LECTURE 1

THE CONTENTS OF THIS LECTURE ARE AS FOLLOWS:

1.0 INTRODUCTION TO FLUID AND BASIC EQUATIONS

2.0 REYNOLDS NUMBER AND CRITICAL VELOCITY

3.0 APPROACH TOWARDS REYNOLDS NUMBER

REFERENCES

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 APPLICATION OF FLUID MECHANICS IN
MINES
1.0 INTRODUCTION TO FLUID AND BASIC EQUATIONS

First of all, the question arises about, what are fluids and why do we need to
study application of fluid mechanics in mine ventilation? For defining fluid, we
must know, how a solid and a fluid differ in their response when they are
subjected to shear stress. Let me tell you that stress when applied parallel or
tangential to the face of a body is called shear stress. It is given by:-

=
, where F= force, A= area

Let us refer to Fig.1 below:-

Fig. 1 Shear stress acting on a material (Solid or fluid)

In Fig. 1, we can say that force F is being applied to the upper face of the
material (Solid or fluid) and the force is parallel to the face of the material. A is
the area of the face. H is the distance between the opposite faces of the
material. D is the displacement or the deformation, the upper face of the

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material undergoes. is the shear stress and is given by the relation, . Now,

the material can respond in the following two ways:

i. Shear Stress strain ( ), or


ii. Shear Stress rate of strain ( . . , = )

The materials which follow the first relation are called solids and the material
following the second are termed as fluids. Thus, we can say that fluid can be
thought of as material which can undergo continuous deformation as long as the
shear stress is applied, however small the shear stress may be. On the other
hand, solid shows resistance to deformation or even if it undergoes deformation
it comes to its original shape if the applied force is under elastic limit. Thus, if a
fluid moves it means shear stress is acting over it.

We are discussing about the application of fluid mechanics in mine ventilation

because air is the chief element on which we will focus our attention when it
comes to underground mine ventilation. Air falls under fluid and obeys all the
basic laws of nature or science like conservation of mass, conservation of
energy, Newtons law of motion, basic laws of thermodynamics, etc.
Now, we will discuss in brief some of the basic equations without going in details
about their derivation.

(a) Newtons law of viscosity

= , = ( 2 ) ;


= ( 2 ) ;

1
= ( )

Fluid which follows the above relation is termed as Newtonian fluid. Let me tell
you that viscosity is the property by which a fluid shows resistance in flow. This
resistance is applied in between the layers of fluid and hence is internal in
nature.
Also, of fluid is related to density of fluid, by the relation:
2
= , = ( )

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(b) Hydrostatic law of fluid

= , = ( 2
) ; = ( 3 ) ;


= ( 2 ) ; = ()

(c) Law of mass conservation

According to this, mass flowing in an isolated system remains constant. Let
us consider Fig. 2.

Fig. 2

From this figure we can write, M1 = M2

= ,

= ( ) ; = ( 3 ) ; = (2 );

= (/)
For incompressible fluid, applying M1 = M2; we get
1 1 = 2 2
, 1 1 = 2 2

This is the equation of continuity in its simplest form and it explains that the
mass of a fluid remains conserved in the course of its flow.

(d) Bernoulli equation

This is based on the law of conservation of energy. Bernoulli equation is a special

case of Eulers equation and is given by:
2
+ + = ,
2

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= ( 3 ) ; = ( ) ; = ( 2 ) ;


= () = ( 2 )

Thus, we can say that for an incompressible and non-viscous fluid the sum of the
kinetic, potential and pressure energies per unit volume is constant. When a
fluid is viscous, we apply law of conservation of energy taking energy loss due to
friction into account.

2.0 REYNOLDSNUMBER AND CRITICAL VELOCITY

Today, what we are going to discuss is familiar to most of you. How many of
you have noticed a change in flow of water from a tap after loosening the knob
of a tap gradually. Did you notice any change in the flow pattern in initial stage
and after some time when you have loosened the knob significantly (Fig. 3).
What difference do you notice? If we ask this question to a layman, he will say
that initially it is simple and ordered and later on when we loosened the knob it
is complex and no more ordered. Why does this change occur? Is it due to
increase in velocity? Yes of course, it is. Again, you will notice that even if the
flow from tap is maintained ordered as in the initial stage, the water after falling
in the basin assumes a flow similar to what we see in the latter stage, i.e. the
flow in the basin is complex and disordered. It means that along with velocity, it
also depends on shape of opening through which it flows.

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Fig. 3 Depiction of laminar and turbulent flow

You would like to see that how this phenomena occurs and how the transition
from simple ordered flow to complex disordered flow takes place.

The theory behind these flow pattern was not developed in a day or two. It took
years to explore it. First of all it was G. H. HAGEN (1797-1884), who observed
this and came out with a conclusion that, the flow pattern is a function of
velocity and viscosity of the fluid. How many of you are familiar with the term
viscosity? Viscosity is the inherent property of a fluid to resist its flow. Fluids
include gases also, and therefore, this type of flow is shown by gases too.

In 1880s, Professor Osborne Reynolds carried out numerous experiment on fluid

flow. We will now discuss the laboratory set up of his experiment. The
experimental set used by Prof. Osborne Reynold is shown in Fig. 4.

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 Fig. 4 Laboratory experimental set up for Reynolds experiment

As you can see from the figure, Reynolds injected dye jet in a glass tube which is
submerged in the large water tank. Please see that the other end of the glass
tube is out of water tank and is fitted with a valve. He made use of the valve to
regulate the flow of water. The observations made by Reynolds from his
experiment are given shown through Figures 5 to 7.

Fig. 5 Sketch showing the flow to be simple and ordered at low velocity

Fig. 6 The flow of dye forming wavy pattern at medium velocity

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 Fig. 7 The flow of dye is complex at higher velocity

Now, it is important to know what velocity should we consider as low, medium or

high for this phenomenon? The answer to this question can be known once we
understand Reynolds number.

3.0 APPROACH TOWARDS REYNOLDS NUMBER

Throughout the experiment, Reynolds thought that the flow must be governed
inertial force
by a dimensionless quantity. What he observed was that is unit less
viscous force

(dimensionless). Let us see the mathematical expression of inertial force and

viscous force.

Inertial force is the force due to motion i.e. which may be also called as kinetic
force.
2
Kinetic energy = where, v = velocity (m/s); m = mass (Kg)
2

2
Inertial force = 2
where, = density (kg/m3); v = velocity (m/s)

2
Now, inertial force = 3 2
= 2
3 = N/m2 = unit of pressure

Thus, inertial force has unit of Newton per meter square.

Viscous force = shear stress = By Newtons law of viscosity (Newton per

meter square)

2
Thus,
=
(as we are interested only in dimensionless quantity,

so we are omitting 2 from the denominator)

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Now, for a finite length we can write dy = l, and du = v

2
This results in
=
, where l = mean diameter of duct; =

viscosity; v = mean velocity.

The expression (vl)/ is called REYNOLDS NUMBER and is designated as

Re.

Now, coming to CRITICAL VELOCITY, I would like to show you a graph which is
depicted in Fig. 8.

Fig. 8 Lower and upper critical velocities in the transition region of flow
from laminar to turbulent

We can see the change of flow from laminar (simple and ordered) to turbulent
(complex and disordered). In between them, transition flow exists. The velocity
at which flow changes from laminar to transition is called LOWER CRITICAL
VELOCITY and that at which transition changes to turbulent is called UPPER
CRITICAL VELOCITY.

We can see that at lower speed, the flow is laminar and at higher speed it is
turbulent.

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Now let us go back to the expression of Reynolds number.

Re =

Thus low velocity for simple and ordered flow indicate that Re should be low.
Hence laminar flow(similar and ordered) takes place when , v and l are small
and is large.

Reynolds concluded from his experiments that for:

Laminar flow - 0 2000
Transition - 2000 4000
Turbulent flow - 4000

Now, we will discuss how the two different types of flow are related to velocity.
Do they depend on velocity linearly or in some other way? The flow turns out to
be turbulent from laminar if we increase the velocity, keeping all other
parameters constant. Since REYNOLDS NUMBER is directly proportional to
velocity, the flow should be a linear function of velocity. However, the pressure
drop which these types of flow create while flowing in a pipe does not follow the
linearity in case of turbulent flow.
p u for laminar flow
p u2 for turbulent flow

At this point let me tell you that in many text books you may find that it is
mentioned p u1.75. But, we will use p u2 for turbulent flow until or unless
it is stated.

REFERENCES

Hartman, H. L., Mutmansky, J. M. & Wang, Y. J. (1982); Mine Ventilation and

Air Conditioning; John Wiley & Sons, New York.

McPherson, M. J. (1993); Subsurface Ventilation and Environmental

Engineering; Chapman & Hall, London.

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Vutukuri, V. S. & Lama, R. D. (1986); Environmental Engineering in Mines;
Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.

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