Comparison of turbulent flow through hexagram and hexagon orifices in circular pipes using large-eddy simulation

Characteristics of turbulent flow through a circular, a hexagon and a hexagram orifice with the same flow area in circular pipes are investigated using wall-modelled large-eddy simulation. Good agreements to available experimental data were obtained in both the mean velocity and turbulent kinetic energy. The hexagram orifice with alternating convex and concave corners introduces outwards radial velocity around the concave corners downstream of the orifice plate stronger than the hexagon orifice. The stronger outwards radial velocity transfers high momentum from the pipe centre towards the pipe wall to energize the orifice-forced vortex sheet rolling-up and leads to a delayed vortex break-down. Correspondingly, the hexagram has a more gradual flow recovery to a pipe flow and a reduced pressure drop than the hexagon orifice. Both the hexagon and hexagram orifices show an axis-switching phenomenon, which is observed from both the streamwise velocity and turbulent kinetic energy contours. To the best knowledge of the authors, this is the first comparison of orifice-forced turbulence development, mixing and flow dynamics between a regular and a fractal-based polygonal orifice. (paper)