A numerical and experimental investigation of the stability of spiral Poiseuille flow

Abstract

The linear stability of the spiral motion induced between concentric cylinders by an axial pressure gradient and independent cylinder rotation is studied numerically and experimentally for a wide-gap geometry. A three-dimensional disturbance is considered. Linear stability limits in the form of Taylor numbers TaL are computed for the rotation ratios μ, = 0, 0·2, and -0·5 and for values of the axial Reynolds number Re up to 100. Depending on the values of μ and Re, the disturbance which corresponds to TaL can have a toroidal vortex structure or a spiral form. Aluminium-flake flow visualization is used to determine conditions for the onset of a secondary motion and its structure at finite amplitude. The experimental results agree with the predicted values of TaL for μ [ges ] 0, and low Reynolds number. For other cases in which agreement is only fair, apparatus length is shown to be a contributing influence. The comparison between experimental and predicted wave forms shows good agreement in overall trends.