Scaling of near-wall turbulence in pipe flow

Abstract

New measurements of the streamwise component of the turbulence intensity in a fully developed pipe flow at Reynolds numbers up to 145 000 indicate that the magnitude of the near-wall peak is invariant with Reynolds number in location and magnitude. The results agree with previous pipe flow data that have sufficient spatial resolution to avoid spatial filtering effects, but stand in contrast to similar results obtained in boundary layers, where the magnitude of the peak displays a prominent Reynolds number dependence, although its position is fixed at the same location as in pipe flow. This indicates that the interaction between the inner and outer regions is different in pipe flows and boundary layers.