Exact Blasius Treatment for a Laminar, Incompressible Boundary
Layer on a Flat Plate at zero Incidence in a One-Dimensional Free Stream

Credit: David Balmer (balmer@chemeng.ed.ac.uk)

Exact Expression for Boundary Layer thickness ...

... Applying this thickness to the averaged skin friction expression derived in lecture 8.1 ...

-----------> agrees with Blasius Solution

...So It appears that the assumed Laminar Boundary Profile



is only an approximation of the exact laminar boundary layer profile. This profile slightly overpredicts the
momentum thickness across the boundary layer when compared with the exact solution. A comparison of the
assumed laminar profile, the 1/7th power law turbulent profile, and the numerically generated Blasius profile
is shown below.