Investigation of the detailed spread characteristics of plane turbulent wakes

An experimental investigation of plane turbulent wakes generated by solid bodies of various cross-sectional shapes and by strips of screens of various solidities has been carried out by means of hot-wire anemometry for the purpose of establishing the detailed spread characteristics of these flows. Each wake was found to attain a state in which the lateral distributions of its principal statistical properties, viz., mean velocity, rms streamwise velocity, rms lateral velocity and Reynolds stress, were self-similar and the characteristics intensity and length scales associated with these distributions varied in accordance with predicted self-preserving laws; moreover, all wakes except those produced by screen-strips having characteristic Reynolds numbers based on screen-wire diameter less than a critical value on about 100 were found to approach a universal self-preserving state.