Published online by Cambridge University Press: 07 June 2016
The problem of predicting the turbulent supersonic base pressure in axisymmetric flow is treated by an extension of a method of solution to the two-dimensional problem given in Ref. 1. The solution consists principally in tracing the boundary-layer development from upstream of the base to downstream of the recompression region for a given base pressure. A unique solution is obtained by specifying the shape of the rehabilitated boundary-layer velocity profile.
A comparison with experiment in the case of the step-down cylinder problem (the sting-support problem) yields some very favourable results. It is pointed out that, while it has not been found possible to obtain a solution to the problem of a vanishingly small sting, the base pressure does not vary appreciably while the sting is decreased from about 0-3 of the base diameter down to zero. It would appear that the present analysis is capable of giving accurate results down to sting/diameter ratios of the order of 0·3.