Shallow turbulent wakes behind bed-mounted cylinders in open channels

Abstract

Flow patterns in the shallow turbulent near-wakes behind bed-mounted cylinders are investigated on smooth and rough beds. A wall wake analysis revealed that the flows in the region away from the bed are similar and well described by the plane wake equation. Wall wake similarity was also observed for turbulent kinetic energy and primary Reynolds stress for moderate to deeply submerged cylinders.Wake analyses in the horizontal plane revealed that similarity of mean velocity profiles across the flow exist in the near-wake region at all elevations for slightly submerged and surface piercing cylinders; and at all elevations below the object height close to moderate and deeply submerged cylinders. For slightly submerged and surface piercing cylinders similarity was observed in the near-wake region between the non-dimensional velocity profiles across the wake and the plane wake equation. However, the similarity of the velocity profiles improves if a modified transverse length scale is used for shallow near-wake flows.

Keywords:

• Bed roughness
• Cylinder
• Open channel flow
• Turbulence
• Wake