Simulations of Initially Highly Disturbed Jets with Experiment-Like Exit Boundary Layers

Abstract

Two isothermal round jets at a Mach number of 0.9 and a diameter-based Reynolds number of have been computed by compressible large-eddy simulation using high-order finite differences on a grid of 3.1 billion points. At the exit of a straight pipe nozzle in which a trip forcing is applied, the jet flow velocity parameters, including the momentum thickness and the shape factor of the boundary layer, the momentum-thickness-based Reynolds number, and the peak turbulence intensity, roughly match those found in experiments using two nozzles referred to as the ASME and the conical nozzles. The boundary layer is in a highly disturbed laminar state in the first case and in a turbulent state in the second. The exit flow conditions, the shear-layer and jet flowfields, and the far-field noise provided by the large-eddy simulation are described. The jet with the ASME-like initial conditions develops a little more rapidly, with slightly higher turbulence levels than the other. Overall, however, the results obtained for the two jets are very similar, and they are in good agreement with measurements available for Mach 0.9 jets. In particular, this similarity holds for the far-field spectra. Because the ASME nozzle has been reported to yield higher noise levels than the conical nozzle, this suggests that the nozzle-exit conditions in the large-eddy simulation do not adequately reflect those in the experiments and/or that the link between the noise differences and the jet initial conditions using the two nozzles is not as simple as was first thought, and that other parameters, associated for instance with the nozzle geometry such as the presence of pressure gradients, may also play an important role.