Investigation of Reduction in Base Drag using Experiment and CFD at Subsonic Speed Regimes

Author(s):  
S. Venkatramanan ◽  
S.H. Gowtham Gudimella ◽  
S. Thanigaiarasu ◽  
J. Anbarasi ◽  
K. Vijayaraja

Base drag, arising from flow separation at the blunt base of a body can be a sizeable fraction of total drag in the context of projectiles, missiles and after bodies of fighter aircrafts. The base drag is the major contribution of total drag for low speed regimes, flight tests have shown that the base drag may account for up to 50% of the total drag. Computational and experimental investigation for a hemispherical flight vehicle body of length 500mm and diameter 50mm was conducted for the purpose of investigating the base drag. Three case studies were conducted to investigate the properties of the flow field around the flight vehicle at different flow velocities of 20m/s, 30m/s and 50m/s at zero angle of attack (AoA). The three cases were (i) a flight vehicle with flat base configuration, (ii) a flight vehicle with a nozzle at the base and (iii) a flight vehicle configuration with a boat tail, Fig 1. Also, the three configurations were investigated at different AoA of -2, 0 and +2. The base drags for three configurations are calculated and the experimental results are compared with the CFD results.

Author(s):  
R.R. Elangovan ◽  
K.R. Vijayakumar ◽  
G. Ramanan

Base drag is arising from flow separation at blunt base of a body. It can be a sizeable fraction of total drag in context of projectiles, missiles and after bodies of fighter aircrafts. The base drag is the major contribution of total drag for low speed regimes, flight tests have shown that the base drag may account for up to 50% of total drag. In this paper an experimental investigation for simple semi-circular flight vehicle body of length 500mm and diameter 50mm was conducted for the purpose of investigating base drag. The base drags for three configurations are calculated and the results are compared with CFD data. The three configurations used for testing are flat base configuration, closed nozzle configuration and boat tail configuration. The evaluation of base drag for three different flow velocities such as (i) 20m/s, (ii) 35m/s and (iii) 50m/s at different angle of attack such as -2, 0 and 2 are experimented and compared.


2016 ◽  
Vol 139 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
A. Hildebrandt ◽  
F. Schilling

The present paper deals with the numerical and experimental investigation of the effect of return channel (RCH) dimensions of a centrifugal compressor stage on the aerodynamic performance. Three different return channel stages were investigated, two stages comprising three-dimensional (3D) return channel blades and one stage comprising two-dimensional (2D) RCH vanes. The analysis was performed regarding both the investigation of overall performance (stage efficiency, RCH total pressure loss coefficient) and detailed flow-field performance. For detailed experimental flow-field investigation at the stage exit, six circumferentially traversed three-hole probes were positioned downstream the return channel exit in order to get two-dimensional flow-field information. Additionally, static pressure wall measurements were taken at the hub and shroud pressure and suction side (SS) of the 2D and 3D return channel blades. The return channel system overall performance was calculated by measurements of the circumferentially averaged 1D flow field downstream the diffuser exit and downstream the stage exit. Dependent on the type of return channel blade, the numerical and experimental results show a significant effect on the flow field overall and detail performance. In general, satisfactory agreement between computational fluid dynamics (CFD)-prediction and test-rig measurements was achieved regarding overall and flow-field performance. In comparison with the measurements, the CFD-calculated stage performance (efficiency and pressure rise coefficient) of all the 3D-RCH stages was slightly overpredicted. Very good agreement between CFD and measurement results was found for the static pressure distribution on the RCH wall surfaces while small CFD-deviations occur in the measured flow angle at the stage exit, dependent on the turbulence model selected.


2019 ◽  
Vol 36 (1) ◽  
pp. 9-18
Author(s):  
Honghui Xiang ◽  
Ning Ge ◽  
Jie Gao ◽  
Rongfei Yang ◽  
Minjie Hou

Abstract Aiming at resolving the problem of measuring probe blockage effect in the performance experiments of high loaded axial flow compressors, an experimental investigation of the probe support disturbance effect on the compressor cascade flow field was conducted on a transonic plane cascade test facility. The influence characteristics of the probe support tail structure on the cascade downstream flow field under different operation conditions were revealed through the detailed analysis of the test data. The results show that the aerodynamic coupling effect between the upstream probe support wake and the downstream cascade flow field is very intense. Some factors, i. e. inlet Mach number, probe support tail structure, circumferential installing position of probe, and axial distance from the probe support trailing edge to the downstream cascade, are found to have the most impact on the probe disturbance intensity. Under high speed inlet flow condition, changing probe support tail structure can’t inhibit probe support disturbance intensity effectively. Whereas under low speed inlet flow condition, compared with the cylindrical probe, the elliptic probe can inhibit probe support wake loss and reduce disturbance effects on the downstream cascade flow field.


Author(s):  
Pushpanjay K. Singh ◽  
M. Renganathan ◽  
Harekrishna Yadav ◽  
Santosh K. Sahu ◽  
Prabhat K. Upadhyay ◽  
...  

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