Added mass of a circular cylinder oscillating in a free stream

The fundamental understanding of the added mass phenomenon associated with the motion of a solid body relative to a fluid is revisited. This paper focuses on the two-dimensional flow around a circular cylinder oscillating transversely in a free stream. A virtual experiment reveals that the classical approach to this problem leads to a paradox. The inertial force is derived afresh based on analysis of the motion in a frame of reference attached to the cylinder centroid, which overcomes the paradox in the classical formulation. It is shown that the inertial force depends not only on the acceleration of the cylinderper se , but also on the relative motion between body and fluid embodied in a parameter called alpha,α , which represents the ratio of the maximum transverse velocity of the cylinder to the free-stream velocity; the induced inertial force is directionally varying and non-harmonic in time depended on the alpha parameter. It is further shown that the component of the inertial force in the transverse direction is negligible forα <0.1, increases quadratically forα <0.5, and tends asymptotically to the classical result as, i.e. in still fluid.