Announcement

• Mid-term exam #1

Will be marked this week and returned in next week’s
tutorials (or labs).

Come to see me, not the tutors, regarding questions
on the mark.
• Supplementary test for the mid-term exam #1

Send me an email with a pdf attachment of your doctor’s
certificate due 27th Aug (Firm).

The certificate must state that your medical condition
didn’t allow you to sit on an one-hour exam on 19th Aug.

Mid-term exams are not formal and we are not obligated
to run sups. This is our courtesy.
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 Chapter 6.1-6.4 & 7.1-7.3
Momentum Equation &
DIMENSIONAL ANALYSIS

Shawn Kook
http://www.mech.unsw.edu.au/thermalfluids
In Chapter 5, we studied about
1. Mass balance
2. Bernoulli (Mechanical Energy balance)
3. General energy balance

In Chapter 6, we solve the momentum equation.

6
6–1 ■ NEWTON’S LAWS
Newton’s second law: The acceleration of a body is proportional to
the net force acting on it and is inversely proportional to its mass.

Linear momentum or just the momentum of the body:

The product of the mass and the velocity of a body.

Therefore, the momentum of a rigid body of mass m

moving with velocity V is mV.

Newton’s second law is usually referred to as the

linear momentum equation.
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Conservation of momentum principle: The momentum of a system
remains constant only when the net force acting on it is zero.

Newton’s second law is also

expressed as the rate of change
Direction of linear momentum
of the momentum of a body is
is the direction of velocity.
equal to the net force acting on it.

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In fluid mechanics, the net force acting on a system is typically not
zero, and we prefer to work with the linear momentum equation
rather than the conservation of momentum principle.

The conservation of angular momentum Principle: The total

angular momentum of a rotating body is the product of the moment of
inertia I and angular acceleration α and remains constant when the
net torque acting on it is zero, and thus the angular momentum of
such systems is conserved.

The rate of change of the angular

momentum of a body is equal to
the net torque acting on it.

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6–2 ■ CHOOSING A CONTROL VOLUME
A control volume can be selected as any arbitrary region in space through which
fluid flows, and its bounding control surface can be fixed, moving, and even
deforming during flow.
VR=VFLUID - VCS

VEX

VR=VEX - VCV
VCV
Examples of
(a) fixed,
(b) moving, and
(c) deforming control volumes.

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6–3 ■ FORCES ACTING ON A CONTROL VOLUME
The forces acting on a control volume consist of
Body forces that act throughout the entire body of the control
volume (such as gravity, electric, and magnetic forces) and
Surface forces that act on the control surface (such as pressure
and viscous forces and reaction forces at points of contact).
Only external forces are considered in the analysis.

Total force acting on control volume:

The total force acting on a control

volume is composed of body
forces and surface forces; body
force is shown on a differential
volume element, and surface
force is shown on a differential
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surface element.
The most common body force is that of gravity, which exerts a downward force
on every differential element of the control volume.

Surface forces are not as simple to

analyze since they consist of both normal
and tangential components.
Normal stresses are composed of
pressure (which always acts inwardly
normal) and viscous stresses.
Shear stresses are composed entirely of
viscous stresses.

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 Stress Tensor!!

Surface force acting on a

differential surface element:

Total surface force acting

on control surface:

When coordinate axes are rotated

(a) to (b), the components of the
surface force change, even
though the force itself remains the
same; only two dimensions are
shown here.

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6–4 ■ THE LINEAR MOMENTUM EQUATION

Reynolds Transport Theorem: the link

between the control volume approach and
system approach

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Flashback!
For energy equation:

Steady
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Special Cases
Steady
flow

Mass flow rate across

an inlet or outlet
Momentum flow rate across
a uniform inlet or outlet:

In a typical engineering
problem, the control volume
may contain many inlets and
outlets; at each inlet or outlet
we define the mass flow rate
and the average velocity.

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Examples of inlets or outlets in which the uniform flow
approximation is reasonable:
(a) the well-rounded entrance to a pipe,
(b) the entrance to a wind tunnel test section, and
(c) a slice through a free water jet in air.

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Momentum-Flux Correction Factor, β
The velocity across most inlets and outlets is not uniform.
The control surface integral of Eq. 6–17 may be converted into algebraic form using
a dimensionless correction factor β, called the momentum-flux correction factor.

(6-17)

β is always greater than or equal to 1.

β is close to 1 for turbulent flow and
not very close to 1 for fully developed
laminar flow.

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Steady Flow

The net force acting on the control volume during steady flow is equal to the
difference between the rates of outgoing and incoming momentum flows.

The net force acting on the control

volume during steady flow is equal to
the difference between the outgoing
and the incoming momentum fluxes.

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Steady Flow with One Inlet and One Outlet
One inlet and
one outlet
Along x-
coordinate

The determination by vector

addition of the reaction force on
A control volume with only one the support caused by a change
inlet and one outlet. of direction of water.
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Flow with No External Forces

In the absence of external forces, the rate of change of the

momentum of a control volume is equal to the difference between
the rates of incoming and outgoing momentum flow rates.

The thrust needed to lift the space

shuttle is generated by the rocket
engines as a result of momentum
change of the fuel as it is accelerated
from about zero to an exit speed of
about 2000 m/s after combustion. 21
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7–1 ■ DIMENSIONS AND UNITS
Dimension: A measure of a physical quantity (without numerical values).
Unit: A way to assign a number to that dimension.
There are seven primary dimensions (also called fundamental or basic
dimensions): mass, length, time, temperature, electric current, amount of
light, and amount of matter.
All nonprimary dimensions can be formed by some combination of the
seven primary dimensions.

A dimension is a measure of a
physical quantity without
numerical values, while a unit is
a way to assign a number to the
dimension. For example, length
is a dimension, but centimeter
is a unit. 27
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7–2 ■ DIMENSIONAL HOMOGENEITY
The law of dimensional homogeneity: Every additive
term in an equation must have the same dimensions.

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Nondimensionalization of Equations
Nondimensional equation: If we divide each term in the equation by a
collection of variables and constants whose product has those same
dimensions, the equation is rendered nondimensional.
Normalized equatiion: If the nondimensional terms in the equation are of
order unity, the equation is called normalized.
Each term in a nondimensional equation is dimensionless.
Nondimensional parameters: In the process of nondimensionalizing an
equation of motion, nondimensional parameters often appear—most of
which are named after a notable scientist or engineer (e.g., the Reynolds
number and the Froude number).

A nondimensionalized form of the

Bernoulli equation is formed by
dividing each additive term by a
pressure (here we use P∞). Each
resulting term is dimensionless
(dimensions of {1}).
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Dimensional variables: Dimensional quantities that change or vary in the
problem. Examples: z (dimension of length) and t (dimension of time).
Nondimensional (or dimensionless) variables: Quantities that change or vary in
the problem, but have no dimensions. Example: Angle of rotation, measured in
degrees or radians, dimensionless units.
Dimensional constant: Gravitational constant g, while dimensional, remains
constant.
Parameters: Refer to the combined set of dimensional variables, nondimensional
variables, and dimensional constants in the problem.
Pure constants: The constant 1/2 and the exponent 2 in equation. Other common
examples of pure constant is π.

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Froude
number

Object falling in a vacuum.

Vertical velocity is drawn
positively, so w < 0 for a falling
object.

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To nondimensionalize an equation, we need to select scaling parameters,
based on the primary dimensions contained in the original equation.

Froude
number

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 Trajectories of a steel ball falling
in a vacuum. Data are
nondimensionalized and
combined onto one plot.

The two key advantages of nondimensionalization of an equation.

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Throwing a baseball
on the moon

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7–3 ■ DIMENSIONAL ANALYSIS AND SIMILARITY
In most experiments, to save time and money, tests are performed on a
geometrically scaled model, rather than on the full-scale prototype.
In such cases, care must be taken to properly scale the results. We introduce
here a powerful technique called dimensional analysis.
The three primary purposes of dimensional analysis are
• To generate nondimensional parameters that help in the design of experiments
(physical and/or numerical) and in the reporting of experimental results
• To obtain scaling laws so that prototype performance can be predicted from
model performance
• To (sometimes) predict trends in the relationship between parameters
The principle of similarity
Three necessary conditions for complete similarity between a model and a
prototype.
(1) Geometric similarity—the model must be the same shape as the prototype,
but may be scaled by some constant scale factor.
(2) Kinematic similarity—the velocity at any point in the model flow must be
proportional (by a constant scale factor) to the velocity at the corresponding
point in the prototype flow. 39
(3) dynamic similarity—When all forces in the model flow scale by a
constant factor to corresponding forces in the prototype flow (force-scale
equivalence).

Kinematic similarity is
achieved when, at all
locations, the speed in the
model flow is proportional to
that at corresponding
locations in the prototype
flow, and points in the same
direction.

In a general flow field, complete similarity between a model and prototype is

achieved only when there is geometric, kinematic, and dynamic similarity.
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Geometric similarity between a
prototype car of length Lp and a model
car of length Lm.

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 The Reynolds number Re is formed by
the ratio of density, characteristic
speed, and characteristic length to
viscosity. Alternatively, it is the ratio of
characteristic speed and length to
kinematic viscosity, defined as ν =µ/ρ.

For example, aerodynamic drag FD

Nondimensional parameter

The Reynolds number is the most well known and useful

dimensionless parameter in all of fluid mechanics.

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