Direct numerical simulation of a wall jet: flow physics

Abstract

A direct numerical simulation (DNS) of a plane wall jet is performed at a Reynolds number of $Re_{j}=7500$. The streamwise length of the domain is long enough to achieve self-similarity for the mean flow and the Reynolds shear stress. This is the highest Reynolds number wall jet DNS for a large domain achieved to date. The high resolution simulation reveals the unsteady flow field in great detail and shows the transition process in the outer shear layer and inner boundary layer. Mean flow parameters of maximum velocity decay, wall shear stress, friction coefficient and jet spreading rate are consistent with several other studies reported in the literature. Mean flow, Reynolds normal and shear stress profiles are presented with various scalings, revealing the self-similar behaviour of the wall jet. The Reynolds normal stresses do not show complete similarity for the given Reynolds number and domain length. Previously published inner layer budgets based on LES are inaccurate and those that have been measured are only available in the outer layer. The current DNS provides fully balanced, explicitly calculated budgets for the turbulence kinetic energy, Reynolds normal stresses and Reynolds shear stress in both the inner and outer layers. The budgets are scaled with inner and outer variables. The inner-scaled budgets in the near wall region show great similarity with turbulent boundary layers. The only remarkable difference is for the turbulent diffusion in the wall-normal Reynolds stress and Reynolds shear stress budgets. The outer layer interacts with the inner layer through turbulent diffusion and the excess energy from the wall-normal direction is transferred to the spanwise direction.