Most of the power required to run a closed-circuit tunnel is absorbed by losses in the

diffuser, the test section and the corners. Axial fan efficiency can exceed 90 percent if the wall
boundary layers at entry are not too thick. The contraction ratio is usually chosen so that total-
pressure losses in the honeycomb and screens are acceptably small, and this usually means that
losses in the third and fourth corners are small also. All losses are basically due to turbulent skin
friction and therefore slowly decrease, in proportion, as the tunnel size (Reynolds number)
increases.

The dimensionless parameter representing consumption of power delivered to the fan

drive shaft, P, is the "power factor"

= P/[(1/2) U3A]

where U and A are the test-section velocity and cross-sectional area and the denominator
is the rate of flow of kinetic energy, (1/2)U2 per unit mass, through the test section (i.e. K.E. per
unit mass times mass flow rate U). In the United States, the reciprocal of power factor, the
"energy ratio", is sometimes quoted. In all cases the efficiency of the electric (or, rarely, gasoline)
motor is considered separately from the tunnel power factor. It can be seen that the power factor
of an open-circuit tunnel with no diffuser is always greater than unity because all the kinetic
energy is dumped at the exit, and there are the usual losses elsewhere.

A poor estimate of power factor obviously leads either to deficiency in maximum speed
(the electric drive motor reaches maximum available voltage or current before reaching
maximum speed) or to incomplete use of the available motor power (the converse). With a
commutator motor it is simply necessary to alter the field excitation, and if the fan or blower is
belt-driven (usual with commercial centrifugal blowers) the pulley ratio can be changed, in either
case to ensure that the maximum power is extracted from the motor. If the fan or blower is so
overloaded that its efficiency is low (more likely with an axial fan, due to blade stall) there is no
simple cure.

The loss in the test section due to boundary-layer growth is easy to estimate from
formulas for total drag of "flat plates" such as Cf =0.074(UL/ )-1/5 where Cf is the streamwise-
average skin-friction coefficient and L is the test-section length. Since the test-section surfaces
usually bear some excrescences or cavities, leading to extra drag, and since the boundary layer
entering the test section from the contraction has a small but finite thickness, the calculated
figure should be "rounded up". The losses due to the maximum likely drag of a model mounted
in the test section require knowledge of the test program throughout the life of the tunnel, which
is not normally available - just make a generous guess. (If a model is so large that its wake
disturbs the flow in the diffuser significantly, it is probably too large for the tunnel: however in at
least two recent experiments "oversize" models were used, in the expectation that any
computations of the flow would use the tunnel walls as the boundaries of the domain of
integration.

Charts for estimating diffuser efficiency are given by Sovran and Klomp "Experimentally
determined optimum geometries for rectilinear diffusers with rectangular, conical or annular
cross-section", in "Fluid Mechanics of Internal Flow" (G. Sovran, ed.) Elsevier (1967), as the
ratio of actual pressure rise to that estimated from one-dimensional inviscid theory for the given
area ratio. These charts have been reproduced in several later textbooks. For a modern analytical
treatment see Johnston "Review - Diffuser design and performance analysis by a unified integral
methd", ASME J. Fluids Engg 120, 6 (1998). Diffuser losses are the biggest unknown in power-
factor estimation: an underestimate may lead to overloading the fan or blower, with consequent
low efficiency.

The loss in a 90 deg. corner with thin vanes corresponds to a pressure-loss coefficient
between 0.12 (high Reynolds number) and 0.15 (low Reynolds number).

Centrifugal blower efficiency can be obtained from manufacturers' performance charts.

Axial fan efficiency near the design point can be taken as 90 percent.

Pressure-loss coefficients for honeycombs are usually negligible compared to those for
screens. For the latter, Wieghardt's data fit (seeScreens and Honeycombs) can be used. If tests of
screen or honeycomb samples are done in a small duct, it is essential to put a screen a short
distance upstream of the sample to reduce the boundary-layer thickness: otherwise the reduction
of displacement thickness as the boundary layer flows through the sample will decelerate the
flow and lead to an underestimate of the pressure-loss coefficient.

Losses due to the boundary layers on the walls of the settling

chamber and contraction are negligible compared to those in the test section.