1118 A STUDY ON THE FLOW CREATED BY SPHERE MOVING ALONG THE AXIS OF A ROTATING CYLINDRICAL CONTAINER FILLED WITH A VISCOUS FLUID

Abstract

An experimental study was carried out on the flow created by a sphere moving along the axis of a rotating container filled with a viscous fluid. Measurements of the the terminal velocity and angular velocity of a sphere, and the three-component velocity fields around the sphere were performed using a PIV system. Flow in a rotating system is governed by the Reynolds Re = wsa/ v, Taylor T = 2Ωa2/v and Rossby Ro = ws/2Ωa numbers, where Ω is the angular velocity of the basic solid-body rotation, ws and a are the sphere velocity and radius, respectively, and v is the kinematic viscosity. As predicted by the Taylor-Proudman theorem, the Taylor-Proudman column is evaluated quantitatively. For low N (= 1/Ro), the drag coefficient CD is less than the value for N = 0, and for large T and N, CD increases.