Analysis of the Buoyant Plume Above a Heated Horizontal Cylinder in a Free Convection Flow (thesis)

Abstract

Years of experimentation have confirmed that the buoyant plume above a heated horizontal source sways [1-15]. The plume generally begins as a plane near the cylinder and forms a sinusoidal, oscillating wave as it rises towards the surface. Several experiments have confirmed the sinusoidal nature of the plume's structure [7, 8]. However, this thesis will present new data on the formation and specific characteristics of this structure and formulate a hypothesis for how the features in the flow affect the structure.