Could tailored golf balls improve putting performance?
Golfers could get tailored golf balls with more precise separation control for the best performance, new research suggests.
Elements such as trip wires, dimples and sand-grain roughness on the surface of a body have been shown to be effective in reducing drag on objects such as golf balls, which helps them fly farther.
Dimples make up the small round indentations on the golf ball. They energize the flow and induce turbulence in the layer of air next to the ball. This turbulent boundary layer can reduce drag.
The study, published in Journal of Turbulence, provides new insights into how the momentum transport is affected by the dimples and how multiple dimple rows interact to generate near wall turbulence.
Co-author Nikolaos Beratlis explains: “To most golfers the fact that a golf ball with a roughened surface can give you 150 yards more than a perfectly smooth one sounds like a paradox.” He adds: “This additional momentum that dimples give keeps the flow attached to the surface longer reducing the pressure difference between the front and back of the golf ball, thus resulting in less drag. “
Results showed that the presence of the dimples triggers instabilities that cause significant momentum transport.
“These results provide guidelines for more precise separation control, which will help us tailor golf balls to individual golfers for best performance,” Nikolaos Beratlis added.
The researchers used a series of direct numerical simulations of the flow past a flat plate with two and eight rows of dimples in a staggered arrangement.
Read the full article, free of charge, online at: http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/14685248.2014.918270
-Ends-
Emma Wheal – Marketing Coordinator, Taylor & Francis Group.
Email: emma.wheal@tandf.co.uk
Tel: 44 (0)20 7017 5494
NOTE TO JOURNALISTS AND EDITORS
Please reference the article as “Effects of dimples on laminar boundary layers”, by N. Beratlis, E. Balaras & K. Squires Journal of Turbulence, published by Taylor & Francis.
http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/14685248.2014.918270
Visit our newsroom at: http://newsroom.taylorandfrancisgroup.com/
Follow us on Twitter @tandfnewsroom
-----------------------------------------
About Taylor & Francis Group
-----------------------------------------
Taylor & Francis Group partners with researchers, scholarly societies, universities and libraries worldwide to bring knowledge to life. As one of the world’s leading publishers of scholarly journals, books, ebooks and reference works our content spans all areas of Humanities, Social Sciences, Behavioural Sciences, Science, and Technology and Medicine.
From our network of offices in Oxford, New York, Philadelphia, Boca Raton, Boston, Melbourne, Singapore, Beijing, Tokyo, Stockholm, New Delhi and Johannesburg, Taylor & Francis staff provide local expertise and support to our editors, societies and authors and tailored, efficient customer service to our library colleagues.