Oblique stagnation-point flow of an incompressible visco-elastic fluid towards a stretching surface

An analysis is made of the steady two-dimensional stagnation-point flow of an incompressible viscoelastic fluid over a flat deformable surface when the surface is stretched in its own plane with a velocity cx, where x is the distance from the stagnation-point and c is a positive constant. It is shown that for a viscoelastic fluid of short memory (obeying Walters' B model), a boundary layer is formed when the stretching velocity of the surface is less than ax, where ax + 2by is the inviscid free-stream velocity and y is the distance normal to the plate, a and b being constants and the velocity at a point increases with increase in the elasticity of the fluid. On the other hand an inverted boundary layer is formed when the surface stretching velocity exceeds ax and the velocity decreases with increase in the elasticity of the fluid. A novel result of the analysis is that the flow near the stretching surface is that corresponding to an inviscid stagnation-point flow when a = c. Temperature distribution in the boundary layer is found in three cases, namely: (i) the sheet with constant surface temperature (CST); (ii) the sheet with variable surface temperature (VST) and (iii) the sheet with prescribed quadratic power law surface heat flux (PHF) for various values of non-dimensional parameters. It is found that in all the three cases when a/c > 1, temperature at a point decreases with increase in the elasticity of the fluid and when a/c < 1, temperature at a point increases with increase in the elasticity of the fluid. Further temperature at a point decreases with increase in the radiation parameter and wall temperature parameter. (C) 2007 Published by Elsevier Ltd.