An Experimental Investigation of Partial Cavitation on a Two - Dimensional Hydrofoil

Abstract

An investigation of leading edge partial cavitation was performed including the cavitation inception conditions, the cavitation patterns together with cavity length measurements. The investigation was enhanced by wall-pressure measurements using an instrumented hydrofoil equipped with seventeen wall-pressure transducers. Several experimental results are presented in the paper. A peak of pressure fluctuations was recorded at the cavity closure. The peak magnitude was seen to increase with the cavity length. For cavity lengths that did not exceed about half the foil chord, the peak originated from pressure fluctuations at a Strouhal number based on the cavity length close to 0.2. For longer cavities, the cavity began to pulsate at a lower frequency with the cavity length varying from the vicinity of the leading edge up to the trailing edge. The reason for such a phenomena is discussed.