Recent interest in unmanned combat air vehicles (UCAVs) has stimulated investigation of the flow structure, as well as its control, on delta wings having low and moderate values of sweep angle. In addition, microair vehicles (MAVs) typically have complex leading-edge forms, including relatively low values of sweep angle. In this paper the flow structure on crossflow planes, located upstream and downstream of the onset of three-dimensional separation from the surface of a delta wing having low sweep angle, has been investigated as a function of the magnitude of localized blowing from slots at the trailing edge. The principal findings can be listed as follows: 1) In the absence of control, a region of three-dimensional separation dominates the near-surface flow, and the crossflow structure is characterized by the vortex shed from the apex and the three-dimensional vortex structure that emanates from three-dimensional separation from the surface. There is no indication of a leading-edge vortex. 2) Occurrence of three-dimensional separation/stall causes remarkable patterns of surface-normal velocity fluctuations in the region close to the trailing edge of the planform. These patterns are indicative of buffeting/unsteady loading. 3) In the presence of trailing-edge blowing, eradication of three-dimensional separation from the surface of the wing is associated with recovery of both the swirl pattern of streamlines and the pronounced axial vorticity concentration in the crossflow plane closest to the apex. Further increases of blowing coefficient cause the center of the vortex structure in the crossflow planes to move closer to the leading edge of the planform. 4) At sufficiently high blowing coefficients, a dual vortex structure occurs. It involves a secondary concentration of axially oriented vorticity, which has the same sign as, and is immediately adjacent to, the primary vortex. This structure is very similar in form to that originally identified at lower angle of attack in the numerical simulation of Gordnier and Visbal ['Higher-Order Compact Difference Scheme Applied to the Simulation of a Low Sweep Delta Wing Flow,' AIAA Paper 2003-0620, Jan. 2003], and confirmed in the experimental investigations of Taylor et al. ['An Investigation of Vortex Flows over Low Sweep Delta Wings,' AIAA Paper 2003-4021, June 2003], and Yaniktepe and Rockwell ['Flow Structure on a Delta Wing of Low Sweep Angle,' AIAA Journal, Vol. 42, No. 3, 2004, pp. 513-523, 'Flow Structure on Diamond and Lambda Planforms: Trailing-Edge Region,' AIAA Journal, Vol. 43, No. 7, 2005, pp. 1490-1500]. In other words, the separated flow along a wing of low sweep angle, at moderate angle of attack, can be transformed, via steady trailing-edge blowing, to the dual primary vortex structure, which occurs naturally, that is, in the absence of any control, at low angle of attack. 5) An increase of blowing coefficient decreases the overall spatial extent of the pattern of surface-normal velocity fluctuations along the semispan of the wing, at locations close to the trailing edge. For the largest value of blowing coefficient, this pattern covers less than half of the semispan, which indicates that only a limited extent of the wing surface is exposed to turbulent buffeting/unsteady loading.
Identification and control of three-dimensional separation on low swept delta wing
Untersuchung und Beeinflussung der dreidimensionalen Strömungsablösung an Deltaflügeln mit kleinem Pfeilungswinkel
AIAA Journal (online) ; 44 , 11 ; 2805-2811
2006
7 Seiten, 6 Bilder, 16 Quellen
Article (Journal)
English
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