Flow structure around two finite circular cylinders located in an atmospheric boundary layer: side-by-side arrangement

Abstract

The flow structure around the free-end region of two adjacent finite circular cylinders embedded in an atmospheric boundary layer (ABL) was investigated experimentally. The experiments were carried out in a closed-return-type subsonic wind tunnel, in which two finite cylinders with an aspect ratio of 6 were mounted vertically on a flat plate in a side-by-side arrangement. The Reynolds number based on the cylinder diameter was about Re = 2 x 10(4). Systems with gap ratios (i.e., center-to-center distance/cylinder diameter) in the range 1.0-2.0 were investigated. A hot-wire anemometer was employed to measure the wake velocity, and the mean pressure distribution on the cylinder surface was also measured. The flow past two finite cylinders was found to have a complicated three-dimensional wake structure in the region near the free ends. As the gap ratio increases, regular vortex-shedding becomes dominant, but the length of the vortex formation region decreases. The pressure distribution and flow structure around two cylinders were found to differ substantially from the behavior of a two-dimensional circular cylinder due to mutual interference. The three-dimensional flow structure seems to originate from the strong entrainment of irrotational fluids caused by the downwash counter-rotating vortices separated from the finite cylinder (FC) free ends. (C) 2003 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.