A two-parameter model of wave regimes for viscous liquid film flows

Wave regimes of viscous liquid film flows are considered when the viscosity coefficients vary in a wide range. An approximate model system of differential equations with two external governing parameters for the film layer thickness and the local flow rate is derived. The viscous dissipation of a film layer is taken into account in this system more accurately than in the well-known one-parameter Shkadov model. New properties of linear and nonlinear waves caused by the hydrodynamic instability of high-viscous liquid flows under gravity and surface tension are found.     

Nonlinearwaves in a liquid film-gas flow system

The instability and regular nonlinear waves in the film of a heavy viscous liquid flowing along the wall of a round tube and interacting with a gas flow are investigated. The solutions for the wave film flows are numerically obtained in the regimes from free flow-down in a counter-current gas stream to cocurrent upward flow of the film and the gas at fairly large gas velocities. Continuous transition from the counter-current to the cocurrent flow via the state with a maximum amplitude of nonlinear waves and zero values of the liquid flow rate and the phase velocity is investigated. The Kapitsa-Shkadov method is used to reduce a boundary value problem to a system of evolutionary equations for the local values of the layer thickness and the liquid flow rate.     

Experimental studies of interfacial instabilities in multilayer pressure-driven flow of polymeric melts

The interfacial deformation and stability of two-(A-B) as well as three-layer symmetric (A-B-A) and asymmetric (A-B-C) pressure-driven flow of viscoelastic fluids has been investigated. Flow visualization in conjunction with digital image processing has been used to observe and measure the rate of encapsulation and interfacial stability/instability of the flow. Specifically, the encapsulation behavior as well as stability/instability of the interface and the corresponding growth or decay rate of disturbances as a function of various important parameters, namely, number of layers and their arrangement, layer depth ratio, viscosity and elasticity ratio as well as disturbance frequency, have been investigated. Based on these experiments, we have shown that the encapsulation phenomena occurs irrespective of the stability/instability of the interface and in cases when both encapsulation and instability occur simultaneously their coupling leads to highly complex and three-dimensional interfacial wave patterns. Moreover, it has been shown that the simple notion that less viscous fluids encapsulate more viscous fluids is incorrect and depending on the wetting properties of the fluid as well as their first and second normal stresses the reverse could occur. Additionally, in two- and three-layer flows it has been shown that by placing a thin, less viscous layer adjacent to the wall longwave disturbances can be stabilized while short and intermediate wavelength disturbances are stabilized when the more elastic fluid is the majority component. Furthermore, in three-layer flows it has been demonstrated that in the linear instability regime no dynamic interaction between the two interfaces is possible for short and intermediate wavenumber disturbances. However, in the nonlinear stability regime dynamic interactions between interfaces have been observed in this range of disturbance wavenumbers leading to highly chaotic flows. Finally, in the parameter space of this study no subcritical bifurcations were observed while supercritical bifurcations resulting in waves with a pointed front and a gradual tail were observed.     

Instability of a compressed elastic film on a viscous layer

A flat, compressed elastic film on a viscous layer is unstable. The film can form wrinkles to reduce the elastic energy. A linear perturbation analysis is performed to determine the critical wave number and the growth rate of the unstable modes. While the viscous layer has no effect on the critical wave number, its viscosity and thickness set the time scale for the growth of the perturbations. The fastest growing wave number and the corresponding growth rate are obtained as functions of the compressive strain and the thickness ratio between the viscous layer and the elastic film. The present analysis is valid for all thickness range of the viscous layer. In the limits of infinitely thick and thin viscous layers, the results reduce to those obtained in the previous studies.     

Instability of fluid motion in a thin spherical layer

We study flow stability in a thin spherical layer with respect to small disturbances. It is shown that for each given layer thickness there is a sequence of critical Reynolds numbers above which the motion is unstable. In its form, the critical disturbance is reminiscent of the secondary flow which develops upon loss of stability of the basic fluid flow between rotating cylinders (Taylor problem).The author wishes to thank M. I. Shliomis for his continued interest in this study.     

Stabilizing effect of diffusion in enhanced oil recovery and three-layer Hele-Shaw flows with viscosity gradient

In the presence of diffusion, stability of three-layer Hele-Shaw flows which models enhanced oil recovery processes by polymer flooding is studied for the case of variable viscosity in the middle layer. This leads to the coupling of the momentum equation and the species advection-diffusion equation the hydrodynamic stability study of which is presented in this paper. Linear stability analysis of a potentially unstable three-layer rectilinear Hele-Shaw flow is used to examine the effects of species diffusion on the stability of the flow. Using a weak formulation of the disturbance equations, upper bounds on the growth rate of individual disturbances and on the maximal growth rate over all possible disturbances are found. Analytically, it is shown that a short-wave disturbance if unstable can be stabilized by mild diffusion of species, where as an unstable long-wave disturbance can always be stabilized by strong diffusion of species. Thus, an otherwise unstable three-layer Hele-Shaw flow can be completely stabilized by a large enough diffusion, i.e., by increasing enough the magnitude of the species diffusion coefficient. The magnitude of this diffusion coefficient required to completely stabilize the flow will depend on the magnitude of interfacial viscosity jumps and the viscosity gradient of the basic viscous profile of the middle layer.     

Wave flow regimes of a thin layer of viscous fluid subject to gravity

The studies of Kapitsa initiated the detailed experimental and theoretical study of the flow of a thin layer of viscous liquid (liquid film) over a solid surface [1–2]. Extensive experimental data on this question have now been accumulated. As a rule, the existing theories are based on linearization of the problem and diverge considerably from the experimental results. The present paper is also addressed to the theoretical solution of this problem. The solution method used enables consideration of the wave flow of the liquid as a nonlinear problem and on this basis permits determining all the parameters of the wave regime-amplitude, wavelength, wave propagation speed, frequency.     

Casson流体在旋转圆盘上的流动

本文研究Casson流体在旋转圆盘上的涂层流动特性,得到基本流动的速度分布,并且用Runge-Kutta法进行数值计算,得到薄膜厚度随时间和流态参数的变化规律,还用能量法检验了流动稳定性。     

Asymptotic Investigation of the Thin Viscous Shock Layer Equations in the Neighborhood of the Stagnation Point for Low Reynolds Numbers

Hypersonic three-dimensional viscous rarefied gas flow past blunt bodies is investigated in the neighborhood of the stagnation point. The problem of applicability of the model of a thin viscous shock layer to the regime of transition from continuum to free-molecular flow is considered. In [1], it was shown that at low Reynolds numbers three hypersonic flow regimes can be distinguished and one of those regimes was investigated. In the present study an asymptotic solution of the thin viscous shock layer equations is obtained for another flow regime. With decrease in the Reynolds number the heat transfer coefficient determined by the solution obtained approaches its free-molecular value and the friction coefficient approaches its free-molecular limit, provided that the shock layer thickness is small. The analytical solution is compared with a numerical solution and the results of calculations based on direct Monte Carlo simulation.     

Wave regimes of ascending flow of a thin layer of a viscous liquid in contact with a gas

The flow of a liquid in thin layers is one of the hydrodynamic problems of chemistry and heat engineering. The large surface area of films and their small thickness make it possible to accelerate thermal, diffusive, and chemical processes at the gas-liquid boundary.Theoretical studies of liquid flow in a vertical descending thin layer are presented in [1–4]. In this paper we study ascending wave flows of a liquid in a thin vertical layer in contact with a gas, i.e., flows in the direction opposite the action of the force due to gravity, with account for the action of the gas on the liquid surface. Such motions are encountered when oil is extracted from strata that are saturated with gas. At some distance from the stratum the oil and gas separate: the gas travels at high velocity inside the pipe, occupying a considerable portion of the pipe, and the liquid is displaced toward the pipe walls, forming a thin film. In certain cases a wave-like interface develops between the oil and gas that travels with a velocity greater than that of the liquid but less than the average gas velocity. Similar phenomena are observed in high velocity mass exchangers.We examine the effect of the gas for both laminar and turbulent flow.Studies that neglect the effect of the gas flow on the liquid show that for waves on the film surface whose lengths are considerably longer than the average thickness of the layer, the liquid motion in the film is described by boundary layer equations in which account is taken of the mass force, i.e., the force due to gravity. With some approximation, we can assume that in accounting for the effect of the gas on the liquid the liquid flow is described by these same equations.     

Stability analysis of fluid-fluid interfaces

Two problems in pipe flow are discussed in which the stability of fluid-fluid interfaces plays an important role. A stability analysis for a simplified 2-D geometry is presented. In gas-liquid pipe flow different flow regimes occur. This is known to be related to the stability properties of the flow. We shall present a linear stability analysis of plane two-phase Poiseuille flow. Two different unstable modes can occur, corresponding to experimental findings for pipe flow. The first is a finite wavelength mode related to the transition to wavy flow via a Hopf bifurcation. The second unstable mode is an infinite wavelength mode, which may be related to the transition to slug flow. Core-annular flow can be used to transport very viscous crude oils. The crude oil is surrounded by a thin water film, which prevents the core from touching the wall. In the hydrodynamic force balance, waves on the interface play an important role. A linear stability analysis of plane Poiseuille-Couette flow can predict the wavelength in agreement with experimental results even far beyond the critical point. No non-linear analysis is available as yet.     

Linear Stability Analysis of a Viscous Liquid Sheet in a High-Speed Viscous Gas

Air-assisted atomizers in which a thin liquid sheet is deformed under the action of a high-speed air flow are extensively used in industrial applications, e.g., in aircraft turbojet injectors. Primary atomization in these devices is a consequence of the onset and growth of instabilities on the air/liquid interfaces. To better understand this process, a temporal linear instability analysis is applied to a thin planar liquid sheet flowing between two semi-infinite streams of a high-speed viscous gas. This study includes the full viscous effects both in the liquid and gas basic states and perturbations. The relevant dimensionless groups entering the non-dimensional Orr–Sommerfeld equations and boundary conditions are the liquid and gas stream Reynolds numbers, the gas to liquid momentum flux ratio, the gas/liquid velocity ratio, the Weber number and the equivalent gas boundary layer to liquid sheet thickness ratio. Growth rates and temporal frequencies as a function of the wave number, varying the different dimensionless parameters are presented, together with neutral stability curves. From the results of this parametric study it is concluded that when the physical properties of gas and liquid are fixed, the momentum flux ratio is especially relevant to determine the instability conditions. It is also observed that the gas boundary layer thickness strongly influences the wave propagation, and acts by damping sheet oscillation frequency and growth. This is especially important because viscosity in the basic gas velocity profile has always been ignored in instability analysis applied to the geometry under study. This revised version was published online in July 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

Numerical simulation of instabilities and secondary regimes in spherical couette flow

In all previous numerical investigations of spherical Couette flow only axisymmetric regimes were considered. At the same time, in experiments [1–4] it was found that when both spheres rotate and the layer is thin centrifugal instability of the main flow leads to the appearance of nonaxisymmetric secondary flows of the azimuthal traveling wave type. The results of an initial numerical investigation of these flows are presented below. Solving the linear problem of the stability of the main flow and simulating the secondary flows on the basis of the complete nonlinear Navier-Stokes equations has made it possible to supplement and explain many of the results obtained experimentally. The type of bifurcation and the structure of the disturbances whose growth leads to the appearance of three-dimensional nonstationary flows are determined, and the transitions between different secondary regimes in the region of weak supercriticality are described.Moscow. Translated from Izvestiya Rossiiskoi Akademii Nauk, Mekhanika Zhidkosti i Gaza, No. 1, pp. 3–15, January–February, 1995.     

Direct numerical simulation of the laminar-turbulent transition in a thick spherical layer

The results of a numerical study of the laminar-turbulent transition in unsteady isothermal three-dimensional flows of viscous incompressible fluid in a thick spherical layer between counter-rotating spherical boundaries are presented. The calculations are performed for the governing parameters corresponding to the experimental data [1, 2]. The numerical investigations include both solving the complete system of Navier-Stokes equations and analyzing the linear stability of steady-state axisymmetric flows with respect to three-dimensional disturbances. A stochastic flow regime is calculated for the first time. The limits of existence of different flow regimes and the hysteresis regions are found. The spatial flow patterns and frequency characteristics are obtained, which makes it possible to extend and refine the existing experimental data.     

Stability of a laminar rivulet liquid flow in a cylindrical duct in the approximation of one-dimensional waves

The problem of the stability of a viscous laminar liquid flow with a liquid free surface in an inclined duct is theoretically considered. Since the dependence of the flow rate on the free-surface height is not monotonic (the highest flow rate in a cylindrical duct is observed at H_*=1.7R), primary attention is given to the region H>H_*. It is proved that there is aw region of instability: for an arbitrarity low Reynolds number, there is a free-surface level above which the flow becomes unstable against one-dimensional disturbances. When the height of the liquid layer is close to the vertical dimension of the duct, the one-dimensional disturbances propagate mainly upstream (for moderate Reynolds numbers). Hence it follows that there is not steady regime of liquid flow from a fully filled duct with an open end. Kutateladze Institute of Thermal Physics, Siberian Division, Russian Academy of Sciences, Novosibirsk 630090. Translated from Prikladnaya Mekhanika i Tekhnicheskaya Fizika, Vol. 40, No. 3, pp. 90–96, May–June, 1999.     

Instabilities of a gas-liquid flow between two inclined plates analyzed using the Navier–Stokes equations

The paper is devoted to a theoretical analysis of a counter-current gas-liquid flow between two inclined plates. We linearized the Navier–Stokes equations and carried out a stability analysis of the basic steady-state solution over a wide variation of the liquid Reynolds number and the gas superficial velocity. As a result, we found two modes of the unstable disturbances and computed the wavelength and phase velocity of their neutral disturbances varying the liquid and gas Reynolds number. The first mode is a “surface mode” that corresponds to the Kapitza's waves at small values of the gas superficial velocity. We found that the dependence of the neutral disturbance wavelength on the liquid Reynolds number strongly depends on the gas superficial velocity, the distance between the plates and the channel inclination angle for this mode. The second mode of the unstable disturbances corresponds to the transition to a turbulent flow in the gas phase and there is a critical value of the gas Reynolds number for this mode. We obtained that this critical Reynolds number weakly depends on both the channel inclination angle, the distance between the plates and the liquid flow parameters for the conditions considered in the paper. Despite a thorough search, we did not find the unstable modes that may correspond to the instability in frame of the viscous (or inviscid) Kelvin–Helmholtz heuristic analysis.     

Uni-modal destabilization of a visco-elastic floating ice layer by wind stress

A destabilization by wind stress of a homogeneous visco-elastic ice layer of infinite horizontal extent and finite thickness floating on a water layer of finite depth is studied. The water is assumed to be weakly compressible; the viscous dissipation in the water layer is shown to be negligible compared to that in the ice layer. In the model, we assume that a homogeneous wind shear stress is applied to the upper surface of the ice layer at near field and the compression within the ice layer is fixed below the maximum admissible value, i.e. below the value above which ice can no longer be treated as an elastic material. The effect of viscosity is shown to stabilize the acoustic mode and all the unstable seismic modes that in a purely elastic model, treated by Brevdo and Il'ichev [Brevdo, L., Il'ichev, A., 2001. Multi-modal destabilization of a floating ice layer by wind stress. Cold Reg. Sci. Technol. 33, 77–89], possess unbounded growth rates for a growing wave number. The buckling mode is unstable in the domain of parameters considered. In all the cases treated, the model is marginally absolutely stable. The localized unstable disturbances propagate against the wind. The spatially amplifying waves in the model amplify in the direction opposite to the wind direction. The stability results are well approximated by those in a Kirchoff–Love thin ice plate model.     

Analysis of lubricated squeezing flow

A thin film of low-viscosity lubricating liquid between a solid wall and a viscous material reduces shear stress on the latter and tends to make it flow as though it were slipping along the wall. The result when the lubricated material is being squeezed out of the gap between approaching parallel plates is flow more nearly irrotational, or extensional, the more effective the lubricating film on the plates. Two Newtonian analyses of this flow situation are reported. One is an approximate, asymptotic analytical solution for Newtonian lubricating flow in the films and combined mixed flow, shear and extension, in the viscous layer. The second is a full two-dimensional axisymmetric solution of the momentum and continuity equations along with the kinematic condition which governs the motion of the interface. Both analyses indicate that there are two limiting flow regimes, depending on the ratio of the thickness of each of the two phases to radius and on the viscosity ratio of the two liquids. In one limit the flow is parallel squeezing and the lubricant layer slowly thins and persists a long time. In the other the lubricant is expelled preferentially. Implications of the results are discussed for rheological characterization of viscoelastic liquids and for prediction of lubricated or autolubricated flows in processing situations.     

Transient two‐layer thin‐film flow

The transient two‐layer thin‐film planar flow is investigated theoretically in this study. The interplay among inertia, viscous and surface/interfacial tension is emphasized. It is found that the film and interface profiles, as well as the flow field, are strongly influenced by the viscosity ratio, velocity and film thickness ratios at inception, and the surface‐to‐interfacial tension ratio. The nonlinear stability of the steady state reveals the formation of a solitary wave after flow inception, which propagates in the form of a convective instability, with the steady state recovered only in the tail (upstream) region of the wave. In the presence of surface/interfacial tension, surface modulation appears, which grows in wavelength and amplitude with position. The flow is found to be particularly stable for higher viscosity of the lower film layer. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.