• Transactions of the Korean Society of Mechanical Engineers B
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• v.27 no.12
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• pp.1716-1723
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• 2003

A stereoscopic PIV(Particle Image Velocimetry) technique was employed to measure the 3 dimensional flow structure of turbulent wake behind a marine propeller with 5 blades. The out-of-plane velocity component was determined using two CCD cameras with the angular displacement configuration. Four hundred instantaneous velocity fields were measured for each of four different blade phases and ensemble averaged to investigate the spatial evolution of the propeller wake in the near-wake region from the trailing edge to one propeller diameter(D) downstream. The phase-averaged velocity fields show the potential wake and the viscous wake developed along the blade surfaces. Tip vortices were generated periodically and the slipstream contraction occurs in the near-wake region. The out-of-plane velocity component and strain rate have large values at the locations of tip and trailing vortices. As the flow goes downstream, the turbulence intensity, the strength of tip vortices and the magnitude of out-of-plane velocity component at trailing vortices are decreased due to viscous dissipation, turbulence diffusion and blade-to-blade interaction.