages are presented. The visualisation technique is based on using a green light sheet generated by a continuous wave (cw) longitudinally diode pumped and frequency doubled Nd:YAG laser. The output laser beam is expanded on one direction and collimated on rectangular direction. The system is tailored to the requirements of qualitative analysis and vortex tracking requirements inside the INCAS 2.5m x 2.0m subsonic wind tunnel test section, for measurements performed on aircraft models. Also the developed laser techniques is used for non-invasive air flow field analysis into environmental facilities settling room (air flow calming area). Quantitative analysis is enabled using special image processing tools upon movies and pictures obtained during the experiments. The basic experimental layout in the wind tunnel takes advantage of information obtained from the investigation of various aircraft models using the developed visualisation technique. These results are further developed using a Particle Imaging Velocimetry (PIV) experimental technique.The focus is on visualisation techniques to be used for wind flow characterization at different altitudes in indus-trial and civil buildings areas using a light sheet generated by a Nd:YAG cw pumped and doubled laser at 532 nm wave-length. The results are important for prevention of biological/chemical disasters such as spreading of extremely toxic pol-lutants due to wind. Numerical simulations of wind flow and experimental visualisation results are compared. A good agreement between these results is observed.

Keywords

• air flow
• visualization
• laser light sheet
• light frequency doubling
• diode pumped Nd:YAG laser
• wind engineering
• build-ing aerodynamics