This work investigates the rod-airfoil air flow by time-resolved Tomographic Particle Image Velocimetry (TR-TOMO PIV) in thin-light volume configuration. Experiments are performed at the region close to the leading edge of a NACA0012 airfoil embedded in the von Kármán wake of a cylindrical rod. The 3D velocity field measured at 5 kHz is used to evaluate the instantaneous planar pressure field by integration of the pressure gradient field. The experimental data are treated with a discretized model based on multiple velocity measurements. The time separation used to evaluate the Lagrangian derivative along a fluid parcel trajectory has to be taken into account to reduce precision error. By comparing Lagrangian and Eulerian approaches, the latter is restricted to shorter time separations and is found not applicable to evaluate pressure gradient field if a relative precision error lower than 10% is required. Finally, the pressure evaluated from tomographic velocity measurements is compared to that obtained from simulated planar ones to discuss the effect of 3D flow phenomena on the accuracy of the proposed technique.

The three-dimensional behavior of flow transition in circular and 6-chevron jets at Re ¼ 5000 is investigated with experiments conducted on a free water jet by time-resolved tomographic particle image velocimetry. The emphasis is on the unsteady organization of coherent flow structures, which play a role in the generation of acoustic noise. Shedding and pairing of vortices are the most pronounced phenomena observed in the near field of the circular jet. The first and second pairing amplify the axial pulsatile motion in the jet column and lead to the growth of azimuthal waves culminating in the breakup of the vortex ring. Streamwise vortices of axial and radial vorticity are observed in the outer region and move inward and outward under the effect of the vortex rings. In the jet with chevrons, the axisymmetric ring-like coherence of the circular jet is not encountered. Instead, streamwise flow structures of azimuthal vorticity emanate from the chevron apices, and counter-rotating streamwise vortices of axial and radial vorticity develop from the chevron notches. The decay of streamwise vortices is accompanied by the formation of C-shaped structures. The three-dimensional analysis allows quantifying the vortex stretching and tilting activity, which, for the circular jet exit, is related to the azimuthal instabilities and the streamwise vortices connecting the vortex rings. In the chevron jet, stretching and tilting peak during the formation of C-structures. Following Powell's aeroacoustic analogy, the spatial distribution of the source term is mapped, evaluating the temporal derivative of the Lamb vector. The spatio-temporal evolution of such source term is visualized revealing that the events of highest activity are associated with the processes of vortex-ring pairing and vortex-ring disruption for the circular jet, and with the decay of streamwise instabilities and the formation of C-shaped structures for the chevron case.

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An experimental study has been conducted on a transitional water jet at a Reynolds number of Re = 5000. Flow fields have been obtained by means of time-resolved tomographic particle image velocimetry (TR-TOMO PIV) capturing all relevant spatial and temporal scales. The measured three-dimensional flow fields have then been postprocessed by the dynamic mode decomposition (DMD) which identifies coherent structures that contribute significantly to the dynamics of the jet. Where the jet exhibits a primary axisymmetric instability followed by a pairing of the vortex rings, dominant dynamic modes have been extracted together with their amplitude distribution. These modes represent a basis for the low-dimensional description of the dominant flow features.

The three-dimensional behavior of jet core breakdown is investigated with experiments conducted on a free water jet at Re = 5000 by time-resolved tomographic particle image velocimetry (TR-TOMO PIV). The investigated domain encompasses the range between 0 and 10 jet diameters. The characteristic pulsatile motion of vortex ring shedding and pairing culminates with the growth of four primary inplane and out-of-plane azimuthal waves and leads to the formation of streamwise vortices. Vortex ring humps are tilted and ejected along the axial direction as they are subjected to higher axial velocities. By the end of the potential core, this process causes the breakdown of the vortex ring regime and the onset of streamwise filaments oriented at 30• -45• to the jet axis and "C" shaped peripheral structures. The latter re-organize further downstream in filaments oriented along the azimuthal direction at the jet periphery. Instead, in the vicinity of the jet axis the filaments do not exhibit any preferential direction resembling the isotropic turbulent regime. Following Powell's aeroacoustic analogy, the instantaneous spatial distribution of the acoustic source term is mapped by the second time derivative of the Lamb vector, revealing the highest activity during vortex ring breakdown. A three-dimensional modal analysis of velocity, vorticity, Lamb vector, and Lamb vector second time derivative fields is conducted by proper orthogonal decomposition (POD) within the first 10 modes. The decomposed velocity fluctuations describe a helical organization in the region of the jet core-breakdown and, further downstream, jet axis flapping and precession motions. By the end of the potential core, vorticity modes show that vortex rings are dominated by travelling waves of radial and axial vorticity with a characteristic 40• -45• inclination to the jet axis. The Lamb vector and the Lamb vector second time derivative modes exhibit similar patterns for the azimuthal component, whereas the vortex ring coherence is described by the radial and the axial components. While velocity, vorticity, and Lamb vector modes are typically associated with Strouhal numbers (St) smaller than 0.9, the modes of the Lamb vector second time derivative are also related to higher frequencies (1.05 ≤ St ≤ 1.9) ascribed to the three-dimensional travelling waves. Far-field acoustic predictions are obtained on the basis of direct evaluation of Powell's analogy with TR-TOMO PIV data. The spectral analysis returns peaks at pairing (St = 0.36) and shedding (St = 0.72) frequency. A broader distribution with a hump between St = 1 and 2.25 is observed, which corresponds to the breakdown of ring vortices. C 2013 American Institute of Physics.