April
23
What would happen if you broke the "sound barrier" in water?
Author: admin Category: 5
I know that the "sound barrier" would be 4.3 times faster in water but its just a theory question.
Very similar phenomena to what happens when you break the "sound barrier" in air.
It is just MUCH more difficult to do so in water, because water’s speed of sound is much greater, and water fluid drag effects will hinder you a lot more.
It is possible to go that fast in water if you "try hard enough". Throw plenty of structural design at your vessel, throw plenty of energy at your propulsion, and you could break the hydrosound barrier. It is just impractical to do so.
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April 23rd, 2010
could u actually go that fast though?? in water??no idea….good ques. though
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April 23rd, 2010
Very similar phenomena to what happens when you break the "sound barrier" in air.
It is just MUCH more difficult to do so in water, because water’s speed of sound is much greater, and water fluid drag effects will hinder you a lot more.
It is possible to go that fast in water if you "try hard enough". Throw plenty of structural design at your vessel, throw plenty of energy at your propulsion, and you could break the hydrosound barrier. It is just impractical to do so.
References :
April 23rd, 2010
We are currently unable to do that. That results because the drag on a body moving in a fluid is D = 1/2 Rho Cd A V^2; where Rho = 1000 kg/m^3 for water compared with rho = 1.23 kg/m^3 at sea level for air. As you can see, the drag force, all other things equal, will be about Rho/rho ~ 800 times greater on a body traveling through water than when traveling through air.
As acceleration a = a0(1 - D/T), where a0 is the acceleration in a vacuum > a the acceleration in the fluid, D is drag, and T is the thrust (e.g., from water jet engines), we see that acceleration through the fluid ceases when D = T. We assume T is fixed so the limiting factor is in how fast V can the body go before reaching D = T, which is when the terminal velocity is reached. Clearly, when Rho > rho, D = T will be reached at slower velocity than when the body is moving in air with rho as the density.
And there you are. The terminal velocity in water will be lower than the terminal velocity in air. Yet the speed of sound in water is higher than in air. Bottom line, until we can create thrusts about 800 times that of our aircraft engines, an underwater body will not even reach comparable speeds of aircraft, let alone bust the sound velocity which is even higher in water.
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