Tag Archives: static pressure

Pitot tube

Another one of those awesome hydrodynamics toys: A Pitot tube!

This is what it looks like:

IMG_1859

Pitot tube. The tip pointing downward in this picture would point right into the flow.

What you can’t see here is the little hole at the tip of the tube that is pointing downwards in the picture. What the Pitot tube measures is the pressure difference between that hole (the stagnation pressure since it’s the stagnation point) and the vents some 3.5 cm above (the static pressure), from which you can calculate the dynamic pressure, hence air speed of a plane (if the Pitot tube was mounted on said plane) or, in our case, the speed of air flow from a fan relative to a stationary Pitot tube.

Again, I’m sadly too lazy to calculate anything, but you can take the measurements from the movie below and do it yourself if you so desire! :-)