Helicopter turboshaft engines may ingest large amounts of foreign particles (most commonly sand/dust), which can cause significant compressor blade damage and even engine failure. In many helicopters, this issue is mitigated by separating the particles from the intake airstream. An effective device for engine air-particle separation is the vortex tube separator (VTS), which uses centrifugal forces in a vortical flow to radially filter foreign particles from a duct with an annular exit. Dozens or hundreds of these devices are linked together on a shared manifold known as a VTS array. There is a distinct lack of scientific literature regarding these arrays, which likely feature significantly more complex flowfields than singular VTSs due to aerodynamic interactions between the devices. The research presented in this dissertation identifies and explains flow features unique to arrays by means of an experimental investigation downstream of various VTS configurations in a wind tunnel. Mean PIV flowfields reveal that the VTS array rapidly generates a strong central recirculation zone while a single VTS does not, implying the existence of axial flow gradients within associated separators that could affect filtration efficiency. The key factor here is the global swirl intensity, which is increased in array flows due to high angular momentum contributions from separators that are radially distant from the duct center. A preliminary momentum integral model is constructed to predict the onset of recirculation in VTS flows. Analysis is then extended to the unsteady flowfield, where it is shown that VTS-generated turbulence contains only low levels of anisotropy. Spectral proper orthogonal decomposition is conducted on the array flow; it reveals the existence of low-frequency harmonic behavior composed of back-and-forth pumping motions downstream of the central VTS. Additionally, a unique precession motion is found in the same region at a slightly higher frequency. Similar precessing vortex cores have been shown to reduce separation efficiency in other cyclone separators. Both of these coherent structures may be associated with the central recirculation zone and may interfere with VTS array filtration given their timescales relative to potential particle relaxation timescales. This dissertation opens the door for future experimental and computational studies of fluid and particle dynamics in VTS flows with the goal of improving VTS array-specific design philosophies. / Doctor of Philosophy / Vortex tube separators (VTSs) help protect helicopter engines by filtering harmful particles (sand, dust, snow, ash, sea spray, etc.) they would otherwise ingest. This is done by creating a vortex in which centrifugal forces eject particles outwards, separating them from the main airstream. These devices are effective when dozens are grouped together into VTS arrays, but little is understood of the complex air and particle dynamics that result from the many interacting vortices both in and around such arrays. This dissertation describes an early effort to study these aerodynamics and open the door for subsequent particle dynamics research. A laser-based measurement technique called particle image velocimetry is used to determine flow velocities downstream of a VTS array placed in a wind tunnel. When velocities are averaged together over time, they reveal a central recirculation zone (a known feature of intensely swirling flows) downstream of the VTS array that vanishes when only a single separator in the array is active. A mathematical model is developed to predict such recirculation. It demonstrates that a VTS array comprises many separators that are far from the center of the duct they are contained within, and these contribute greatly to the overall swirl intensity. Other data analysis techniques are used to investigate the instantaneous velocity flowfield, which differs significantly from averaged quantities. One such technique is spectral proper orthogonal decomposition, which extracts so-called "coherent structures" from the flow - correlated high-energy motions that exist at certain frequencies and may not be visible in the raw data. This analysis finds two interesting structures at the very center of the duct, possibly associated with the recirculation zone: a back-and-forth pumping motion at a very low frequency (and some of its harmonic frequencies), and a "precessing" (unsteadily rotating) vortex at a slightly higher frequency. These motions, as well as the central recirculation zone itself, are impactful because they may affect the filtration process within the VTS upstream of where they were measured. Such effects will be investigated in future experiments and, if confirmed, may influence the design of VTS arrays.

The present study describes the flow characteristics of swirling flows induced by twisted tape inserts in circular pipes. The study is focused on the secondary flow which is investigated experimentally and with numerical models. The results are expected to improve the paper manufacturing process by identifying and removing the detrimental secondary flow. Experimental tests show for the first time the existence of two co-rotating helical vortices superimposed over the main swirling flow, downstream of twisted tapes. The close proximity of the two co-rotating vortices creates a local counter-rotating flow at the pipe centerline. The flow is analyzed using LDV measurements and high speed camera visualization with fine air bubbles seeding which confirm that the helical vortices are stable. After extracting the characteristic tangential velocity profiles of the main vortex and of the two secondary vortices, it was observed that the maximum tangential velocity of all three vortices is the same, approximately half of the bulk velocity. The winding of the helical vortices is in the swirl direction and the pitch of the helical vortices is found to be independent of the inlet velocity. The experimental findings are confirmed by numerical simulations. The numerical results show that the helical vortices originate inside the swirler and evolve from single co-rotating vortices on each side of the tape. The flow characteristics are analyzed in detail. Swirlers with multiple twists and multiple chambers are shown to have less stable secondary motion and could be employed in applications were the secondary motion is detrimental.

<p>The fluid flow in the mold during up-hill teeming is of great importance for the quality of the cast ingot and therefore the quality of the final steel products. At the early stage of the filling of an up-hill teeming mold, liquid steel enters, with high velocity, from the runner into the mold and the turbulence on the meniscus could lead to entrainment of mold flux. The entrained mold flux might subsequently end up as defects in the final product. It is therefore very important to get a mild and stable inlet flow in the entrance region of the mold. It has been acknowledged recently that swirling motion induced using a helix shaped swirl blade, in the submerged entry nozzle is remarkably effective to control the fluid flow pattern in both the slab and billet type continuous casting molds. This result in increased productivity and quality of the produced steel. Due to the result with continuous casting there is reason to investigate the swirling effect for up-hill teeming, a casting method with similar problem with turbulence.</p><p>With this thesis we will study the effect of swirling flow generated through a swirl blade inserted into the entry nozzle, as a new method of reducing the deformation of the rising surface and the unevenness of the flow during filling of the up-hill teeming mold. The swirling blade has two features: (1) to generate a swirling flow in the entrance nozzle and (2) to suppress the uneven flow, generated/developed after flowing through the elbow. The effect of the use of a helix shaped swirl blade was studied using both numerical calculations and physical modelling. Water modelling was used to assert the effect of the swirling blade on rectifying of tangential and axial velocities in the filling tube for the up-hill teeming and also to verify the results from the numerical calculations. The effect of swirl in combination with diverged nozzle was also investigated in a similar way, i. e. with water model trials and numerical calculations.</p>

This thesis is motivated by the necessity to understand the flow structure of turbulent flows in bends encountered in many technical applications such as heat exchangers, nuclear reactors and internal combustion engines. Flows in bends are characterised by strong secondary motions in terms of counter-rotating vortices (Dean cells) set up by a centrifugal instability. Specifically the thesis deals with turbulent flows in 90° curved pipes of circular cross-section with and without an additional motion, swirling or pulsatile, superposed on the primary flow.  The aim of the present thesis is to study these complex flows in detail by using time-resolved stereoscopic particle image velocimetry to obtain the three-dimensional velocity field, with complementary hot-wire anemometry and laser Doppler velocimetry measurements. In order to analyse the vortical flow field proper orthogonal decomposition (POD) is used. The so called ``swirl-switching'' is identified and it is shown that the vortices instantaneously, ``rock'' between three states, viz. a pair of symmetric vortices or a dominant clockwise or counter-clockwise Dean cell. The most energetic mode exhibits a single cell spanning the whole cross-section and ``rolling'' (counter-)clockwise in time. However, when a honeycomb is mounted at the inlet of the bend, the Dean vortices break down and there is strong indication that the ``swirl-switching'' is hindered. When a swirling motion is superimposed on the incoming flow, the Dean vortices show a tendency to merge into a single cell with increasing swirl intensity. POD analysis show vortices which closely resemble the Dean cells, indicating that these structures co-exist with the swirling motion. In highly pulsating turbulent flow at the exit of a curved pipe, the vortical pattern is diminished or even eliminated during the acceleration phase and then re-established during the deceleration. In order to investigate the effect of pulsations and curvature on the performance of a turbocharger turbine, highly pulsating turbulent flow through a sharp bend is fed into the turbine. Time-resolved pressure and mass-flow rate measurements show that the hysteresis loop in the pressure-ratio-mass-flow plane, may differ significantly between straight and curved inlets, however the mean operating point is only slightly affected. / <p>QC 20140523</p>

Les écoulements vrillés, qui sont largement utilisés dans les turbines à gaz, sont connus pour être sujet à des bifurcations entre différentes topologies (grandes reconfigurations de l'écoulement) qui peuvent affecter les performances et la sécurité du moteur. Ce travail se concentre sur l'étude de ces bifurcations en utilisant la Simulation aux Grandes Echelles (SGE). Cette étude montre qu'un petit changement dans les conditions dynamique du fluide, induite par les différents modèles de sous-maille utilisés, peut provoquer une transition entre deux régimes d'écoulement distincts lorsque l'écoulement tourbillonnaire est proche des conditions critiques de transition. La sensibilité de la SGE aux modèles de sous-maille est également identifiée comme le résultat d'un manque de résolution à certains endroits critiques, un problème qui est analysé en utilisant une méthode d'adaptation de maillage. L’adaptation de maillage est testée sur des cas académiques et industriels. Ici, par ajustement de la résolution du maillage sur la base des caractéristiques de l'écoulement étudié (raffinement et grossissement de la grille en maintenant constant le coût numérique), des améliorations substantielles peuvent être obtenues, en terme de prédictions de la SGE. Ce travail peut être considéré comme une des premières étapes vers la mise en place d'une procédure standard (reproductible et indépendante de l’utilisateur) de maillage pour la SGE. / Swirling flows, which are widely employed in gas turbines, are known to undergo bifurcation between different topologies (large reconfigurations of the flow field) affecting the engine performance and safety. This work focuses on the study of such bifurcations using Large-Eddy Simulation (LES). It shows that a small change in the fluid dynamics conditions, induced by the different Sub-Grid Scale (SGS) models used in the simulations, can cause a transition between two, distinct, flow states when the swirling flow is close to transition conditions. The sensitivity of LES to SGS modeling is also identified as the result of a lack of mesh resolution at some critical locations, a problem which is analyzed using mesh adaptation. Mesh adaptation is tested on canonical and industrial flows. Here, by adjusting the mesh resolution based on the characteristics of the flow examined (refining and coarsening the grid keeping constant the numerical cost), substantial improvements of the LES predictions can be obtained. This work can be considered as the first step toward the establishment of a standard (repeatable and user independent) meshing procedure for LES.

This work deals with study of swirling flows where the spiral vortical structure appears. The main relation is to flow seen in the draft tube cone of hydraulic turbines operated out of the design point (i.e. best efficiency point). In this cases large coherent vortex structure (vortex rope) appears and consequently high pressure pulsations are propagated to the whole machine system leading to possible restriction of turbine operation. This flow features are consequence of flow instability called vortex breakdown in case of Francis turbine operated at part load (flow rate lower than optimal one). The present study is carried out using simplified device of swirl generator in order to access similar flow conditions as can be found in real hydraulic turbines. Both the dynamic and dissipation effect of spiral vortex breakdown are investigated. The first part of thesis deals with spiral form of vortex breakdown. The experimentally measured velocity profiles (LDA) and wall static pressures are correlated with numerical simulations carried out using open-source CFD package OpenFOAM 2.2.2. The high speed camera recording of cavitating vortex core is used to obtain image ensemble for further post-processing. The dissipation effect of spiral vortex structure is in detail discussed based on computed flow fields. The second part of thesis is dedicated to the application of POD decomposition to the study of spatio-temporal features of spiral vortex dynamics. Firstly the POD is applied to the both the experimentally obtained image ensemble of cavitating vortex and numerically computed static pressure fields. Secondly the comprehensive analysis of spiral vortex mitigation effect by the axial water jet is analyzed. The collaborative study employing the swirl generator apparatus designed by the researchers from Politehnica University of Timisoara in Romania is performed and changes in spatio-temporal vortex dynamic are studied. In this study the numerical data (in a form of three-dimensional pressure and velocity fields) are obtained using commercial CFD software ANSYS Fluent R14.

The fluid flow in the mold during up-hill teeming is of great importance for the quality of the cast ingot and therefore the quality of the final steel products. At the early stage of the filling of an up-hill teeming mold, liquid steel enters, with high velocity, from the runner into the mold and the turbulence on the meniscus could lead to entrainment of mold flux. The entrained mold flux might subsequently end up as defects in the final product. It is therefore very important to get a mild and stable inlet flow in the entrance region of the mold. It has been acknowledged recently that swirling motion induced using a helix shaped swirl blade, in the submerged entry nozzle is remarkably effective to control the fluid flow pattern in both the slab and billet type continuous casting molds. This result in increased productivity and quality of the produced steel. Due to the result with continuous casting there is reason to investigate the swirling effect for up-hill teeming, a casting method with similar problem with turbulence. With this thesis we will study the effect of swirling flow generated through a swirl blade inserted into the entry nozzle, as a new method of reducing the deformation of the rising surface and the unevenness of the flow during filling of the up-hill teeming mold. The swirling blade has two features: (1) to generate a swirling flow in the entrance nozzle and (2) to suppress the uneven flow, generated/developed after flowing through the elbow. The effect of the use of a helix shaped swirl blade was studied using both numerical calculations and physical modelling. Water modelling was used to assert the effect of the swirling blade on rectifying of tangential and axial velocities in the filling tube for the up-hill teeming and also to verify the results from the numerical calculations. The effect of swirl in combination with diverged nozzle was also investigated in a similar way, i. e. with water model trials and numerical calculations. / QC 20101115

Despite its importance in various industrial applications there is still a lack of experimental studies on the dynamic and thermal field of swirling jets in the near-field region. The present study is an attempt to close this lack and provide new insights on the effect of rotation on the turbulent mixing of a passive scalar, on turbulence (joint) statistics as well as the turbulence structure. Swirl is known to increase the spreading of free turbulent jets and hence to entrain more ambient fluid. Contrary to previous experiments, which leave traces of the swirl generating method especially in the near-field, the swirl was imparted by discharging a slightly heated air flow from an axially rotating and thermally insulated pipe (6 m long, diameter 60 mm). This gives well-defined axisymmetric streamwise and azimuthal velocity distributions as well as a well-defined temperature profile at the jet outlet. The experiments were performed at a Reynolds number of 24000 and a swirl number (ratio between the angular velocity of the pipe wall and the bulk velocity in the pipe) of 0.5. By means of a specially designed combined X-wire and cold-wire probe it was possible to simultaneously acquire the instantaneous axial and azimuthal velocity components as well as the temperature and compensate the former against temperature variations. The comparison of the swirling and non-swirling cases clearly indicates a modification of the turbulence structure to that effect that the swirling jet spreads and mixes faster than its non-swirling counterpart. It is also shown that the streamwise velocity and temperature fluctuations are highly correlated and that the addition of swirl drastically increases the streamwise passive scalar flux in the near field. / QC 20101124

<p>Continuous caster moulds are the last and most important stage in the steelmaking process, where inclusions can either be generated or removed. With increasing casting speed using conventional immersion nozzles critical problems, such as unstable bulk mould flow have been noticed. Mould flux entrapment due to vortex and shearing action from the oscillating surface waves have become of particular concern. It is therefore necessary to have a calm inlet flow at the entrance of the mould. Recently, it has been acknowledged that a swirl blade placed at the upstream of the immersion nozzle effectively resolves the problems arising from unstable bulk mould flow. Therefore, to increase the knowledge of effect of swirling flow on the flow pattern in the mould, fundamental mathematical models of a billet mould equipped with a swirl blade in the nozzle have been developed. The model was used to study the effect of divergent angle of the immersion nozzle and mould aspect ratio on the flow field and temperature distribution inside billets moulds. Data from water model experiments were used to verify the mathematical model predictions. A fairly good agreement was found between physical modeling data and predictions, which ensured that the numerical model is reliable. Thereafter, the differences between square and round billet moulds were studied. Next, the effect of changing aspect ratio of the rectangular mould on the fluid flow and heat transfer, while keeping mould surface area constant, was studied. Two types of immersion nozzles, bottomless and conventional, were also analyzed during the research. The model moulds were changed gradually from a square billet with an aspect ratio of 1x1 to a rectangular billet with an aspect ratio of 3x1. First, the temperature and velocity distributions were calculated. Later, unsteady calculations were done to determine velocity fluctuations on the meniscus level for two types of nozzles and several moulds geometries.</p>

Swirling is an emergent transfer pattern among college students. Swirlers are students who may have participated in a combination of reverse transfer, lateral transfer, or traditional transfer patterns. The available research on swirling has been predominately quantitative in nature. This study was designed to obtain qualitative data on multi-institutional transfers from a qualitative perspective. A heuristic phenomenological approach grounded in the transformational learning theory method was used to obtain data. The data were obtained via an online blog-based interview. The interview revealed six themes in regards to why students swirl. This study also addressed time-to-degree and outcomes associated with students who swirl.