A turbulent plane jet impinging nearby and far from a flat plate

Plane air jets presenting an impact find applications in many industrial devices. They can be found in installations of heating, cooling or drying, cleaning, pulverization, or containment of polluted environments. Other applications can be found in the ventilation of buildings. The correct design of these kinds of installations requires thorough knowledge of the structure of the jet from the cinematic point of view. With this intention a test bench with variable geometry was developed. Then, using laser Doppler velocimetry (LDV) and particle image velocimetry (PIV), it is possible to analyze the development of the jet for various geometrical and cinematic configurations. It appears that the development of the jet is independent of the Reynolds number, and the velocity decrease in the developed and impinging zones can be characterized by using very simple laws. Furthermore, by PIV visualization of the impinging zone, it has been possible to highlight the causes of mass transfer through the jet. Received: 19 January 2000 / Accepted: 14 May 2001