Enhanced mixing of a rectangular supersonic jet by natural and induced screech

The influence of shear layer excitation on the mixing of supersonic rectangular jets was studied experimentally. Two methods of excitation were used to control the jet mixing. The first used the natural screech of an underexpanded supersonic jet from a converging nozzle. The level of the screech excitation was controlled by the use of a pair of baffles located to block the acoustic feedback path between the downstream shock structure and the nozzle lip. A screech level variation of over 30 decibels was achieved and the mixing was completely determined by the level of screech attained at the nozzle lip. The second form of self-excitation used the induced screech caused by obstacles or paddles located in the shear layers on either long side of the rectangular jet. With sufficient immersion of the paddles intense jet mixing occurred and large flapping wave motion was observed using a strobed focused Schlieren system. Each paddle was instrumented with a total pressure tap and strain gages to determine the pressure and drag force on the square cross-section paddle. Considerable drag was observed in this initial exploratory study. Future studies using alternate paddle geometries will be conducted to maximize jet mixing with minimum drag.