Numerical investigation of polymer additive effects on the flow around immersed bodies

Although it is a well-known fact that dilute solutions obtained by adding a small amountof polymer or surfactant to Newtonian fluids lead to a reduction in friction factor and dragcoefficient at high Reynolds number flows; its mechanism and the polymer induced flowstructure at high Reynolds numbers need to be investigated in more detail for different flowgeometries by means of new experimental methods, as well as numerical simulations with theapplication of different rheological constitutive models. For clarification of such an importantpart of fluid mechanics, numerical simulations have been performed with Newtonian,generalized Newtonian (Power-law) and viscoelastic (FENE-P) fluid models, Reynoldsnumber up to 4000 for circular cylinder domain and Reynolds number up to 2000 for squarecylinder domain. The results of the simulations have been compared with literature. The mostdistinctive consequences of these simulations is that Power-law fluid, not the viscoelasticfluid, causes decrease in drag coefficient and increase in vortex shedding frequency in thewake region compared to Newtonian fluid, for both circular and square cylinder simulations. Itis also concluded that polymer addition, with respect to Power-law fluid, results in an oppositeeffect, on vortex formation length and drag coefficient, at high Reynolds numbers.