Determination of the Fluid-Elastic Stability Threshold in the Presence of Turbulence: A Theoretical Study

Abstract

A model has been developed to examine the effect of the superposition of turbulent buffeting and fluid-elastic excitation on the response of a single flexible tube in an array exposed to cross-flow. The modeled response curves for a 1.375-pitch ratio parallel triangular array are compared with corresponding experimental data for the same array; reasonably good qualitative agreement is seen. Turbulence is shown to have a significant effect on the determination of the stability threshold for the array, with increasing turbulent buffeting causing a reduction in the apparent critical velocity. The dependence of turbulence response on mass ratio is also found to yield a slight independence between mass and damping parameters on stability threshold estimates, which may account for similar experimental findings. Different stability criteria are compared, and an attempt is made to provide some guidance in the interpretation of response curves from actual tests.