Date of Award

Spring 1998

Document Type

Thesis

Degree Name

Master of Science (MS)

Department

Mechanical & Aerospace Engineering

Program/Concentration

Aerospace Engineering

Committee Director

Colin P. Britcher

Committee Member

Stanley J. Miley

Committee Member

P. Balakumar

Call Number for Print

Special Collections; LD4331.E535 M367

Abstract

The following work describes and validates a methodology for the aerodynamic design of a low drag, efficient inlet-airfoil to be used on the cooling installations of a high altitude remotely piloted aircraft. Owing to the primary aircraft design requirement of subsonic endurance at high altitude (85,000 ft), the flight conditions present an aerodynamically unfavorable combination of low chord Reynolds number (500,000) and high subsonic Mach number (0.5). At this flight condition, the inlet-airfoil must meet the heat exchanger cooling flow requirements while maintaining the aerodynamic performance of the airfoil. As a result, the design method is closely coupled with not only the performance requirements, but also the basic flow physics of low Reynolds number flow (e.g., laminar separation bubbles). With an understanding of the critical flow features affecting the performance, sensible pressure distributions can be formulated. Using a multi-element airfoil design code, the geometry is then solved in the inverse mode by prescribing the desired pressure distribution. Using a current concept aircraft as a baseline, the method is used to develop an example design. A scale model of the final design is then wind tunnel tested at flight Reynolds number, and the results serve to validate the design method and tools. The experiment also provides an opportunity for the development of methods specific to low Reynolds number testing of thick airfoils.

Rights

In Copyright. URI: http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/ This Item is protected by copyright and/or related rights. You are free to use this Item in any way that is permitted by the copyright and related rights legislation that applies to your use. For other uses you need to obtain permission from the rights-holder(s).

DOI

10.25777/41pn-fg88

Download

Share

COinS