Experiments in Fluids 21 (1996) 469 476 L~' Springer-Verlag 1996
Holographic sensor for measurement of wall velocity gradients
J. E. Millerd, J. P. Swienton, F. Unterscher, J. D. Trolinger, L. G. Smith, J. C. LaRue
Abstract Time-resolved measurements of skin friction and
boundary layer turbulence are important to the design of more
fuel efficient aircraft. In this paper we describe the design
and testing of a holographic fan fringe sensor that can
non-intrusively measure time-resolved velocity gradients near
an aerodynamic surface. The holographic sensor produces
a set of optical interference fringes inside the viscous sub-layer
that form a fan rather than a linear array. Particles scattering
light in the sub-layer produce a Doppler frequency that is
a direct measurement of the velocity gradient and is propor-
tional to aerodynamic shear stress and skin friction. The
holographic recording condenses the optics necessary to form
the fringes into a small 3-5 mm package, eliminates the need
for optical access from behind the model, and produces
a compact and robust sensor.
1 Naqwi and Reynolds (1991). The method uses a set of optical
Introduction
Many sensors for the measurement of time-resolved shear
stress have been developed and investigated. A significant
number of these sensors have involved hot films or hot wires
mounted close to the surface, (e.g., Leipman and Skinner 1958;
Brown 1967); however, in air flows, heat transfer to the sub-
strate has led to uncertainty in the measurement. For this
reason, when accurate measurements in air are required, hea-
ted films and wires mounted on unmodified surfaces are no
longer used. Accurate measurements have been made using
probes that consist of pulsed wires, (Castro and Dianat 1985),
hot wires with cavities below the sensor (Houdeville et al.
1984), and hot wire probes with surface temperature control.
(Ajagu et al. 1982).
One drawback to these probes is that they all use a hot
wire as the active element. For that reason, they have mixed
Received: 8 August 1995~Accepted: 25 April 1996
I. E. Millerd, J. P. Swienton, F. Unterscher, J- D. Trolinger
MetroLaser, 18006 Skypark Cir. Suite 108, Irvine, CA 92714, USA
L. G. Smith
Wright Laboratories, Wright-Patterson AFB, OH, USA
]. C. LaRue
Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Dept.,
University of California, Irvine, CA 92717, USA
Correspondence to: J. E. Millerd
469
sensitivity, i.e., they respond not only to variations in the shear
stress but also to variations in the flow temperature and
concentration. This mixed sensitivity makes it challenging to
use these sensors in high speed flows or in other flows where
the temperature or concentration varies. In summary, while
accurate measurements can be obtained using carefully
designed shear stress probes that use hot wire sensors, they
have the following disadvantages: mixed sensitivity, they
require individual calibration, direct electrical contact and
surface modifications (hole must be drilled for mounting), the
sensors are fragile, and except for pulsed wire sensors, the
probes can only be operated in a unidirectional flow.
Laser based systems for the measurement of shear stress
have been developed which, with the exception of surface
modification, do not have the disadvantages listed in the
preceding paragraph. One such system has been developed by
intensity fringes that form a fan pattern. The fringes are
formed from two narrow slits located on the surface of the
model. The fringe spacing of the fan array increases linearly
with distance as does the velocity in the boundary-layer sub-
layer. Particles scattering light from inside the sub-layer
produce a Doppler frequency that is essentially independent of
their height from the surface. Figure 1 illustrates the conven-
tional laser anemometer and fan fringe anemometer (FAN)
measurements.
Conventional laser velocity (LV) measurements near or in
the sub-layer surface from several problems. As the probe
volume is moved nearer to the surface, the signal-to-noise ratio
greatly decreases due to scattering from the wall. In addition,
the finite size of the probe volume causes spatial averaging.
Because particle densities are not uniform as a function of
distance from the surface (fewer particles close to the wall),
interpretation of these averaged measurements is difficult. In
order to measure velocity gradients using conventional LV, it is
necessary to measure several locations simultaneously. The
small size of the sub-layer (sub millimeter) makes locating the
probe volumes extremely difficult. The fan fringe sensor
overcomes all these limitations.
The operation of the fan-fringe sensor has been validated
theoretically and experimentally; however, its optical imple-
mentation is cumbersome and requires access from behind the
model. A fiber optic implementation was demonstrated by
Naqwi and Petrik (1993) that improved the compactness and
robustness of the instrument but still required optical access
from behind the model. We have designed a sensor that
employs a holographic optical element which greatly simplifies
 Velocity Panicle a b
prorae velocity 'i"-:rwo-be ............Dopp]er-bursis-iiCyiind aiwave--Doppierburst-s!
~ [ linear fmges (timedomain) fan finges (timedomain)

'vvVVW w~ ,vvVVVVW, I

~vvvvvvvw ,vvvvvwv, !
................................................................................ j l.................................................................................. i Fig. 1. Doppler bursts near the surface for
a conventional linear fringe probe volume,
and b fan fringes of velocity gradient sensor.
470 (After Naqwi and Reynolds 1991)

boundary-layer flow (Schlichting 1968), the Doppler signal

produced from a set of fan-like interference fringes in identical
for all positions in the sub-layer. The velocity gradient can be
found from (Naqwi and Reynolds 1991),

~u dA (1)
_ <Flow
Maskwifl 3~--5mm Model where So is the Doppler frequency, Ou/~y is the velocity
surface
Focusingoptics gradient normal to the surface, and dA/dy is the change in
sensor fringe spacing as a function of height. For the case of two
Fiberoptics cylindrical sources located on the surface, the slope of the
fringe spacing is given by
i Fiber
~\\ launchers / dA )~
- (2)
.... Beam "~ dy s
where 2 is the wavelength of light and S is the distance between
sources. Substituting Eq. (2) into Eq. (1) we arrive at
Fig. 2. Comparison of conventional (fiber optic) and holographic ~u
implementation of fan fringe sensor

The velocity gradient can then be applied to calculate the mean

the optics and eliminates the need for optical access from wall shear stress, Zwall,
behind the model. Figure 2 illustrates the difference between
conventional (fiber optic) and holographic implementations of
the sensor. An image of two slits, located on the surface of the
Twall: # (~)wall (4)
sensor, is recorded in the holographic material. When illumin-
where p is the viscosity coefficient for a Newtonian fluid.
ated with a simple collimated laser beam, the image of the two
Because the wavelength and the slit spacing are fixed para-
diffracting slits is reconstructed, producing two cylindrical
meters of the holographic recording, the Doppler burst
waves that interfere to create a set of fanned interference
frequency provides a direct measurement of the velocity
fringes.
gradient. Recreating the image of two line sources is quite easy to
Holographic recordings characteristically have diffraction
do holographically; however, it is necessary to have the images
limited performance, which means they are able to accurately
appear exactly at the surface. The hologram must be located
reproduce the wavefronts generated from the highest quality
underneath the surface so that the reconstructed images form
optical components. Because the sensor can be economically
at the surface. Ensuring that the image forms exactly at the
produced on small glass plugs (2-5 m m dia. x 5 mm), they can
surface makes this a technically challenging hologram to
be mass produced and placed at multiple locations on a model.
record. However, once recorded properly, reconstruction can
Each sensor can be addressed with the same laser transmitter
be accomplished by simply illuminating with a raw or slightly
and optical receiver or multiple, simultaneous measurements
focused laser beam, thus eliminating almost all the optics.
could be made.
Using the holographic sensor also overcomes the current
necessity of having optical access from behind the model.
2 Figure 3 shows how the hologram is replayed and the fan
Operation principles fringes are formed.
Assuming a linear velocity gradient approaching the wall, Essential to the design of the sensor is that the fringe spacing
which is valid inside the laminar sub-region of a fully turbulent approaches zero at the wall. This ensures that a constant
 Registration plate. .Glass subs~a~

] " ~ f- --~ "~---d

Cylindrical lens

Ir~oaJse~
Glass substrate " ~ /
Photoresist
Fig. 3. Reconstruction of FAN sensor. Diffraction of incident light off
silvered back surface produces real image of two slits on front glass
surface. Reference beam is incident in horizontal plane and fan fringes
are reconstructed in the vertical plane
Top view __ ~ ~ . ~
:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::: i~
.~::~::
471
::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::|~i:~::~::~ t~ :3:!~,~::~:~:::~:~::::.'.~.~r~:~ ::~:W::;:~$
==================================================== ~:::::"* :~'
~..........................................................................................
~ .....................................................
~...................
~ 300
Cylindrical lens
Fig. 5. Recording of the velocity gradient sensor. Reference beam is
incident from behind the plate and forms a 30~ angle with the non-
focusing axis of the object beam

100

90 keep the signal error below 10% for the measurement region
between 50 and 200 gm.
80 84

-~ 7o- 3
"~ 6 0 - Sensor recording
Photoresist was chosen as the holographic recording medium
~. 5 0 -
0
because of its durability and ability to achieve high diffraction
o 40- efficiency. Conventional photoresist has a sensitivity that
.~_ e= 20 pm
drops dramatically at wavelengths longer than 450 nm so it
LO
30- / is necessary to record the holograms using a laser source
20- with a shorter wavelength. In our case, we choose a helium-
to ] cadmium laser operating at 442 nm. For playback, it is desira-
ble to use an argon ion laser since high power sources can
0"
o 5'0 160 1;0 200 be purchased at a relatively moderate cost. Reconstruction
Position above surface (pm) with a different laser wavelength introduces chromatic aberra-
tions in the reconstructed image. A computer model that
Fig. 4. Percent change in Doppler frequency (from a constant value) incorporated fundamental principles of ray tracing and
as a function of position above surface for increasing misalignment of diffraction theory (Born and Wolf 1989) was constructed using
slit focal points. Each adjacent curve represents a difference of 2 gm MathCad. The computer calculations showed that when the
in e
recording geometry is such that the reference beam and the fan
fringes are in the same plane (equivalent to an off-axis image of
the slits) the reconstructed slits would increase in size from 5
Doppler frequency is produced, regardless of position. Mis-
to 10 times when recorded with 442 nm and played back at
alignment of the focal point of the slit, either in front or behind
488 nm. To mitigate the chromatic aberrations of the system,
the surface, will cause the point where fringes converge to also
the reference beam angle was moved so that its plane of inci-
move in front or behind the surface. This will introduce a
dence was perpendicular to the fan direction. This results
position dependent term into the Doppler frequency. By allow-
in an on-axis focusing arrangement during playback which
ing the fringe spacing to have a misalignment offset, e, we can
greatly reduces chromatic aberrations and allows near diffrac-
make the following substitution for fringe spacing as a function
tion limited beams to be reproduced. Figure 5 shows the
of distance normal to the surface,
recording arrangement.
For our experiments, an apertured cylindrical lens ( f =
A = dA ( y + e). (5)
dy 15 mm) was used to form a single slit. By controlling the
aperture, the slit size and quality could be controlled. A 4 m m
Equation (5) can be used to calculate the deviation of aperture was used, resulting in a 2 gm slit width. Wider aper-
Doppler frequency from a constant value as a function of tures resulted in unacceptable beam aberrations. Due to
height off the surface and the misalignment offset. Results of physical limitations caused by the short focal length cylindrical
this numerical calculation are shown in Fig. 4. As a result of lens, the reference beam was incident from the backside of
these calculations, it was determined that it was necessary to the plate. This recording geometry results in a blazed grating
align the focal point of the slits to within 5 gm of the surface to in the photoresist which can increase diffraction efficiency
 significantly over the conventional sinusoidal gratings (Sher-
idan 1968). Because the object beam was focusing, it was
necessary to bias the energy in the two beams 10:1 in favor of
the reference beam so that intensities at the photoresist were
roughly equal.
The holographic plate was mounted on a registration plate
using an index matching fluid. The registration plate was
attached to a precision translation stage so that its position
relative to the focal spot could be adjusted. A microscope
objective was used to view the focus of the laser beam and
white light scattering off imperfections at the surface of the
472 registration plate. By bringing both into focus at the same time,
the position of the focus could be located precisely at the
face of the registration plate. To record a hologram without
chromatic corrections, (i.e., the playback and recording
wavelengths are the same), the object beam is focused at the
back surface of the registration plate. To generate the image of
two slits from one hologram, two exposures were made with
the registration plate displaced vertically between each. The
two slits were recorded 10 ~tm apart with a resolution limited
by the stage of approximately 2.5 pm.
Because longer wavelength light will diffract at a larger angle,
holograms recorded at 442 nm will focus at a shorter distance
when played back to 488 nm. To compensate for this focal
length shorting, it is necessary to record the hologram with the
slit focused slightly in front of the glass (shown as d in Fig. 5).
Calculations of the correction distance depend upon the
substrate thickness, index-of-refraction and reference beam
angle. The MathCad computer model was used to calculate
the position and size of the slit image when recorded and
reconstructed at different wavelengths. A nominal correction
of 220 ~tm was calculated using this program with the following
parameters: recording wavelength equals 442 nm, reconstruc-
tion wavelength equals 488 nm, and the glass thickness equals
3.81 mm. The 220 ~tm compensation distance was used to
record an initial set of holograms. The holograms were
replayed using 488 nm laser light and the position of focal
points were measured using a microscope. The correction
distance was then adjusted slightly to achieve registration to
within 5 pm. Sensors with and without chromatic corrections
were successfully recorded using BK7 glass substrates coated
with positive photoresist (Shipley 1400 series), with the focus
of the slits coming together on the front surface of the glass
substrate. The holograms were developed and coated with
aluminium to increase diffraction efficiency by increasing the
reflectivity. The coating increased the reflectivity from 4% to
about 90%. The overall diffraction efficiency, defined as the
fraction of light present in the diffracted fan fringes divided by
the light incident on the hologram, was approximately 28%.
The physical size of the hologram was approximately 0.5 mm
so the use of reconstruction beams larger than this dimension
will result in lower overall diffraction efficiencies because of the
overfilling. The sensors were also anti-reflection coated on the
front surface to minimize unwanted reflections.
The sensor used in this set of experiments was characterized
by measuring the far field characteristics to obtain beam waists
and slit separation and was examined in the near field using
a microscope to measure the alignment of the slits with respect
to the surface. Based on the far field diffraction pattern, the
waist of the focussed slits was calculated to be 1.8 ~tm and the
separation between slits was 10.7 ~tm. The sensor is designed to
work with 488 nm light, which gives a calibration constant
of 2/S = 0.04530_+ 0017. This value is used to convert from
Doppler frequency to velocity gradient (see Eq. (3)). The focal
point was verified to be within 5 microns of the surface. The
length of the slits extended for approximately 1.5 cm. Fringe
uniformity was good over the entire length and diffraction
efficiency was constant to within 20-30%.
After aluminizing the holograms, an additional glass sub-
strate was epoxied to the surface of the photoresist. The glass
served to protect the photoresist surface during handling of the
sensor.
4
Experimental configuration
The sensors were tested and validated in a narrow calibration
channel fitted with an optical window across from a test plug.
The FAN sensor was glued in the channel with Duco cement
(dissolvable in acetone) using a straight edge ruler to ensure
that the sensor and wall surfaces were fush. The calibration
channel thickness can be varied between 3.2 and 19 mm to
allow for laminar or turbulent flow. The small thickness of the
channel allows for close optical access, simplifying the align-
ment procedure. Channel flow was accomplished in two
different ways. A squirrel-cage fan was coupled to the end of
the channel and used to draw air through. For this arrange-
ment, water particles were drawn into the channel flow by
placing an ultra-sonic humidifier near the mouth of the inlet.
The humidifier provided very uniform seeding which was
estimated to be between 3 and 7 ~tm. The squirrel-cage pro-
vided a nominal center channel velocity of around 10 m/s.
The fan could be loaded by partially blocking its exit to achieve
smaller flow rates.
For higher flow rates, a pressure inlet was used. The cali-
bration channel was fitted with a pressurized intake section
that consisted of a 25.4 m m high pressure air inlet, multi-layer
screen baffle for flow quality, a convergent nozzle and a seeder.
Compressed air was used from an industrial compressor
capable of delivering 57 m3/min which provided centerline
velocities up to 85 m/s. For this arrangement a pressure seeder
was used. The seeder consisted of two small diameter tubes
( ~ 10 ~m) one supplying pressurized water and the other high
pressure air. The air tube was oriented at 90 ~ with respect
to the water tube to create a shearing stream that produced
particles in the 1-50 ktm range. The calibration channel
seeding and optical arrangement are shown in Fig. 6 for the
case of the compressed air driver.
The centerline channel velocity of the 19 m m channel was
also measured using a small pitot tube at the end of the channel
and by static pressure taps on the channel wall. These two
methods were used to calibrate the channel for flow generated
by both the squirrel-cage fan and the compressed air, indepen-
dently. In addition, this channel has been extensively tested by
UCI over many years and its flow characteristics are well
documented.
The fan fringe sensor was then inserted into the channel so
that the image of the slits were in the spanwise dimension
in order to measure the streamwise velocity gradient. The
reconstruction beam (argon ion ;~= 488 nm, P = 100 mW) was
incident on the surface of the hologram at 35 ~ from below the
 2.44 m
~Pressuretaps Plugwith hologram
......................................
h tall ] p u tll\ \ Collection
window lens
M ,rs.J_ r<~ \x,ytranslation
C~(lin-~.~ a . . ~ \ stage
~caL _.L_ ~IL~KL~__'N\AI
Fiber-~
O holder ~
bBo~rad- Fiber)
Fig. 6. Calibration channel optical setup for playback of fan fringe
sensor and seeding arrangement for compressed air driver
Beam from ~ irror
transmitter
\",
Fan fringes
Reconstructions1 /TY
, ~ 7 " Hologram
Fig. 7. Reconstruction beam addressing fan fringe hologram from 35~
below normal
horizontal plane, as represented in Fig. 7, resulting in the fringe
pattern being projected into the horizontal plane. In this
configuration, the axial velocity gradient and shear stress are
measured. The 35 ~ angle represents the chromatic correction
necessary to compensate for the 442 nm recording at 30 ~ and
playback at 488 nm.
The transmitter consisted of an air cooled, argon ion laser,
two cylindrical lenses to reduce the beam size in the vertical
dimension and two mirrors which allowed the steering of the
beam necessary to obtain the 35 ~ reconstruction angle. The
cylindrical lenses produced a waist size of approximately
100 ~tm. This was done to increase the intensity of the beams
near the surface but had no effect on focusing the light in the
streamwise or fan direction which was controlled entirely by
the hologram. The cylindrical lenses were spaced such that the
beam waist occurred near the surface of the glass after
diffracting off the hologram. The use of the mirrors allowed
extra freedom for the positioning of the transmitter.
The actual probe volume was defined by the overlap of the
fan fringes and the receiver solid angle. The receiver utilized in
imaging the probe volume on the surface of the glass consis-
ted of a single achromatic focusing lens, which focused the
scattered light into a multimode fiber optic cable. The fiber
optic cable was mounted on an X, Y, Z translation stage to
allow fine adjustment of the overlap region. The other end of
the fiber was attached, via SMA connector, to a photomultiplier
tube and amplifier which was housed in a custom-built box.
The PMT was a 10 stage tube (Hamamatsu 1P21) with a
Screen baffles sensitivity of 1.8 x 105 A/W and a dark current of 2 nA. The
_.___/_Pressure transimpedance amplifier has a gain of 750 VIA and a band-
nlet width of 50 MHz. Active low pass filtering is provided onboard
with cutoff frequency selectable through a resistor selection.
Total system sensitivity is fixed at 135 V/~tW. The electrical
burst signals were digitized using an g bit DASP 100 high speed
analog to digital conversion board from Signatec. Maximum
digitizing rate is 0.01 ~ts/point. The DASP100 has an onboard
digital signal processing chip that can perform a 256 point fast
Fourier transform (FFT) in 3.7 ms. The board was mounted in
a 25 MHz 386/SX personal computer.
The fan-fringe burst signals have a small number of fringes 473
and the flow field has a large root mean square (RMS) fluctu-
ation near the surface, making the filtering of signal from noise
challenging. We wrote custom software to overcome this pro-
cessing problem. Because the FAN sensor produces a fixed
number of fringes (in this case seven) it is possible to make
determinations of burst validity based on the width and fre-
Glass substrate quency spectrum of each burst. The A to D converter was
triggered via analog amplitude thresholding. The data was then
sampled at a rate considerably over the largest expected
frequency and for a duration much longer than the longest
expected burst. The width of the burst was then determined
through software analysis of the data. Each burst was remap-
ped into 64 data points using an interpolation routine and
placed into a 256 point array. The additional points were zero
filled. Because there should be no more than 7 fringes in a valid
burst, burst widths wider than 64 data points represent data
that was significantly over-sampled. De-sampling to 64 points
eliminates high frequency noise and makes windowing and
subsequent filtering easier. A Hamming window was applied to
the data and a fast Fourier transform (FFT) was performed.
The frequency domain data was analyzed to find a peak in the
spectrum, If the spectral peak fell in a region corresponding to
4 to 8 fringes per burst, the burst was considered to be valid.
The FFT spectrum was further analyzed to determine if the
signal-to-noise ratio was adequate (defined as the magnitude at
the peak frequency divided by the average magnitude at all
other frequencies).
Because of the dynamic re-mapping of the data, each burst
is processed identically, regardless of its frequency. Digital
high pass and low pass frequency filter points are effectively
readjusted as a function of the measured burst width. This
permits measurement over a wide frequency range with very
high resolution. The maximum measurable frequency is (fs)/2
and the maximum resolution is (fs)/N*64/256, where fs is the
sampling frequency and N is the number of samples. For our
experiments we used a sampling rate of 6 MHz and a sample
size of 1024 bytes which gave us a maximum frequency of
3 MHz and a resolution of 1.5 kHz.
5
Experimental results
A typical burst distribution measured with the fan fringe
sensor in the calibration channel (h = 19 mm) operating at
a center channel velocity of 10 m/s is shown in Fig. 8. The
mean value of the measured velocity gradient is 16400/s
(Zwall= 0.295 N/m 2) with an RMS deviation of 36.7%. This
velocity profile agreed well with data measured previously with
a two-beam laser velocimeter (LV) near the wall (Smith et al.
 0.45 Skin friction PDF 1.0
IFan not y+= 10
! fully i
0.40 0.9 I formed l Valid region i Outsidesublayer _ ~ /
0.35
0.8
0.30
025 0.7-
o 0.20
0.6
a, 0.15

Itt
E
0.10 0.5
r
0.05 Mean freq. = 0.386 MHz
0.4-
o ~
474
Normalized skin friction
0.2
Fig. 8. Probability density function for normalized skin friction
0.1 RMS i i;:
measurement in 19 mm channel with u~l= 10 m/s >45 % i RMS - 36 % = RMS < 30 %

0 100 200 300 400 5 0 6 0 700

Distance above surface (pm)
12
-7------/ Fig. 10. Measured burst frequency from the FAN sensor as a function
] /. J du/dy = 16405/s = 0.295 N/m 2
of receiver alignment. Circles are data taken using 100 ~tm fiber and
10 triangles represent 50 ~tm fiber data. Diagram on top helps to illustrate
three regions: Low region - fan is not completely formed, Mid region
- valid sensor region. For region - outside laminar sub-layer

2~ . LV data
~ FAN sensor
0 believe that valid data can be measured at heights above 85 gm
0 015 110 210 2'5 30 315 40
Distance (mm)
Fig. 9. Comparison of FAN sensor data with two-beam velocimeter
boundary layer survey data (LV data from Smith et al. 1995), 19.0 mm
channel with ucl= 10 m/s
1995). A comparison of the fan fringe and LV data is shown in
Fig. 9.
Data were collected as a function of receiver alignment. It
was found that the measured mean and standard deviation
were strongly coupled to the alignment. Figure 10 shows a plot
of burst frequency vs. alignment of the measurement volume
with respect to the surface. Relative displacement of the
receiver was determined from a mechanical translation stage
with 10 Ixm resolution; however, the absolute position of the
receiver could not be easily determined by mechanical means.
The zero point calibration in Fig. 10 was determined indirectly
from subsequent measurements which suggest a m i n i m u m
operation height of 85 ~tm.
In general, near the surface RMS values were greater than
50% and the mean was much lower than expected. This result
was attributed to light scattered by particles in the region of
incomplete fan fringe formation. At approximately 85 lam, the
RMS approached the generally accepted value of 36% for
turbulence intensity within the sub-layer (Alfredsson et al.
1988). The mean value also represented a reasonable value for
the velocity slope. Between 85 and 300 ~tm, the mean value
remained constant to within 10% and RMS remained between
35% and 39%. Beyond 300 ~tm, both the mean and RMS values
decreased. These results are consistent with what is expected
due to the rolling over the velocity outside of the sub-layer. The
results were not significantly effected by the use of 50 or
100 ~tm core fiber and were repeatable on different days. We
and is bounded by the sublayer thickness.
To measure shear stress over a wide range without r u n n i n g
into limitations on compressor flow rate, the channel width
was reduced to 6.35 mm. The receiver was positioned so that it
collected scattered light from the lowest valid region of the fan
fringes located approximately 85 microns above the surface.
For a steady state, fully developed flow, the true mean wall
shear stress, ft .... can be computed using Conservation of
Momentum and the difference in pressure measured at two
positions separated in the downstream direction. The equation
for the true mean shear stress is expressed as,
Ap(wh)
?true = (6)
2L (W + h)
where Ap is the pressure difference, L is the distance between
pressure taps, h is the height of the channel and w is the width.
In this case h = 0.635 cm, w = 10.2 cm and L = 61 cm. The mean
wall shear stress measured using the FAN sensor is shown
plotted as a function of ftrue in Fig. 11. The error bars represent
the uncertainty in the sensor transfer function (2/S) and slit
alignment with respect to the surface.
In order to accurately measure the mean shear stress, the
sensor volume must remain within the viscous sublayer, 6sub.
The viscous sublayer is the very thin region near the wall where
the velocity profile is linear, i.e., ~watt= gfdy, where ~ is the
mean velocity measured at y. By general agreement, the height
 3.0
E 2.5
Z 8O
v
2.0
t-
1.0
' 0.5
0 0
01s 10 l's 2'0 s 30
~true-true mean shear stress (N/m 2)
Fig. 11. Mean wall shear stress measured using FAN sensor as
a function of the true mean shear stress which was calculated from
Eq. (6) using measured values of the pressure differential. Line
indicates condition where the measured and average shear stress are
equal. Error bars represent 10% uncertainty in the measurement
of the sublayer is taken to extend to 5v/u* where v is the
kinematic viscosity, u * = (~waH/p)v2 is the wall friction velocity,
and p is the density of air. Based on the mean velocity profiles
measured by Eckelmann (1974) and Kim et al. (1987), the mean
velocity differs by about 10% from the value predicted using
the linear relationship at y = 7v/u*.
Thus, it is reasonable to expect that the present sensor will
accurately measure the mean shear stress only when the
location of the sensor volume is less than y = 5v/u*. If the
sensing volume is placed at y = 7v/u*, the measured shear
stress would be about 10% less than the true value. Figure 11
indicates that the mean wall shear stress measured by the FAN
sensor and the corresponding values obtained using the
pressure drop measurements are in good agreement up to
1 N/m 2. Using the generally accepted value for the viscous
sublayer we calculate
5 5v 5vp m
,,,t, = ~ - ~ = - 1 ~ = 85 ~tm. (7)
27wall
Beyond 1 N/m 2 the FAN measurements are progressively
smaller than the measured true value. At 2 N/m 2 the FAN
measurement is lower by approximately 10%. Using the
criteria of y - - 7 v / u * for a 10% difference, we calculate the
measurement location to be at 85 txm. Thus, the data in Fig. 11
is consistent with a measurement location of 85 ~m.
We estimate that with improved recording techniques, such
as the use of precision masks to form the slits during record-
ing, the m i n i m u m operational height can be reduced by a
factor of three (a -- 1 ~tm, S = 7.5 p.m, Ymin~ 30 ~tm). Since the
sublayer thickness decreases as the square root of wall shear
stress, as seen in Eq. (7), this would extend the measurement
capability by a factor of 9 and result in a maximum measurable
wall shear stress of 9 N/m 2.
Figure 12 shows the measured RMS distribution at each of
the data points from Fig. 11. The average RMS value is 36%
excluding the 47% value measured at a shear stress value
of 0.15 N/m 2. The mean velocity was not directly measured
during the course of this investigation and hence the Reynolds
number can not be determined from directly measured
lOO
j 90
_e 70
t 9 Average RMS = 36 %
.....~ 1 4 9 1 4 9 e .o 9 e j .........
m 30
e-
m 20
. . . . ( . . . . I . . . . I . . . . I ' ' ' ' 1 ' ' ' '
0 0.5 1.0 1.5 2.0 2.5 3.0 475
Ytrue - true mean shear stress (N/m 2)
Fig. 12. Wall shear stress standard deviation (RMS), as measured by
FAN sensor, vs. the measured true mean shear stress
quantities. However, an estimate of the Reynolds number can
be obtained from Dean's correlation (Dean 1978)
Cf= 0.073 Re,~ ~ (8)
where Ci is the skin friction coefficient and Re,. is the Reynolds
number based on the bulk velocity and full height of the
channel. Based on Dean's correlation, the estimated Reynolds
number at a mean wall shear stress of 0.15 N/m 2 is appro-
ximately 1940 which clearly corresponds to intermittent or
transitional flow. The presence of intermittent flow probably is
responsible for the higher RMS values found at the low values
of mean shear stress.
6
Future improvements
The use of a cylindrical lens to form the slits for the sensors
recorded and tested in this paper resulted in beam waists larger
than desired and therefore, small far field diffraction angles.
This increased the size of the non-overlapping zone near the
surface and resulted in a m i n i m u m operational height for the
FAN sensor of y > 85 ~m. One way to overcome these limita-
tions is to record the sensor using a precision mask to form the
slits. Additionally, it is necessary to use the same wavelength to
record and reconstruct the hologram to avoid any chromatic
aberrations.
Figure 13 shows an alternate recording geometry that will
produce much higher quality holographic recordings. The
mask can be produced using standard photolithography
techniques where the pattern, shown as an inset, is etched onto
a metal covered glass substrate. The mask is then placed in
direct contact with the front surface of the holographic sensor.
The recording laser beam is split into four legs: the reference
beam (incident on the back of the substrate), two object beams
to illuminate the slits ( # 1 and # 2 ) , and a third object beam
( # 3) that is used for aligning the receiver during playback.
The sensors can either be recorded and replayed at 442 n m
(permitting the use of conventional photoresist) or can be
recorded at 488 nm in newer holographic materials such as
HSM's green sensitive photoresist of Dupont's photopolymer.
Use of photopolymer material would also permit angular
multiplexing of each individual slit. Each slit could be recorded
individually by blocking the other and varying the reference

Slitwidthis 1pm Sensorsubst~ate x.
/ ~'~ Photo
.." ~ h r
/ sensor could be increased by almost an order of magnitude
Mirror ...............~ i through improved recording techniques. Planned improve-
476
E O'+ectbe
t ,
I / \\ Mask I '
~ / .....,/+ :Nsubstrate.../ Expanueu
9 ~-"Y
Fig. 13. Recording geometry and mask design for self-aligning FAN
sensor
beam angle between each. Each slit is then reconstructed by
a separate address beam, incident at different angles. By
frequency shifting one of the beams with respect to the other,
the interference fringes would rotate, adding a frequency bias
to the measurement which could be useful in the detection of
flow reversals.
It is also possible to record a projection of the receiver's field
of view at a spot adjacent to the fan-fringe hologram in order to
simplify receiver alignment (object beam # 3). After recording
and developing the hologram, illumination of this region with
an address beam will produce a diffracted order that will
exactly duplicate the receiver's solid angle. By imaging this
light with the receiving lens into the fiber, the receiver can
be easily (and perhaps automatically) aligned to its correct
position. The address beam is then translated over by several
millimeters to reconstruct the FAN hologram and the align-
ment is complete. This concept can be incorporated into the
design of the mask to make recording easier. Figure 13
illustrates the mask design and recording geometry.
7 New York.
Conclusions
In conclusion, we have demonstrated that holographic fan-
fringe sensors can be recorded and used to make velocity
gradient (shear stress and skin friction) measurements inside
the laminar sub-layer of turbulent boundary layer flows. These
sensors can also be used to measure time-resolved shear stress
for detection of boundary-layer separation. The holographic
sensors are extremely compact, eliminate the need for optical
access from behind the model and greatly simplify the optics
necessary for operation. The fan-fringe sensors have been
tested and validated in a laboratory calibration channel at
shear stresses up to 1 N / m 2. The operational range of the
Reference ments to the sensor could permit detection of flow reversals
beam and automated alignment schemes.
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