Calculation of Viscous Transonic Flows about a Supercritical Airfoil.
Abstract
A critical examination of several aspects of the numerical simulation of high Reynolds number transonic airfoil flows is presented. Subcritical and supercritical flow fields about an aft-cambered airfoil were generated by solving the mass-averaged Navier-Stokes equations with turbulence incorporated through an algebraic eddy viscosity model. The governing equations were solved on curvilinear body-fitted grids utilizing two different algorithms., i.e., MacCormack's explicit and Beam-Warming implicit. The numerical uncertainties associated with different schemes, grid resolution, artificial viscosity and far field boundary placement were investigated and found to be of the same order of magnitude or less than the corresponding uncertainties in the available experimentat data. Comparison of computed and experimental results showed good prediction of all the essential flow features. However, detailed comparison of velocity profiles pointed out deficiencies of the turbulence model downstream of the shock/boundary layer interaction in the airfoil cove and in the near-wake. Thin-layer and Navier-Stokes computed results were found in excellent agreement with each other. However, the Euler equations failed to provide a reasonable approximation of the flow due to the dramatic viscous-inviscid interaction effects for supercritical airfoils. Keywords: Computational fluid dynamics, MacCormack's explicit algorithm, Transonic flow, and Numerical methods and procedures.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Jul 01, 1986
- Accession Number
- ADA173519
Entities
People
- Miguel R. Visbal
Organizations
- Universal Energy Systems