Instability analysis of modulated Taylor vortices

This study investigates the instability analysis of modulated Taylor vortices flow by utilising a numerical method. Based on the consideration that the outer cylinder is fixed and the inner cylinder rotates at a non-zero averaged speed under varying modulated amplitudes and frequencies, the flow is converted from one-dimension Couette flow to Taylor vortices. When the modulated amplitude is greater than 1 and the rotation speed of the inner cylinder exceeds the threshold value for one-dimensional flow, the flow will be more stable at intermediate and high frequencies. When the modulated amplitude is sufficiently large and the inner cylinder rotates at medium frequency, subharmonic flow arises.     

On the development of Taylor vortices in a vertical annulus with a heated rotating inner cylinder

A numerical study has been conducted to determine the heat transfer characteristics and flow patterns which develop around a rotating, heated vertical cylinder enclosed within a stationary concentric cylinder. A tall annulus (aspect ratio of 10) with fixed, adiabatic horizontal end-plates and a radius ratio of 0·5 has been considered. Furthermore, the effect that the introduction of buoyancy forces by heating the inner cylinder has on the development of the Taylor vortex flow is examined. It is observed that the formation of the Taylor vortices is delayed until the rotational parameter σ = Gr/Re² has a value below unity for any given Reynolds number Re which is above the critical value Re_crit for the formation of Taylor vortices in an isothermal flow. Also, the Taylor cells first appear at the top of the annulus. As σ is gradually decreased below unity, bifurcations to other states are observed. The final structure of the secondary flow is noticeably distorted in the mixed-convection mode, with the size of the Taylor cells varying greatly along the height of the annulus. This distortion diminishes as σ is further decreased, until the isothermal flow pattern is nearly recovered below σ = 0·01.     

轻载径向滑动轴承中Taylor涡动的产生和影响研究

本文用原始变量法直接求解了三维的Ｎ－Ｓ方程，计算分析了高速旋转有限长圆柱轴承中油膜层流失稳产生涡动的临界Ｔａｙｌｏｒ数及流场、压力场和摩擦阻力。轴承端部泄油量等的变化。结果表明，在有限长同心圆柱轴承中，随着轴旋转速度的提高，轴承磨擦阻力线性增大，油膜层流失稳出现的涡动增加轴承摩擦阻力并减少轴承端部泄油量，油膜层流失稳后，轴承长度方向均匀地排列着一些流体涡，涡动的强度从轴承中间截面向轴承端部逐渐减弱     

Flow pattern and stability of pseudoplastic axial Taylor–Couette flow

The effect of an axial flow on the stability of the Taylor–Couette flow is explored for pseudoplastic fluids. The fluid is assumed to follow the Carreau–Bird model and mixed boundary conditions are imposed while the axial flow can be independent of rotational flow. The four-dimensional low-order dynamical system, resulted from Galerkin projection of the conservation of mass and momentum equations, includes additional non-linear terms in the velocity components originated from the shear-dependent viscosity. In absence of axial flow the base flow loses its radial flow stability to the vortex structure at a lower critical Taylor number, as the pseudoplasticity effects increases. The emergence of the vortices corresponds to the onset of a supercritical bifurcation which is also seen in the flow of a linear fluid. However, unlike the Newtonian case, pseudoplastic Taylor vortices lose their stability as the Taylor number reaches a second critical number corresponding to the onset of a Hopf bifurcation. Existence of an axial flow, induced by a pressure gradient appears to further advance each critical point on the bifurcation diagram. Complete flow field together with viscosity maps are given for stability regions in the bifurcation diagram.     

The lowest stability and bifurcation in supercritical Taylor vortices

Here, we numerically investigate the lowest stability and bifurcation boundary of supercritical Taylor vortices in flows with different wavenumbers and for various radius ratios; the radius ratios range from those corresponding to axisymmetrical Taylor vortex flow (TVF) to those corresponding to wavy vortex flow (WVF). The variation in the wavenumber of a supercritical TVF is found to affect the stability of the flow, because the wavenumber of the Taylor vortices remains constant only when the flow is quasi-static. The variation in the wavenumber is examined and found to be significant when the radius ratio is less than 0.7842. The results for TVF are compared with those for the flow during the quasi-static transition from TVF to WVF.     

Study on the influences of interaction behaviors between multiple combustion-gas jets on expansion characteristics of Taylor cavities

The purpose of this study is to investigate means of controlling the interior ballistic stability of a bulk-loaded propellant gun(BLPG).Experiments on the interaction of twin combustion gas jets and liquid medium in a cylindrical stepped-wall combustion chamber are conducted in detail to obtain time series processes of jet expansion,and a numerical simulation under the same working conditions is also conducted to verify the reliability of the numerical method by comparing numerical results and experimental results.From this,numerical simulations on mutual interference and expansion characteristics of multiple combustion gas jets(four,six,and eight jets) in liquid medium are carried out,and the distribution characteristic of pressure,velocity,temperature,and evolutionary processes of Taylor cavities and streamlines of jet flow Held are obtained in detail.The results of numerical simulations show that when different numbers of combustion gas jets expand in liquid medium,there are two different types of vortices in the jet flow field,including corner vortices of liquid phase near the step and backflow vortices of gas phase within Taylor cavities.Because of these two types of vortices,the radial expansion characteristic of the jets is increased,while changing numbers of combustion gas jets can restrain Kelvin-Helmholtz instability to a certain degree in jet expansion processes,which can at last realize the goal of controlling the interior ballistic stability of a BLPG.The optimum method for both suppressing Kelvin-Helmholtz instability and promoting radial expansion of Taylor cavities can be determined by analyzing the change of characteristic parameters in a jet flow field.     

Order in chaotic pseudoplastic flow between coaxial cylinders

Order is found within the chaotic nonlinear flow between rotating coaxial cylinders. The flow stability analysis is carried out for a pseudoplastic fluid through bifurcation diagram and Lyapunov exponent histogram. The fluid is assumed to follow the Carreau–Bird model, and mixed boundary conditions are imposed. The low-order dynamical system, resulted from Galerkin projection of the conservation of mass and momentum equations, includes additional nonlinear terms in the velocity components originated from the shear-dependent viscosity. It is observed that the base flow loses its radial flow stability to the vortex structure at a lower critical Taylor number, as the shear-thinning effects increase. The emergence of the vortices corresponds to the onset of a supercritical bifurcation, which is also seen in the flow of a linear fluid. However, unlike the Newtonian case, shear-thinning Taylor vortices lose their stability as the Taylor number reaches a second critical number corresponding to the onset of a Hopf bifurcation. Complete flow field together with viscosity maps are given for different scenarios in the bifurcation diagram.     

Heat and fluid flow in cylindrical and conical annular flow-passages with through flow and inner-wall rotation

The flow and heat transfer in cylindrical and conical annular flow-passages with through flow and inner-wall rotation have been numerically simulated by using the large eddy simulation with a Lagrangian dynamic subgrid-scale model. Inlet through-flow Reynolds number was 1000 and the Taylor number was set at 0, 1000, 2000, and 4000. In the conical flow passage, when the inner-wall rotation speed was increased, at first spiral vortices in the downstream region and then much more complicated vortices appeared. The vortices for Ta = 4000 changed the structure in both through-flow and wall-normal directions in the downstream half of the passage. The flow structure and heat transfer of the conical case were completely different from those of the cylindrical case. It was because of the three factors: the expansion of the flow passage, the rotation radius change in the through-flow direction, and the centrifugally driven through-flow. The last factor is due to the acute angle between the centrifugal and through-flow directions.     

Turbulent Taylor-Couette vortex flow between large radius ratio concentric cylinders

Turbulent Taylor vortices between two concentric cylinders have been studied at a very high radius ratio of 0.985, equivalent to that found in relatively small underwater thruster units (typically with gaps of 2 mm). In order to study the flow at this radius ratio, a 1.42-m diameter experimental apparatus (with a rotating inner cylinder and a stationary outer cylinder) was constructed possessing a gap of 10 mm. Consequently, air bubbles could be visualised translating in water. A method was developed for identifying Taylor vortex properties from filtered digital images of the air bubbles and summing intensities to produce bubble density distributions. Whereas individual instantaneous images can be misleading, averaged bubble density distributions make it possible to identify vortex separation sizes and the positions of vortex outflow boundaries.     

Nonlinear Stability of Taylor Vortices in Infinite Cylinders

We consider the Taylor‐Couette problem in an infinitely extended cylindrical domain in the case when Couette flow is weakly unstable and a family of spatially periodic equilibria, called the Taylor vortices, has bifurcated from this trivial ground state. We show that those Taylor vortices which are not linearly unstable in the sense of Eckhaus are in fact nonlinearly stable with respect to small spatially localized perturbations. The main difficulty in showing this result stems from the fact that on unbounded cylindrical domains the Taylor vortices are only linearly marginally stable with continuous spectrum up to the imaginary axis. Bloch‐wave representations of the solutions and renormalization theory allow us to show that the nonlinear problem behaves asymptotically like the linearized one which is under a diffusive regime. (Accepted September 8, 1997)     

Convective and absolute instabilities in counter-rotating spiral Poiseuille flow

We present results of an experimental study on the stability of Taylor–Couette flow in case of counter-rotating cylinders and an imposed axial through flow. We are able to confirm results form recent numerical investigations done by Pinter et al. [24] by measuring the absolute and convective stability boundaries of both propagating Taylor vortices (PTV) and spiral vortices (SPI). Thus our work shows that these theoretical concepts from hydrodynamic stability in open flows apply to experimental counter-rotating Taylor–Couette systems with an imposed axial through flow. PACS 47.20.-k, 05.45.-a, 47.15.fe     

Transition in the flow between conical cylinders

Flow visualization and the polarographic method were used to study the transition to turbulence of the flow in a concentric annulus formed by conical cylinders of the same apex angle. The inner cone was rotated and the outer one kept stationary. Observations and spectral investigation revealed different flow states in the transition as the Taylor number was increased. The flow states include Taylor vortices, helical flow, wavy spirals, fluctuations regime and turbulence. In this system the turbulence occurs when all the structures observed before disappear. Therefore a complete chaotic motion is obtained. Measurements of the mean and fluctuating wall velocity gradient complete the transition information. Received: 9 October 1997/Accepted: 3 February 2000     

Experiments on the stability of an impulsively-initiated circular Couette flow

Experiments were performed to study the stability characteristics of an unsteady circular Couette flow generated by an impulsive stop of the outer cylinder; the initial condition was a state of rigid-body rotation. Instability of the unsteady basic state is manifested by Görtler vortices, which themselves become unstable to longer-wavelength disturbances, or Taylor vortices which persist indefinitely. The quantities of primary interest are the onset time of instability, the axial vortex wavelength at onset, and the time-evolution of this wavelength. A one-dimensional photodiode array is used to gather data from the flow, which is seeded with flow-visualization material. At sufficiently high values of the Reynolds number, the influence of the inner cylinder on the onset of instability is negligible, based on comparisons with previous experimental data.     

Improved nonlinear fluid model in rotating flow

The pseudoplastic circular Couette flow (CCF) in annuli is investigated. The viscosity is dependent on the shear rate that directly affects the conservation equations solved by the spectral method in the present study. The pseudoplastic model adopted here is shown to be the suitable representative of nonlinear fluids. Unlike the previous studies, where only the square of the shear rate term in the viscosity expression is considered to ease the numerical manipulations, in the present study, the term containing the quadratic power is also taken into account. The curved streamlines of the CCF can cause the centrifugal instability leading to toroidal vortices, known as the Taylor vortices. It is further found that the critical Taylor number becomes lower as the pseudoplastic effect increases. The comparison with the existing measurements on the pseudoplastic CCF results in good agreement.     

Flows around rotating disks with and without rim-shroud gap

Experimental and numerical approaches have been used to study the effect of the radial rim-shroud gap on the flow structures found around a rotating disk in a finite cylindrical casing. When the radius of the disk and the inner radius of the casing are comparable and there is no radial gap, instabilities bring spiral rolls with a positive front angle in the Bödewadt layer on the end wall of the stationary casing. When the disk radius is smaller than the inner radius of the casing, vortex flows appear within the radial gap between the disk rim and the side wall of the casing. If the disk is thin, but not too thin, disturbances generated by these vortex flows proceed inward and the spiral rolls with a negative front angle appear in the Bödewadt layer. In the case of a thick disk, wavy Taylor vortex-like flow appears in the radial gap. The disturbances formed by the vortex flow do not well propagate into the inner region, and a flow pattern of bead-like vortices or a chain of vortices consisting of a series of small vortices are found around the disk in the visualized figure parallel to the disk.     

Transition from vortex to wall driven turbulence production in the Taylor–Couette system with a rotating inner cylinder

Axisymmetrically stable turbulent Taylor vortices between two concentric cylinders are studied with respect to the transition from vortex to wall driven turbulent production. The outer cylinder is stationary and the inner cylinder rotates. A low Reynolds number turbulence model using the k‐ω formulation, facilitates an analysis of the velocity gradients in the Taylor–Couette flow. For a fixed inner radius, three radius ratios 0.734, 0.941 and 0.985 are employed to identify the Reynolds number range at which this transition occurs. At relatively low Reynolds numbers, turbulent production is shown to be dominated by the outflowing boundary of the Taylor vortex. As the Reynolds number increases, shear driven turbulence (due to the rotating cylinder) becomes the dominating factor. For relatively small gaps turbulent flow is shown to occur at Taylor numbers lower than previously reported. Copyright © 2002 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

圆Couette流混沌现象的实验研究

本文用流动显示和激光散射功率谱观泌了圆Couette流中的混沌现象,发现有两条导致弱湍流激发的道路:一条是从准周期运动到混沌,另一条是阵发混沌,对于这两条道路在诸转变阈值上的巨大差别,作者用弱非线性作用局域有效的新观点给出物理解释。     

Bubble capture and migration in Couette–Taylor flow

 Bubble capture and migration under the effect of organized structures in weak turbulent Couette–Taylor flow between two concentric cylinders, the inner one rotating, has been investigated. Bubbles generated at the free surface for large enough angular velocities are sucked into the flow by the upper organized structures. Then they migrate progressively from top to bottom by jumping from cell to cell. With an upper solid stationary wall instead of the free surface, injected bubbles are trapped by the coherent vortices beyond a critical Taylor number. However, in this situation there is no migration mechanism carrying the bubbles from top to bottom. This particular migration and capture process, able to act against the forces of buoyancy, has been investigated by perturbing the flow by adding a vertical plate protruding from the inner surface of the solid stationary wall. The perturbation so introduced causes the deformation of the upper coherent structures and reinstalls the migration of the bubbles. Received: 27 October 1997/Accepted: 21 May 1998     

Measurements of an unsteady liquid metal flow during spin-up driven by a rotating magnetic field

A cylindrical cavity with an aspect ratio of unity is filled with liquid metal and suddenly exposed to an azimuthal body force generated by a rotating magnetic field (RMF). This experimental study is concerned with the secondary meridional flow during the time, if the fluid spins up from rest. Vertical profiles of the axial velocity have been measured by means of the ultrasound Doppler velocimetry. The flow measurements confirm the spin-up concept by Ungarish (J Fluid Mech 347:105–118, 1997) and the continuative study by Nikrityuk et al. (Phys Fluids 17:067101, 2005) who suggested the existence of two stages during the RMF-driven spin-up, in particular the so-called initial adjustment phase followed by an inertial phase which is dominated by inertial oscillations of the secondary flow. Evolving instabilities of the double-vortex structure of the secondary flow have been detected at a Taylor number of 1.24 × 10⁵ verifying the predictions of Grants and Gerbeth (J Fluid Mech 463:229–240, 2002). Perturbations in form of Taylor–Görtler vortices have been observed just above the instability threshold.     

Direct numerical simulation of turbulent flow in a spanwise rotating square duct at high rotation numbers

In this paper, direct numerical simulations have been performed to study the effects of Coriolis force on the turbulent flow field confined within a square duct subjected to spanwise system rotations at high rotation numbers. In response to the system rotation, secondary flows appear as large streamwise counter-rotating vortices, which interact intensely with the four boundary layers and have a significant impact on flow statistics, velocity spectra and coherent structures. It is observed that at sufficiently high rotation numbers, a Taylor–Proudman region appears and complete laminarization is almost reached near the top and side walls. The influence of large organized secondary flows on the production rate and re-distribution of turbulent kinetic energy has been investigated through a spectral analysis. It is observed that the Coriolis force dominates the transport of Reynolds stresses and turbulent kinetic energy, and forces the spectra of streamwise and vertical velocities to synchronize within a wide range of scales.