PIV measurements for a complex topographic terrain

Particle image velocimetry (PIV) measurements are performed on a 1:3000 scale model of complex topographic area. Three distinct topographic features are investigated: a valley, a ridge and a 3D hill.PIV performs well in capturing two-dimensional mean and turbulent velocity fields both horizontally and vertically over extended areas with an approx. 5 m full-scale resolution. The results show that while for the valley and hill cases the flow is relatively well correlated over large spatial extends, the ridge flow is strongly influenced by both local and major topographies.The PIV measurements compare well with hot-wire-based mean velocity profiles for the three cases. Moreover, the turbulence intensity profiles match well for flow regions without recirculation. The ridge wake region shows discrepancies between the two techniques, which are attributed to the complexity of the flow in this region and limitations of both techniques.