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by brandmeyer 3518 days ago
Totally wrong. All of that turbulence goes into heat, which must be sunk through the walls (or something else), and is therefore lost. "Fully turbulent flow" is a reference to the transition away from (low-friction) laminar flow. Flow gets to be fully turbulent by experiencing high internal fluid friction due to its own viscosity. Air's viscosity is low relative to water, but it still isn't zero. 500 mph flow through a big long tube is extremely lossy.