The objective of this study was to make velocity measurements in drag-reducing flows which would be sufficient in scope and accuracy to test proposed models of drag-reducing flows and to yield new information about the mechanisms of drag reduction. Consequently, measurements of the mean and turbulence intensity of the streamwise velocity component were made in fully developed, turbulent, drag-reducing flow in a two-dimensional channel with a laser-Doppler anemometer. The anemometer was operated in the individual-realization mode and corrections were made to eliminate statistical biasing of the data. Two polyacrylamides and a polyethylene oxide were used to produce seven flows which had drag reductions ranging from 24 to 41 %. Measurements were also made in water to establish the standard characteristics of the flow channel.

The data show that the drag-reducing mean velocity profile can be divided into three zones: a viscous sublayer, a buffer or interactive region and a logarithmic region. There is no evidence that the viscous sublayers of the drag-reducing channel flows are thicker than those in the solvent flows. In addition the normalized streamwise fluctuations are essentially the same in both the solvent and drag-reducing sublayers. The changes caused by the polymer addition occur in the buffer region. The drag-reducing buffer region is thicker and the velocity profile in the outer flow region adjusts in order to accommodate this buffer-region thickening. The measurements of the streamwise velocity fluctuations also show that the polymer additives redistribute the primary turbulent activity over a broadened buffer region. The normalized magnitude of these fluctuations is, however, considerably lower in these two-dimensional drag-reducing channel flows than in those previously reported by Rudd (1972), Logan (1972) and Kumor & Sylvester (1973). Moreover, the mean velocity profiles in the buffer region do not confirm the hypothesis of Virk, Mickley & Smith (1970) that the data will follow their proposed ‘ultimate profile’ when the drag reduction is less than that given by the maximum asymptote. The mean velocity measurements also show that the proposed methods for predicting the upward shift in the outer portion of the mean velocity profile are inconsistent and lack universality. However, these results do confirm the previous suggestions of Virk (1971), Tomita (1970) and Lumley (1973) that the buffer region is the area of importance and change in drag-reducing flows.

We have obtained a closed-form solution for the sound radiation from multipole sources imbedded in an infinite cylindrical jet with an arbitrary velocity profile. It is valid in the limit where the wavelength is large compared with the jet radius. Simple formulae for the acoustic pressure field due to convected point sources are also obtained. The results show (in a simple way) how the mean flow affects the radiation pattern from the sources. For convected lateral quadrupoles it causes the exponent n of the Doppler factor (1 - M cosθ)−n multiplying the far-field pressure signal to be increased from the value of 3 used by Lighthill to 5.

Transition in a two-dimensional plane wall jet was examined for the range of exit Reynolds numbers between 100 and 600. The wall jet was produced by the flow of water, which issued either from a smoothly-contoured nozzle or from the end of a long parallel channel. Observations were recorded both visually and with a hot-film anemometer. Both natural and forced transition cases were studied. Natural transition generally occurred in the following stages: (i) formation of discrete vortices in the outer shear layer; (ii) coalescence of adjacent vortices in the outer shear layer, coupled with the rolling up of the inner shear layer; (iii) eruption of the wall jet off the surface of the flat plate into the ambient fluid; (iv) dispersion of the organized flow pattern by three-dimensional turbulent motions; and (v) re-laminarization of the upstream flow, until another vortex pairing occurred. The initial stages of transition are two-dimensional in nature; and are dominated by the mechanism of vortex pairing, which is commonly observed in free shear layers. The inner-region shear layer exerts a stabilizing influence on the velocity profile at low Reynolds numbers. Forced transition was essentially similar to natural transition, except for the elimination of the downstream intermittency and the establishment of a fixed downstream location for transition.

The noise produced by mean flow-turbulence interaction of a circular subsonic jet is investigated theoretically, and expanded in azimuthal constituents of the turbulent pressure fluctuations. It is found that the low-order azimuthal constituents are the most efficient sound sources. On the basis of pressure correlation measurements, the azimuthal constituents are determined in a low Mach number jet. It is found that, in a range of Strouhal numbers between 0·2 and 1, the first three to four azimuthal constituents clearly dominate over the rest of the turbulent source quantity. A strictly axisymmetric ring vortex model for the coherent structure of the turbulence is, however, shown to be inappropriate.

In an attempt to explain the discrepancies that have been observed in the spread of nominally axisymmetric jets, an experimental investigation has been carried out in which the effects of a number of factors which it was thought might be important to jet development have been studied. These factors included the nozzle boundary-layer thickness, turbulence level and convergence. However, over the limited range of the tests, it was found that none of these factors had a very strong influence on the jet development. By contrast, the insertion of small rectangular tabs into the jet flow on the nozzle perimeter was found to have a very profound effect on the jet development. In particular, it was found that just two tabs produced gross distortions in the jet development resulting in the jet almost splitting in two with high velocity regions on either side of the diameter joining the tabs. Some explanations for this effect based on further tests with wedges are put forward.

In addition to the measurements of the mean flow field, a few spectrum and correlation measurements are reported for jets both from a clean nozzle and also from a nozzle with two tabs. In the former tests, evidence additional to the results of other experimenters was found for the existence of flow structures which have some coherence around the entire circumference of the jet. It has been suggested that these ‘vortex rings’ or ‘puffs’ may be of some importance in producing jet noise and it seems that the effect of inserting tabs is to prevent the occurrence of these structures.

Extensive boundary-layer measurements have been made on a cone-ogive-cylinder model at a free-stream Mach number of 7·0 and momentum-thickness Reynolds number of 8500. Mean flow transformations and calculated turbulence correlations are presented which are in good agreement with previous incompressible results. New quantitative turbulence measurements including measurements of the first higher moment and probability density of fluctuations in mass flow and total temperature in hypersonic flow are also presented. The higher moment and probability density data show that the characters of the fluctuation modes of the mass flow and total temperature are significantly different in the wall region and in the outer part of the boundary layer. These differences together with data on the turbulence scale and lifetime obtained from autocorrelation and space-time correlation measurements are discussed.

This paper discusses the sound generated when an inhomogeneity in density is convected in a low Mach number steady flow through a contraction in a duct of infinite extent, and also when the inhomogeneity exhausts through a nozzle into free space. The analyses of Candel (1972) and Marble (1973) for the case of duct flow were based on a frequency decomposition of the incident inhomogeneity and cannot adequately deal with sharp-fronted inhomogeneities and entropy spots. However, the practical difficulties of this earlier work can be avoided at low flow Mach numbers by conducting the analysis in terms of an approximate expression for the acoustic Green's function in the manner described by Howe (1975). This method also permits a considerable extension of the range of the earlier investigations to the determination of the sound generated when the inhomogeneity is swept out of a nozzle orifice into free space. It is shown that the acoustic pressure perturbations developed in a duct at a contraction are in general proportional to the fractional difference between the density of the inhomogeneity and that of the mean flow times a typical mean flow pressure level, and are due principally to the fluctuation in thrust accompanying the passage of the inhomogeneity through the region of variable pressure gradient. The pressure waves generated at a nozzle orifice and radiated into free space are O(M0) smaller, where M0 is a mean flow Mach number based on the speed of sound in the jet.

The evolution of the power spectrum of surface gravity waves is described by means of an energy transport equation. A slowly varying, prescribed ocean current and wind source are assumed to account for spatial inhomogeneities in the surface wave spectrum. These inhomogeneities lead to a new nonlinear wave-wave interaction mechanism.