Turbulent flow in smooth and rough pipes

Abstract

Recent experiments at Princeton University have revealed aspects of smooth pipe flow behaviour that suggest a more complex scaling than previously noted. In particular, the pressure gradient results yield a new friction factor relationship for smooth pipes, and the velocity profiles indicate the presence of a power-law region near the wall and, for Reynolds numbers greater than about 400×10 3 ( R + >9×10 3 ), a logarithmic region further out. New experiments on a rough pipe with a honed surface finish with k rms / D =19.4×10 −6 , over a Reynolds number range of 57×10 3 –21×10 6 , show that in the transitionally rough regime this surface follows an inflectional friction factor relationship rather than the monotonic relationship given in the Moody diagram. Outer-layer scaling of the mean velocity data and streamwise turbulence intensities for the rough pipe show excellent collapse and provide strong support for Townsend's outer-layer similarity hypothesis for rough-walled flows. The streamwise rough-wall spectra also agree well with the corresponding smooth-wall data. The pipe exhibited smooth behaviour for , which supports the suggestion that the original smooth pipe was indeed hydraulically smooth for Re D ≤24×10 6 . The relationship between the velocity shift, Δ U / u τ , and the roughness Reynolds number, , has been used to generalize the form of the transition from smooth to fully rough flow for an arbitrary relative roughness k rms / D . These predictions apply for honed pipes when the separation of pipe diameter to roughness height is large, and they differ significantly from the traditional Moody curves.