Experimental Investigation of Single Roughness Element Effects on Supersonic Boundary Layer Transition

Predicting the characteristics of a transitional boundary layer remains an open challenge in supersonic flow fields. An experimental campaign to understand the effects of a single roughness element on a supersonic laminar boundary layer was designed. Two Mach numbers were tested, 1.6 and 2.3, including two roughness heights, 0.1 mm and 1 mm, over a flat plate. Steady and unsteady wall temperature and pressure levels were recorded to interpret the influence of the wake of the roughness. Heat flux and adiabatic wall temperature trends, temperature and pressure fluctuations RMS trends and time evolution of spectral content were reported. The initial wall temperature was varied during the wall temperature measurements and the resulting steady and unsteady effects on the roughness wake were investigated.