The shape function of a free-falling laminar jet: Making use
of Bernoulli’s equation
Taha Massalhaa)
Academic Arab College for Education, Haifa 32000, Israel
Rafael M. Digilovb)
Department of Education in Technology & Science, Technion–Israel Institute of Technology, Haifa 32000,
Israel
(Received 9 November 2012; accepted 4 August 2013)
The shape function of a laminar liquid jet issuing from a circular orifice and falling vertically in air
under gravity is analyzed. The diameter of the jet is observed to decrease with the axial distance
from the nozzle. The governing equation for variation of the jet radius with the axial coordinate is
derived from a modified Bernoulli’s law, including the interfacial energy density and viscous
losses. The analytical solution found in terms of dimensionless group numbers agrees well with
experimental data. VC 2013 American Association of Physics Teachers.
[http://dx.doi.org/10.1119/1.4819196]
I. INTRODUCTION
When a fluid pours from an outlet into the air, it forms a
free-falling stable jet that accelerates, stretches, and narrows
under the influence of gravity.1 The jet flow behavior is of
considerable interest in fluid mechanics and engineering
practice and has found a wide variety of applications such as
the sol-gel process in the production of small fluid particles,
the spinning processes in fabrication of polymer fibers, and
biomedical devices. Recently, a liquid microjet has been produced2
that can be used in spacecraft propulsion, fuel injection,
mass spectroscopy, and ink-jet printing.
The key challenge when analyzing a jet flow is to find the
jet shape function (JSF);3–8 that is, the relationship between
the jet radius r and the axial distance z from the exit orifice.
For laminar flow of an isothermal liquid with a density q,
issuing from a circular orifice of radius R0 with exit velocity
t0 in a gravitational field g, dimensional analysis predicts the
following functional dependence for the JSF:
~z ¼ fðr~; Fr; We; ReÞ: (1)
Here, ~z ¼ z=R0 and r~ ¼ ~z=R0 are the reduced jet length and
jet radius, respectively, and the key dimensionless group parameters
in the problem are the Froude number ðFrÞ, the
Weber number ðWeÞ and the Reynolds number ðReÞ, given
by
Fr ¼ t2
0
2R0g
; We ¼ 2R0qt2
0
c ; Re ¼ 2R0qt0
g : (2)
These quantities represent, respectively, the relative effects
of gravity ðgÞ, surface tension ðcÞ, and viscosity ðgÞ in comparison
to inertia, with each defined to be large when inertial
effects are comparatively large.
Neglecting the surface tension effect, Clarke9 derived an
analytical JSF for viscous fluids in terms of the Airy function.
However, his JSF is valid only for high Re because at
low Re the effect of the surface tension becomes more significant
than the viscosity10 and cannot be ignored.11 Adachi12
analyzed the effects of the fluid viscosity and surface tension
in the asymptotic regions of high and low Reynolds number.
No analytical equation for the JSF over a wide range of all
three dimensionless group numbers is known. For inviscid
fluids (the limit of large Re but still laminar flow), an analytical
form of JSF proposed by many authors can be summarized
as13
~z ¼ Fr
1
r~4 m
n
Bo
1
r~ 1
; (3)
where the first term is due to gravity while the second is the
surface tension term due to the curvature of the liquid-air jet
surface. Here Bo ¼ We=Fr ¼ 4R2
0qg=c is the Bond number,
characterizing the relative effect of gravity with respect to
surface tension, while m and n are parameters of the model.
According to Kurabayashi,5 n ¼ 8, whereas the slenderness
approximation used by Anno6 yelds n ¼ 4. For n ¼ 0 and
large Bond numbers, Eq. (3) reduces to the well-known
Weisbach equation14
~z ¼ Fr
1
r~4 1
: (4)
The effects of surface tension and viscosity on the form of
the stationary jet are active research topics15–17 and not yet
fully understood. In this paper, we develop an analytical
approach based on energy considerations to derive the governing
differential equation for the jet radius as a function of
axial position. We formulate a modified Bernoulli equation18
for a free-falling jet that includes the jet interfacial energy
density and losses due to the fluid viscosity. An analytical
equation for the JSF derived in terms of the dimensionless
group numbers is compared with experimental observations,
and good agreement is obtained.
II. FORMULATION OF THE PROBLEM
Consider isothermal, laminar flow of an incompressible
Newtonian fluid with viscosity g, surface tension c, and density
q, issuing downward from a circular orifice of radius R0
into the air with initial velocity t0 and falling in a gravitational
field g^z (z being measured vertically downward) in the form
of an axisymmetric jet narrowing downward (see Fig. 1).
For this jet flow, a modifed Bernoulli-type equation18 along
the streamline, including energy losses due to fluid viscosity19
and free surface energy of the jet, can be written in the form
733 Am. J. Phys. 81 (10), October 2013 http: