Abstract

This paper investigates the steady boundary-layer flow of an incompressible fluid over the
surface of a moving flat plate with slip boundary condition and predicts a full range of values for
shear stress on the plate as the fluid moves along it. It also gives a consistent mathematical model
for solving the boundary layer equations of motion.

Keywords

Boundary layer flow, slip condition

Introduction

For the past many years, the problem of the classical boundary layer flow over a surface has been
studied by researchers of the field. Boundary layer behavior on a moving surface is an important
type of flow that occurs in a number of engineering processes for example a polymer sheet or
filament extruded continuously from a die or a long thread travelling between a feed roll and a
wind up roll in an ambient fluid. Boundary layer flows of a steady incompressible fluid on a
surface moving with a constant velocity in a Newtonian fluid at rest was first studied by Sakiadis
(1961). He showed that the solution of such a situation is substantially different from that of a
boundary layer flow over a stationary flat plate known as Blasius problem (1908).

Much of the work in the boundary layer flow has been done with the traditional no slip boundary
condition (briefly discussed later). The aim of this paper is to investigate the two dimensional
boundary layer equations for a moving flat plate in a moving fluid with a slip boundary condition,
which usually occurs when there is a relative motion between a solid and a fluid. It is now well
known that, in certain situation slip can occur for example, fluid flow in nano tubes and flow in
low density gasses. Theories for the generation of fluis slip includes surface roughness (Priezjev
and Troian,2006) and nano bubbles on the surface and applied shear (Huang and Breuer,2007).

No Slip Boundary Condition

At the interface between the fluid and solid there is usually a zero relative velocity. This no slip
condition was first proposed by Bernoulli in 1738, the validity of which was accepted in the 19 th
century as it is consistent with the experimental evidence.

Slip Boundary Condition

In 1823 Navier proposed a more general boundary condition which takes into account that the
fluid may slip on the surface of a solid. In 1879 Maxwell used kinetic theory of gasses to identify
the slip boundary condition as

 2  TMAC  u ( x, y )
u(x,y) =   w
 TMAC  y

where  is the mean free path and TMAC is the tangential momentum accommodation
coefficient which frequently has a value of 1.
 Therefore the fluid velocity at the solid surface is assumed to be proportional to the shear rate at
the surface and the constant of proportionality has the dimensions of length.

The slip length, L s is defined in terms of the accommodation coefficient and the mean free path
as

 2  TMAC 
Ls =   and can be defined (Panton, 2005) as the ratio of the surface velocity to
 TMAC 
the surface shear rate.

u ( x, y )
u(x,y) = L s at y=0
y

In physical terms, the slip length is the fictitious distance inside the solid where fluid velocity
extrapolates linearly to zero. (see figure below)

Figure: Slip length for simple shear flow along a flat plate

Governing Equations

For the steady incompressible Laminar fluid over a moving flat plate where u(x,y) is the fluid velocity
component in the horizontal direction and v(x,y) is the fluid velocity component in the y direction, the
boundary layer equations are
 u ( x, y ) v( x, y )
 0
x y

u ( x, y ) u ( x, y )  2u ( x, y )
u ( x, y )  v ( x, y ) 
x y y 2

which are continuity and momentum equations respectively.