Vortex is a fluid structure such that any fluid particle present within that

structure experiences a ‘rotation’. A vortex is associated with a vector called

vorticity, just like a particle in motion is associated with a vector called velocity.
Vorticity has a magnitude which is twice the angular velocity of the rotating fluid
structure, and a direction that is basically the axis of rotation.
Turbulence is chaotic flow that arises out of instabilities occurring in a non-
chaotic or a laminar flow. Part of the energy associated with the laminar flow is
extracted by the instabilities and transferred to ‘eddies’, which are
circular/vortical structures that have a rotational rate (or vorticity) associated
with them. This energy can then get cascaded to even smaller eddies and so on,
until at the smallest scale the energy gets transferred to heat energy by
viscousity/friction.
Vortex can be either laminar or turbulent, whereas turbulence gives rise to only
turbulent vortices

A vortex is a mathematical idealization, so I will ignore the fact that in a real

vortex an individual molecule might move in any direction (i.e. not necessarily
the direction of the vortex).
In a nutshell, turbulence is disorderly, chaotic; a vortex is orderly. Turbulence
lacks continuity; a vortex is continuous everywhere except the center.
More formally: A vortex has a center. Points on opposite sides of the center move
in different directions, no matter how close to the center they are. But in a
neighborhood that doesn’t contain the center, the directions of any two point's
approach a single direction as the size of the neighborhood shrinks. This is not
the case for any turbulent neighborhood.

Turbulence is if you like “deterministic chaos” triggered from instabilites such

as the Tollmien–Schlichting instability (in bounded shear flows for example)
and others whereas vortex motion is often seen as a regular motion defining
coherent structures and which is often associated with the so called vorticity
which is 2∗ω2∗ω with ωω being the angular velocity.
CHARACRISTIC LENGTH
It’s a length which characterizes an important length dimension of your
problem. For example if you want to non-dimensionalize your position (x) in an
equation, let's take Navier Stokes, your non-dimensionalized position is x~ =x/L
where L is the length scale which can be the diameter of a pipe.
You can also use it as mentioned by others for dynamics similarity since similar
flow can be obtained as long as the ‘number’ is the same. By ‘number’ I’m
referring to dimensionless numbers such as Reynold’s number etc. Reynolds
number is a result of what I mentioned in the first paragraph.
Normally it is a length used in determining dynamic similitude.

For instance, the ratio between inertia and viscous forces called Reynolds number
depends on a characteristic length used to compare experimental data determined in
similar situations.

In pipes normally it is the diameter of the pipe. Using Moody's chart to determine the
friction factor you need to determine the Reynolds number that depends on the diameter
of the pipe. All the experimental data referring to pipes consider the diameter of the pipe
as the characteristic length.

When using similar formulas for wings, then the chord length of the wing is used as
characteristic length to scale the experimental data.

4\5=

Tecplote\
Hi Lorenzo,

This usually is caused by a divide by zero error when the

operation is division (in the case of multiplication, it
usually means that you obtained a number that is too large
for Tecplot to handle). The best way to do this is to alter
your equation slightly:
Insteadof:{Arel}=({A}/ABS({A}))
Trythis:{Arel}=({A}/MAX(ABS({A}),1.0E-6))
The diffirence here is that the denominator is guarded
against going below .000001. This keeps the division error
from happening. You can alter this parameter to be any
value greater than zero to avoid the problem that you are
encountering. In the above equations, you can substitute
your variable's name for A.

Best Regards,