Eur. Phys. J. E (2015) 38: 111
https://doi.org/10.1140/epje/i2015-15111-7

Regular Article

Generalized linear stability of non-inertial rimming flow in a rotating horizontal cylinder

Department of Chemical Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur, UP, 208016, India

^* e-mail: naveent@iitk.ac.in

Received: 3 June 2015
Revised: 15 September 2015
Accepted: 16 October 2015
Published online: 28 October 2015

Abstract

The stability of a thin film of viscous liquid inside a horizontally rotating cylinder is studied using modal and non-modal analysis. The equation governing the film thickness is derived within lubrication approximation and up to first order in aspect ratio (average film thickness to radius of the cylinder). Effect of gravity, viscous stress and capillary pressure are considered in the model. Steady base profiles are computed in the parameter space of interest that are uniform in the axial direction. A linear stability analysis is performed on these base profiles to study their stability to axial perturbations. The destabilizing behavior of aspect ratio and surface tension is demonstrated which is attributed to capillary instability. The transient growth that gives maximum amplification of any initial disturbance and the pseudospectra of the stability operator are computed. These computations reveal weak effect of non-normality of the operator and the results of eigenvalue analysis are recovered after a brief transient period. Results from nonlinear simulations are also presented which also confirm the validity of the modal analysis for the flow considered in this study.