Study on airfoil performance in unsteady flows

Aircraft accident rates may be on the decline with the improvement in technology and maintenance practices. However, there is still room for improvement as the number of passengers on aviation transport is set to grow and increase in the near future. There is still a general lack of understanding ho...

Full description

Bibliographic Details
Main Author: Teo, Alvin Zhen Wei.
Other Authors: School of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering
Format: Final Year Project (FYP)
Language:English
Published: 2012
Subjects:
Online Access:http://hdl.handle.net/10356/49796
_version_ 1811693073978097664
author Teo, Alvin Zhen Wei.
author2 School of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering
author_facet School of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering
Teo, Alvin Zhen Wei.
author_sort Teo, Alvin Zhen Wei.
collection NTU
description Aircraft accident rates may be on the decline with the improvement in technology and maintenance practices. However, there is still room for improvement as the number of passengers on aviation transport is set to grow and increase in the near future. There is still a general lack of understanding how an aircraft behaves in unsteady flows, or gust. Most wind tunnels can only generate steady flows. However, this does not accurately represent real life conditions, where the wind speed and direction may change almost instantaneously. Hence, this project looks into developing a suitable mechanism to generate gust in wind tunnels. The first aim of this project is to design a gust generator operating on oscillating airfoils in order to generate unsteady gusts. The desired output of this gust generator is to produce a sinusoidal flow. The second aim is to conduct a parametric study on the different factors, such as the oscillation frequency, the oscillation amplitude, and the various distances, that would affect the output and the performance of this gust generator. The flow is studied by observing the variation on the forces exerted on a symmetric airfoil. This preliminary study enables more complex flow patterns to be studied in future, with the results from the sinusoidal gust forming the basic building blocks. This can be done with the Fourier series and the super position theorem, which allow the results from various simple gust patterns to be added up to predict the result of a complex gust pattern. This is in the hopes of better understanding aircraft performance in gust conditions, thus leading to better safety records.
first_indexed 2024-10-01T06:45:53Z
format Final Year Project (FYP)
id ntu-10356/49796
institution Nanyang Technological University
language English
last_indexed 2024-10-01T06:45:53Z
publishDate 2012
record_format dspace
spelling ntu-10356/497962023-03-04T19:10:02Z Study on airfoil performance in unsteady flows Teo, Alvin Zhen Wei. School of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Tang Hui DRNTU::Engineering::Aeronautical engineering::Aerodynamics Aircraft accident rates may be on the decline with the improvement in technology and maintenance practices. However, there is still room for improvement as the number of passengers on aviation transport is set to grow and increase in the near future. There is still a general lack of understanding how an aircraft behaves in unsteady flows, or gust. Most wind tunnels can only generate steady flows. However, this does not accurately represent real life conditions, where the wind speed and direction may change almost instantaneously. Hence, this project looks into developing a suitable mechanism to generate gust in wind tunnels. The first aim of this project is to design a gust generator operating on oscillating airfoils in order to generate unsteady gusts. The desired output of this gust generator is to produce a sinusoidal flow. The second aim is to conduct a parametric study on the different factors, such as the oscillation frequency, the oscillation amplitude, and the various distances, that would affect the output and the performance of this gust generator. The flow is studied by observing the variation on the forces exerted on a symmetric airfoil. This preliminary study enables more complex flow patterns to be studied in future, with the results from the sinusoidal gust forming the basic building blocks. This can be done with the Fourier series and the super position theorem, which allow the results from various simple gust patterns to be added up to predict the result of a complex gust pattern. This is in the hopes of better understanding aircraft performance in gust conditions, thus leading to better safety records. Bachelor of Engineering (Aerospace Engineering) 2012-05-24T03:59:37Z 2012-05-24T03:59:37Z 2012 2012 Final Year Project (FYP) http://hdl.handle.net/10356/49796 en Nanyang Technological University 83 p. application/pdf
spellingShingle DRNTU::Engineering::Aeronautical engineering::Aerodynamics
Teo, Alvin Zhen Wei.
Study on airfoil performance in unsteady flows
title Study on airfoil performance in unsteady flows
title_full Study on airfoil performance in unsteady flows
title_fullStr Study on airfoil performance in unsteady flows
title_full_unstemmed Study on airfoil performance in unsteady flows
title_short Study on airfoil performance in unsteady flows
title_sort study on airfoil performance in unsteady flows
topic DRNTU::Engineering::Aeronautical engineering::Aerodynamics
url http://hdl.handle.net/10356/49796
work_keys_str_mv AT teoalvinzhenwei studyonairfoilperformanceinunsteadyflows