Abstract:
A set of testing apparatus to study the effects of microbubbles drag reduction was designed in this paper. The turbulent boundary layer was formed on the surface of a 2D flat plate. The behaviors of the microbubbles were visualized quantitatively using the high speed camera. The skin-friction drag was measured using balances. The effects of the drag reduction with different air flow, free-stream velocity and buoyancy were analyzed. It shows that the microbubbles are effective in reducing the skin friction in high Reynolds number regime of 10
6. It proves that microbubbles can significantly reduce skin-friction of the solid wall and the drag reduction radio is up to 36%. Results show that when the gas flow rate increases, the skin-friction reduction ratio increases.