EXPERIMENTAL AND NUMERICAL INVESTIGATION OF LAMINAR-FLOW OVER A FORWARD FACING STEP INSIDE A PIPE

An experimental and numerical study of the 3D laminar flow inside a pipe over a forward facing step is presented. Flow visualization and LDA results show that as the Reynolds number increases, the flow topology involves from a single to multiple primary horseshoe vortices. The predicted 3D axial and tangential velocity fields are in satisfactory agreement with the experiments. Numerical heat transfer calculations show that the horseshoe vortices enhances heat transfer.