Educational experiments with Particle Image Velocimetry in a small Prandtl water tunnel
Abstract
A small water tunnel was designed as a table top experiment to visualize and measure basic fluid dynamic phenomena. The visualization of the flow by a laser light sheet and the measurement with Particle Image Velocimetry (PIV) proves to be very instructive for teaching high school and university students. Three basic fluid dynamic experiments are reported: the determination of the vortex shedding frequency of a cylinder (von-Karman vortex street), the measurement of circulation around a flat plate and the lift coefficient of a NACA profile. All three experiments show good agreement with theoretical expectations.
Cite
@article{arxiv.2508.02147,
title = {Educational experiments with Particle Image Velocimetry in a small Prandtl water tunnel},
author = {William Thielicke and Steffen Risius},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2508.02147},
year = {2025}
}
Comments
10 pages, 10 figures, to be published in the proceedings of the "DGLR-Fachsymposium der STAB - Deutsche Str\"omungsmechanische Arbeitsgemeinschaft", 13. - 14. November, Regensburg, Germany