COURSE NUMBER: ME 323

Fluid Mechanics II
3 credit hour

Boundary Layer

Course teacher
Dr. M. Mahbubur Razzaque
Professor
Department of Mechanical Engineering
BUET 1
 Boundary-Layer Theory
The technique of boundary layer (BL) analysis can be used to compute
viscous effects near solid walls and to “patch” these onto the outer
inviscid motion. This patching is more successful as the body Reynolds
number becomes larger.
If the Reynolds number is low, the viscous region is very broad and
extends far ahead and to the sides of the plate. The plate retards the
oncoming stream greatly, and small changes in flow parameters cause
large changes in the pressure distribution along the plate.

2
Thus, although in principle it should be possible to patch the viscous
and inviscid layers in a mathematical analysis, their interaction is
strong and nonlinear. There is no existing simple theory for external
flow analysis at Reynolds numbers from 1 to about 1000. Such thick-
shear-layer flows are typically studied by experiment or by numerical
modeling of the flow field on a computer.

A high-Reynolds-number flow is much more amenable to boundary

layer patching. The viscous layers, either laminar or turbulent, are very
thin (thinner even than the drawing shows).

The viscous effects are confined to this thin layer of fluid next to the
body and to the wake downstream of the body and is called boundary
layer.

3
The edge of the boundary layer, with thickness designated by d(x),
cannot be observed in an actual flow.

We arbitrarily define the boundary layer thickness as the locus of

points where the velocity u is equal to 99% of the free-stream velocity
U∞. Since the boundary layer is thin, the pressure in the boundary
layer is assumed to be the pressure p(x) at the wall.

4
The boundary layer begins as a laminar flow with zero thickness at the
leading edge of a flat plate or with some finite thickness at the
stagnation point of a blunt object or an airfoil. After a distance xT, the
laminar flow undergoes a transition process that results, after a short
distance, in a turbulent flow.

The quantity is the local Reynolds number and is the

critical Reynolds number. For flow over a flat plate with zero pressure
gradient, this transition process occurs when 3x105 for flow
on rough plates or 5x105 for flow on smooth rigid plates.

5
The transition region is relatively short and is usually ignored in
calculations. The flow up to xT is assumed to be laminar, and the flow
after xT is considered to be turbulent.

The turbulent boundary layer thickens much more rapidly than the
laminar layer. It also has a substantially greater wall shear. A sketch of a
turbulent boundary layer with its submerged viscous wall layer is
shown below. The time-average thickness is d(x), and the time-average
viscous wall-layer thickness is dn(x). Both layers are actually quite time
dependent. The instantaneous boundary-layer thickness varies between
0.4d and 1.2d, as shown.

6
Von Kármán Integral Equation

A thick boundary layer is drawn to scale in Fig. 8.24 for U = 1 m/s. For
higher velocities the boundary-layer thickness decreases. If the velocity
is high, say, U = 100 m/s, the boundary layer would hardly be noticed
drawn to the same scale. Yet all viscous effects are confined in that thin
layer; the velocity is brought to rest with very large gradients. Viscous
dissipative effects in this thin layer are large enough to cause sufficiently
high temperatures that satellites burn up on reentry to atmosphere.

7
From the velocity profile in the boundary layer of Fig. 8.24, it is observed
that the velocity goes from u = 0.99U at y = d to u = 0 at y = 0 over a very
short distance (the thickness of the boundary layer).

If the velocity profile can be assumed known, the continuity and

momentum integral equations will enable us to predict the boundary-layer
thickness and the wall shear and thus the drag.

Consider an infinitesimal control volume, shown in Fig. 8.25a. The integral

continuity equation allows us to find ˙mtop (see Fig. 8.25b). It is, assuming
unit depth,

8
9
If the velocity profile can be assumed, this equation along with t0(x) = mdu/dy|y=0
allows us to solve for both d(x) and t0 (x).

There are two additional lengths often used in boundary-layer theory. They are
the displacement thickness dd and the momentum thickness q, defined by

In terms of momentum thickness defined in equation (8.6.7), the von Kármán’s

integral equation (8.6.5) takes the form, assuming that r = const.,

This is called the momentum integral relation. It is valid for either laminar or
turbulent flat-plate boundary layer flow.
10
By substituting (7.7) into (8.6.8) and rearranging we obtain

11
12
Momentum thickness
The momentum-layer thickness is the equivalent thickness of a fluid layer with
velocity U with momentum equal to the momentum lost due to friction; the
momentum thickness is often used as a characteristic length in turbulent
boundary-layer studies.

The fluid passing through an element of the boundary layer carries momentum
per unit width at a rate (ruδy)u, whereas in frictionless flow the same amount
of fluid would have momentum (ruδy)U. For constant density, the total
reduction in momentum flow rate δ
 ρU  u  udy
0
equals the momentum flow rate under frictionless conditions through a
thickness θ. Therefore δ
ρU 2q   ρU  u  udy
0
Where,

The quantity θ is, therefore, a measure of the deficit of momentum flux caused
by the presence of the boundary layer and for this reason is sometimes referred
to as the momentum deficit thickness.
13
The displacement thickness is the displacement of the streamlines in the free
stream as a result of velocity deficits in the boundary layer, as required by
continuity considerations.

As shown in Fig. 7.4, outer

streamlines must deflect
outward a distance δ*(x)
to satisfy conservation of
mass between the inlet
and outlet:

The quantity δ* is called the displacement thickness of the boundary layer. To

relate it to u(y), Eq. (7.11) may be rearranged by canceling r and b from both
sides to get:

14
15
16
17
18
19
20