Cavity flow control using a rod in cross flow

For a variety of aerodynamic conditions and geometric configurations fluid structure interactions give rise to a reverberant field. This phenomenon, referred to as resonant acoustics, has practical importance due to its undesirable effects such as noise, structural loading, and unsteady flow field. Several flow control technologies exist but they lose efficacy at off-design conditions. With the focus on expanding their operating envelope, the present work investigates the physics of the flow control using a combination of detailed experimental measurements and theoretical analysis. The model resonant acoustic flow problem that we chose for our study is cavity tones, i.e., the high intensity acoustic tones produced by high speed air moving over rectangular cavity. The flow control actuator is a rod in cross flow, i.e., a thin horizontal rod placed upstream of the cavity.;In the present work, a detailed experimental study has been undertaken to characterize the acoustics, mean velocity field as well as the pressure perturbation field both inside and outside of the cavity. Control cases with contrasting suppression results are chosen to illustrate important aspects of the mean flow field. To investigate whether the cylinder, through its wake, changes the stability characteristics of the shear layer that develops over the cavity, stability analysis of the shear layer is undertaken. First, stability of artificial velocity profiles that are prototypical of the experimentally measured velocity profiles is investigated; in order to determine what parameters of the velocity profiles influence the stability of the shear layer the most. Next stability of experimentally measured velocity profiles is evaluated to calculate integrated growth rates along the length of the cavity. Mean velocity data is also used to elucidate the shear layer lift off mechanism of the rod. Both integrated growth range and shear layer lift off data are compared with the acoustic suppression results. Based on the trends it appears that shear layer lift off, which interferes with the acoustic interaction between the shear layer and the trailing edge of the cavity, is the dominant mechanism by which the rod controls flow over the cavity.