Suppression of vortex-induced forces on a two-dimensional circular cylinder by a short and thin splitter plate interference

This paper briefly reviews bluff body aerodynamics and focuses mainly on the use of short and thin splitter plates to interfere with the vortex wakes and suppress vortex-induced forces (VIF). The present investigation primarily examines the suppression of unsteady, two-dimensional wake instabilities over a low Reynolds number range of less than 250. A circular cylinder is used as the bluff body in this study. Wake instabilities of both bounded and unbounded flows are investigated. It is found that channel walls have a stabilizing effect on the shedding, and, in this case, VIF can be eliminated entirely by a correctly placed splitter plate. The investigation is carried out by way of numerical simulation using a commercial incompressible, viscous computational fluid dynamics (CFD) solver. A simple experiment is also performed to confirm the effectiveness of a splitter plate in suppressing flow induced vibration. Nomenclature 1UDS = 1 st order upwind difference scheme 2UDS = 2 nd order upwind difference scheme i u l A = matrix coefficients C D = drag coefficient CDS = central difference scheme CFD = computational fluid dynamics C D = drag coefficient, based on U 0 , d U D C D ⋅ ⋅ = 2 0 2 1 ρ C D L L ⋅ ⋅ = 2 0 2 1 ρ C C L * = lift coefficient, based on U * , d U L L ⋅ ⋅ = 2 * * 2 1 ρ C C p = pressure coefficient, 2 0 2 1 U p p p ⋅ C − = ∞ ρ C pb = mean base pressure coefficient at 180° from the front stagnation point d = diameter of circular cylinder D = drag force f = shedding frequency h = channel height l = splitter plate length l s = distance of splitter plate separation from obstructing body l sc = distance of splitter plate from center of circular cylinder L = lift force p = pressure Re d = Reynolds number based on d and U 0 , µ ρ d U d ⋅ ⋅ = 0 Re Re d * = effective Reynolds number based on d and U * , µ ρ d U d ⋅ ⋅ = * * Re S φ = sources or sinks of a scalar quantity φ St = Strouhal number, 0 U d f St ⋅ = St * = Modified …