Internal and near-wall flow fields around a structured porous coated cylinder and their role in passive flow and noise control

The mechanisms responsible for vortex shedding reduction, due to the application of a porous coating to a smooth cylinder placed in uniform flow, are still uncertain despite several numerical and experimental studies. To help understand these mechanisms, a transparent Structured Porous Coated Cylinder (SPCC) was manufactured to investigate the internal and near-wall flow fields. The SPCC mimics the more commonly used porous materials such as metal foam and polyurethane, that possess randomized structures preventing a clear line-of-sight along the span and circumference of the porous layers. Tomographic Particle Image Velocimetry was used in a water-tunnel facility to investigate three small regions of an SPCC, on the windward, mid-region and leeward sides. In this paper, previously unseen experimentally obtained internal flow fields of a porous coated cylinder are presented. The following summarize the key observations (1) stagnation from freestream flow to the inner cylinder diameter in the windward region, (2) boundary layer profiles within the porous layer in the circumferential mid-region and (3) bleeding from the porous layer into the wake in the leeward region. These results provide key experimental findings for comparison and validation of numerical simulations of bulk porous media, such as the Darcy-Forscheimer method used in conjunction with the Ffowcs Williams-Hawkings acoustic analogy.