how to justify if a flow is turbulent in the ocean modeling
 

Hi All,

My apology for asking such a fundamental question, but I've been struggling to understand on what basis should we say that the flow is turbulent (apart from the experimental results)? For ideal cases such as duct or pipe, then we normally use Reynolds number to justify the flow characterisation, however, for open channel I don't think this is quite the case. How about using Froude number as opposed to Reynolds number?

Thanks very much for your time and attention.

Kind Regards,
Robert

You should not focus to much on a Reynolds number. Even for pipe flow it is possible to have laminar flow for Re=10 000 in special occasions. The Froude number cannot be a measure, since the molecular viscosity plays an important role in the dissipation and break up of eddies at small scales.

Hi Bernhard,

Thanks for your reply. So to go back to the question, how do I know if a flow is turbulent prior to choose solvers, etc?

Kind Regards,
Robert

In general you know what your simulating, so you know what to expect. This is the only option to tell it on beforehand, but I think it is really essential to understand what you are modelling when you start your simulations. And how can you judge the results if you don't really understand the case?

Of course you can look at your results, and check in what regime the turbulent viscosity is, but that doesn't make sense for me.

Thanks Bernhard.

I judge my results based on comparison with the experimental observations. The way I do it now is similar to your second suggestion (I know this isn't the right way - which is the reason why I post this discussion on the board) which is to cross reference the turbulent viscosity ratio based on the Reynolds number and match the results with the experimental data.

Thanks and Regards,
Robert

Hi Robert,
You can use the results for channel flows. Re=V B/nu
were V=medium velocity, B=channel depth, nu=kinematic viscosity. Transition from laminar to turbulent flow is expected for appproximately Re=1300.
Paulo

I have a similar question (I decided to ask here instead of creating a new thread; sorry if I'm stealing this thread, but it seems relevant if you omit the "ocean modelling" part).

So, is it possible to somehow check quantitatively if the flow is turbulent? In my case, there is a pipe with a wire grid/mesh inside. It is possible to calculate Re from a known flow velocity and some characteristic lengths of the structure. However, how to assess the turbulence (if any) more precisely and to know at least approximately the velocity at which the flow begins to turbulize? Most solvers are based on the assumption of the flow nature, so one should select the appropriate solver, but how to select the correct one if I don't know in advance the flow regime (except for the value of Re and maybe some other parameters)?

There were already some questions (threads) about modelling the laminar/turbulent transition, but 1) they were rather old and probably things have changed in newer OF versions, 2) I think this question is simpler, because we don't have to model the transition itself.