Pressure Drop Due to the Entrance Region in Ducts of Arbitrary Cross Section

Abstract

A general analytical method has been devised for determining the pressure drop due to flow development in the entrance region of ducts of arbitrary cross section. The essential feature of the analysis is that the pressure drop can be determined without actually solving for the entrance-region velocity development. Instead, the calculation only requires a knowledge of the fully developed velocity profile. Application of the method is made to a variety of cross sections including the circular tube, elliptical ducts, rectangular ducts, isosceles triangular ducts, and annular ducts. Numerical results are presented and comparisons are made with available experiments and with prior analysis.