Correlated incompressible and compressible boundary layers

Abstract The boundary-layer equations for a compressible fluid are transformed into those for an incompressible fluid, assuming that the boundary is thermally insulating, that the viscosity is proportional to the absolute temperature, and that the Prandtl number is unity. Various results in the theory of incompressible boundary layers are then taken over into the compressible theory. In particular, the existence of ‘similar’ solutions is proved, and Howarth’s method for retarded flows is applied to determine the point of separation for a uniformly retarded main stream velocity. A comparison with an exact solution is used to show that this method gives a closer approximation than does Pohlhausen’s.