PIV measurements of isothermal plane turbulent impinging jets at moderate Reynolds numbers

This paper contains a detailed experimental analysis of an isothermal plane turbulent impinging jet (PTIJ) for two jet widths at moderate Reynolds numbers (7200–13,500) issued on a horizontal plane at fixed relative distances equal to 22.5 and 45 jet widths. The available literature on such flows is scarce. Previous studies on plane turbulent jets mainly focused on free jets, while most studies on impinging jets focused on the heat transfer between the jet and an impingement plane, disregarding jet development. The present study focuses on isothermal PTIJs at moderate Reynolds numbers characteristic of air curtains. Flow visualisations with fluorescent dye and 2D particle image velocimetry (PIV) measurements have been performed. A comparison is made with previous studies of isothermal free turbulent jets at moderate Reynolds numbers. Mean and instantaneous velocity and vorticity, turbulence intensity, and Reynolds shear stress are analysed. The jet issued from the nozzle with higher aspect ratio shows more intensive entrainment and a faster decay of the centreline velocity compared to the jet of lower aspect ratio for the same value of jet Reynolds number. The profiles of centreline and cross-jet velocity and turbulence intensity show that the PTIJs behave as a free plane turbulent jet until 70–75% of the total jet height. Alongside the information obtained on the jet dynamics, the data will be useful for the validation of numerical simulations.