Lift Enhancement of a Stationary Wing in a Wake

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Lift Enhancement of a Stationary Wing in a Wake

Zhang, Z. / Wang, Z. / Gursul, I.

A stationary wing placed in the wake of a bluff body experiences lift enhancement. The quasi-periodic flow in the wake causes excitation of the separated flow in the poststall conditions. The increase in the time-averaged lift force is associated with the flow separation, leading-edge vortex formation, and subsequent reattachment in a process similar to the dynamic stall of oscillating wings. The lift enhancement is maximum for an optimal offset distance from the wake centerline. At the optimal location, potential flow oscillations, rather than the direct impingement of large vortices in the wake, provide the excitation. The smaller amplitude flow oscillations lead to a large separation bubble in the time-averaged sense in the poststall regime. The delayed flow separation in the wake has a similar mechanism and frequency to those of the active flow control methods for separation. The degree of the lift enhancement is remarkable, given that the wake at a Reynolds number of 50,000 is expected to be highly three-dimensional.