Effect of Upstream Cylinder’s Oscillation Frequency on Downstream Cylinder’s Vortex Induced Vibration

Abstract

Vortex induced vibration or widely known as VIV, is a very complex hydrodynamic phenomenon. There are relatively very few experimental and numerical references for oscillating pair of cylinders because of the early assumption that the interference between the two cylinders is weak and thus each of the cylinders may have the same behavior as found in the case of a single cylinder, but recent researches showed this assumption was not true. For tandem arrangement, several parameters govern the nature of VIV of downstream cylinders, such as spacing, upstream cylinders VIV amplitude etc. The nature of downstream cylinders response isn’t same as classical VIV or WIV (wake induced vibration). Oscillation frequency of a cylinder subjected to flow induced vibration is one of the important characteristics Oscillation frequency is highly dependent on natural frequency of the cylinder. By changing spring stiffness or mass ratio, natural frequency can be altered. The aim of this study is to investigate the effect of upstream cylinder’s oscillation frequency on the vibration of downstream cylinder. Numerical simulations have been conducted to understand the nature of vortex induced vibration (VIV) of a pair cylinder in tandem arrangement at high Reynolds numbers. Cylinders were subjected to uniform flows in sub-critical flow regime and have been allowed to oscillate in cross flow direction only. The spacing between the upstream and downstream cylinders was four times of the cylinder diameter. The oscillation frequency of the upstream cylinder has been altered by varying the mass ratio of the upstream cylinder. It was found that for same Reynolds number, downstream cylinder’s VIV amplitude is increased quite significantly if the upstream cylinder oscillates relatively slowly. The shear stress transport detached eddy turbulence model has been used for simulating the turbulent flow around the two cylinders. An advanced mesh movement known as “mesh morphing” model was employed to lessen the requirement for re-meshing which help to increase the accuracy of the prediction. Calculation of accurate results due to large domain deformations was achieved by re-positioning existing mesh points. The numerical results of a single cylinder subjected to one degree of freedom (1DOF) vibration have been compared with the available experimental results to validate the present study. The study is important in terms of designing VIVACE (Vortex Induced Vibration for Aquatic Clean Energy) converter for low speed current. In recent past, multiple cylinders have been used for VIVACE converter. So, the study of VIV of two equal-diameter cylinders in tandem arrangement at low current speed is very significant.