Modulation of wake evolution, separation, and radiated noise by a cylinder with porous media cladding

Abstract

In this paper, the effects of porous media parameters on circular cylinder wake flow and radiation noise are investigated using large eddy simulations and Ffowcs Williams–Hawkings acoustic analogy. We performed three-dimensional numerical simulations for flow around the cylinder coated with a porous layer of different pores per inch in a subcritical flow regime (ReD=4.7×104) to explore the control mechanism of porous media on wake and radiation noise. The results show that the application of porous media significantly alters the separation pattern behind the cylinder and stabilizes the shear layer detached from the cylinder. The existence of porous layers leads to the transformation of chaotic and irregular vortex structures into more orderly vortices. Moreover, this study also reveals that the cylinder coated with high pore density can provide the desired noise reduction. The analysis of vortex sound theory indicates that porous media reduces the interaction area and magnitude of the positive and negative Lamb vector divergences, which is beneficial for drag reduction and noise attenuation. In addition, the comparison of sound pressure contours shows that the application of porous media does not change the radiation mode of noise, but the porous media with high pore density helps to decrease the generation of noise and intensity of the sound source.