The Investigation of Crossflow Velocity and Off-the-Surface Streamtrace Topology for a Moderately Swept Wing at Transonic Mach Numbers

The purpose of this thesis is to investigate the crossflow and off-the-surface velocity traces on a moderately swept wing at transonic Mach numbers. Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) was used to generate the data used to visualize the flow field. This was done for angles of attack of 6, 7, 8 and 10 degrees at a Mach number of 0.8.

An overview of flow topology and singular point theory is given as a means to describe the flow field and describe the differences between it at various angles of attack. After performing an investigation of the crossflow velocity traces it was verified that the use of a line of separation in the flow topology as an indication for flow separation is a necessary condition. It was also found that the crossflow topology is more sensitive to shock location than to angle of attack.

It has been verified that a line of separation, as defined by Tobak and Peake [ref 1], in the crossflow is an indication that separation may be present on the surface of the wing. Furthermore, shocks complicate the crossflow. In all of the cases the crossflow just aft of a shock becomes much more complex than it was before the shock. New singular points appear and interactions between singular points arise. As angle of attack is increased the flow topology changes critically only in the change from 6 to 7 degrees. This is the range in angle of attack in which a sudden shift in the location of the shock occurs, so it may be postulated that for this wing the flow topology is more sensitive to shock location as opposed to angle of attack. Comparing the topology between the 7, 8 and 10 degree cases, supports this hypothesis as the topology is similar before and after the shock for each case. The flow topology for each case before the shock is much different then the topology just aft of the shock.

The investigation of off-the surface traces has shown that as angle of attack is increased the area of separated flow not only grows but also becomes more complex. For the 6 degree angle of attack case, the region of separated flow was concentrated near the surface and as one moved off the surface the flow quickly returned to the attached flow direction with no singular points. This was the case for the 7 degree angle of attack case only the flow did not reattach until after one moved approximately 0.25 feet off the surface. As the angle of attack was increased the distance off the surface in which the flow returned to moving in the downstream direction increased. Furthermore, as angle of attacked was increased the number of singular points and their intensity grew.

It was also verified that in all of the cases investigated the presence of a line of separation was an indication of separated flow. Moreover, in all but two cases there were two lines of separation. One located along the furthest outboard and inboard area of the separated region. No lines of separation were observed in or around attached flow, thus the lines of separation may not only indicate that separation is present but in fact give a location for the separated region.