FACILITIES
The fluid-structure interactions and nonlinear dynamics laboratory is located in Room # 112 of the Marine Center at The UH-Manoa. The lab space and all the equipment is shared with the Surface and Underwater Propulsion and Robotics (SUPR) Lab. The laboratory is equipped with the latest hardware and instruments for experimental fluid mechanics, vibrations modeling, simulation, and testing including:
A 1-meter diameter rotating flow tank that is used for both research and education. It is used to study the generation of wake vortices. Since it generates a rotating body of water, it is also useful for studying interactions with global rotating flows.
The control flow tank (The tank measures 4.1 m long, 1.3 m wide and 1.1 m high) has a 2-axis gantry system for dynamic model positioning mounted to the top. This tank is used as a mini-towing tank for propulsion research, and for performing measurement of flow structures behind bluff bodies.
Custom elastomer/polymer curing chamber. This setup consists of a compressor pump hooked up to a vacuum chamber with pressure dial that is strapped to the table of an orbital shaker. The custom chamber guarantees even viscous elastomers cure with no internal air bubbles.
Phantom VEO 340L high-speed digital camera. This camera is used for quantitative flow visualization studies and has high sensitivity and resolution to handle different filming conditions. The lab also has an adjoining set of zoom and fixed focal length lenses to meet different filming needs.
Electronics workstation for assembling and debugging sensors and circuit boards. This station contains soldering tools, a multimeter, an oscilloscope, and a benchtop power supply.
Workstation equipped with: Motion tracking (ProAnalyst), Altair engineering packages, ProteusDS Offshore Dynamics Analysis software