Vortex generators and turbulent boundary layer separation control

Boundary layer separation is usually an unwanted phenomenon in most technical applications as for instance on airplane wings, on ground vehicles and in internal flows such as diffusers. If separation occurs it leads to loss of lift, higher drag and results in energy losses. It is therefore important to be able to find methods to control and if possible avoid separation altogether without introducing a too heavy penalty such as increased drag, energy consuming suction etc. In the present work we study one such control method, namely the use of vortex generators (VGs), which are known to be able to hinder turbulent boundary layer separation. We first study the downstream development of streamwise vortices behind pairs and arrays of vortex generators and how the strength of the vortices is coupled to the relative size of the vortex generators in comparison to the boundary layer size. Both the amplitude and the trajectory of the vortices are tracked in the downstream direction. Also the influences of yaw and free stream turbulence on the vortices are investigated. This part of the study is made with hot-wire anemometry where all three velocity components of the vortex structure are measured. The generation of circulation by the VGs scales excellently with the VG blade height and the velocity at the blade edge. The magnitude of circulation was found to be independent of yaw angle. The second part of the study deals with the control effect of vortex generators on three different cases where the strength of the adverse pressure gradient (APG) in a turbulent boundary layer has been varied. In this case the measurements have been made with particle image velocimetry. It was found that the streamwise position where the VGs are placed is not critical for the control effect. For the three different APG cases approximately the same level of circulation was needed to inhibit separation. In contrast to some previous studies we find no evidence of a universal detachment shape factor H12, that is independent of pressure gradient.QC 2010111

Turbulent Boundary Layer Separation and Control

Boundary layer separation is an unwanted phenomenon in most technical applications, as for instance on airplane wings, ground vehicles and in internal flow systems. If separation occurs, it causes loss of lift, higher drag and energy losses. It is thus essential to develop methods to eliminate or delay separation.In the present experimental work streamwise vortices are introduced in turbulent boundary layers to transport higher momentum fluid towards the wall. This enables the boundary layer to stay attached at  larger pressure gradients. First the adverse pressure gradient (APG) separation bubbles that are to be eliminated are studied. It is shown that, independent of pressure gradient, the mean velocity defect profiles are self-similar when the scaling proposed by Zagarola and Smits is applied to the data. Then vortex pairs and arrays of vortices of different initial strength are studied in zero pressure gradient (ZPG). Vane-type vortex generators (VGs) are used to generate counter-rotating vortex pairs, and it is shown that the vortex core trajectories scale with the VG height h and the spanwise spacing of the blades. Also the streamwise evolution of the turbulent quantities scale with h. As the vortices are convected downstream they seem to move towards a equidistant state, where the distance from the vortex centres to the wall is half the spanwise distance between two vortices. Yawing the VGs up to 20° do not change the generated circulation of a VG pair. After the ZPG measurements, the VGs where applied in the APG mentioned above. It is shown that that the circulation needed to eliminate separation is nearly independent of the pressure gradient and that the streamwise position of the VG array relative to the separated region is not critical to the control effect. In a similar APG jet vortex generators (VGJs) are shown to as effective as the passive VGs. The ratio VR of jet velocity and test section inlet velocity is varied and a control effectiveness optimum is found for VR=5. At 40° yaw the VGJs have only lost approximately 20% of the control effect. For pulsed VGJs the pulsing frequency, the duty cycle and VR were varied. It was shown that to achieve maximum control effect the injected mass flow rate should be as large as possible, within an optimal range of jet VRs. For a given injected mass flow rate, the important parameter was shown to be the injection time t1. A non-dimensional injection time is defined as t1+ = t1Ujet/d, where d is the jet orifice diameter. Here, the optimal  t1+ was 100-200.QC 2010082