On the use of a low-Reynolds extension to the Chen–Kim (k–ε) model to predict thermal exchanges in the case of an impinging plasma jet

The present paper is devoted to the modeling of an impinging argon/hydrogen plasma jet under atmospheric plasma spraying conditions. A two-layer extension to the Chen–Kim (k–ε) turbulence model was implemented in the Phoenics code, allowing the prediction of temperature and velocity fields in the turbulent jet and the description of the viscous sublayer at the surface of the front body. The predictions of thermal exchanges are compared to results obtained with a heuristic formula deduced from experiments and taken from the literature. A comparison is also made with results obtained with some other models and the results indicate that the present proposed model is by far the most accurate.