Diffraction of Normal Shock by Yawed Wedges

Chester ( 1954 ) extended Lighthill’s ( 1949 ) theory by considering the interaction of a plane normal shock wave with an infinite thin wedge at small angle of incidence, and arbitrary angles of yaw up to a certain limiting value depending on the shock strength . If the velocity of the shock is U and the wedge is yawed through an angle ß, then the point of intersection of the shock front and leading wedge travelsalong the leading wedge with velocity $$ {U \over {\sin \beta }}. $$. If an equal and opposite velocity is superimposed on the whole field, the shock becomes stationary and we have the steady flow behind the shock . The flow in fact in many respects has similarity to Busemann’s cone field problem .