Films by Hunter Rouse

Former IIHR Director Hunter Rouse.

This widely used fluid mechanics film series, which was produced at IIHR in the early 1960s by former IIHR Director Hunter Rouse, was groundbreaking in many ways—including the use of color throughout and the quick pace of the presentation. The teaching films move quickly through the course material, presenting introductory concepts, fundamental principles, gravitational effects, laminar and turbulent flow, lift and draft, and compressibility.

The film series is available to view here or on the University of Iowa’s YouTube channel (click on the film titles to view). The series is also available on DVD. The six films can be purchased (in complete sets only) for $200 (See Order Form).

1. Introduction to the Study of Fluid Motion

Designed to orient engineering students, this video shows examples of flow phenomena from a host of everyday experiences. Empirical solutions by means of scale models are illustrated. The significance of the Euler, Froude, Reynolds, and Mach numbers as similitude parameters is illustrated.

2. Fundamental Principles of Flow

Second in the series, this video departs from the essential generality of the first by explicitly illustrating, through experiment and animation, the basic concepts and physical relationships that are involved in the analysis of fluid motion. The concepts of velocity, acceleration, circulation, and vorticity are introduced, and the use of integral equations of motion is demonstrated by a simple example.

3. Fluid Motion in a Gravitational Field

In this third video of the series, which proceeds from the introductory and the basic material presented in the first two videos, emphasis is laid upon the action of gravity. Principles of wave propagation are illustrated, including aspects of generation, celerity, reflection, stability, and reduction to steadiness by relative motion. Simulation of comparable phenomena in the atmosphere and the ocean is considered.

4. Characteristics of Laminar & Turbulent Flow

The fourth video deals with the effect of viscosity. Dye, smoke, suspended particles, and hydrogen-bubbles are used to reveal the velocity field.

Various combinations of Couette and plane Poiseuille flow introduce the principles of lubrication. Axisymmetric Poiseuille flow and development of the flow around an elliptic cylinder are related to variation in the Reynolds number, and the growth of the boundary layer along a flat plate is shown.

Instability in boundary layers and pipe flow is shown to lead to turbulence. The eddy viscosity and apparent stress are introduced by hotwire-anemometer indications. The processes of turbulence production, turbulent mixing, and turbulence decay are considered.

5. Form Drag, Lift, and Propulsion

In the fifth video of the series, emphasis is laid upon the role of boundary-layer separation in modifying the flow pattern and producing longitudinal and lateral components of force on a moving body. Various conditions of separation and methods of separation control are first illustrated. Attention is then given to the distribution of pressure around typical body profiles and its relation to the resulting drag. The concept of circulation introduced in the second film is developed to explain the forces on rotating bodies and the forced vibration of cylindrical bodies. Structural failure of unstable sections is demonstrated.

6. Effects of Fluid Compressibility

The last in the six-video series makes extensive use of the analogy between gravity and sound waves and illustrates, through laboratory demonstrations and animation, the concepts of wave celerity, shock waves and surges, wave reflection, and water hammer.

Two-dimensional waves are produced by flow past a point source at various speeds relative to the wave celerity to illustrate the effect of changing Mach number, and the principle is applied to flow at curved and abrupt wall deflections. Axisymmetric and three-dimensional wave patterns are then portrayed using color Schlieren pictures.