Stokes flow of a rotating sphere around the axis of a circular orifice or a circular disk

Abstract

This paper presents an infinite series solution to the creeping flow equations for the axisymmetric motion of a sphere of arbitrary size rotating in a quiescent fluid around the axis of a circular orifice or a circular disk whose diameters are either larger or smaller than that of the sphere. Numerical tests of the convergence are passed and the comparison with the exact solution and other computational results shows an agreement to five significant figures for the torque coefficients in both cases. The torque coefficients are obtained for the sphere located up to a position tangent to the wall plane containing either the orifice or the disk. It is concluded that the torque coefficients of the sphere and the disk are monotonically increasing with the decrease of the distance from the disk or the orifice plane in both cases.