PIV Measurements of Non-cavitating and Cavitating Flow in Wake of Two-dimensional Wedge-shaped Submerged Body

Abstract

The vortex flow behind a bluff body has been a subject of interest for a very long time because of its engineering applicability such as to vortex induced vibration. In the near wake of a bluff body, vortices are periodically shed in two shear layers, which originate in the trailing edges. The far wake is made up of the classical Karman vortices, which are connected together by streamwise and spanwise vortices. These vortex formations have been studied in many experimental and numerical ways. However, most of the studies considered non-cavitating flow. In this study, we investigated cavitating flow in the wake of a two-dimensional wedge. Experiments were conducted in a cavitation tunnel of Chungnam National University. Using a particle image velocimetry (PIV), we measured the velocity fields under two different flow conditions: non-cavitating and cavitating regimes. We also investigated the vortex shedding frequencies using an absolute pressure transducer mounted on the top of the test window. Throughout the experiments, it was found that the shedding frequency of the vortex was strongly affected by cavitation, and the Strouhal number could exceed its value in the non-cavitating regime.

Keywords

• Particle image velocimetry
• Wake flow
• Cavitation
• Vortex street