Effects of airfoil shape, thickness, camber, and angle of attack on calculated transonic unsteady airloads

Abstract

The effects of airfoil shape, thickness, camber, and mean angle of attack on transonic unsteady airloads were investigated as calculated by the transonic small-disturbance computer code XTRAN2L. Shape effects were investigated by examining the pressure distributions, shock locations, and unsteady airloads for three 10 percent thick airfoils. NACA 0010, NACA 64A010, and parabolic arc. Thickness effects were determined by studying a single airfoil shape with three different thicknesses: NACA 0008, NACA 0010, and NACA 0012. Angle of attack and camber effects were studied by including mean angle of attack or by adding a simple parabolic camber distribution to the originally symmetric airfoils. Comparisons of unsteady airloads for different airfoil configurations show similar results caused by variations in airfoil shape, thickness, camber, or mean angle of attack. Computer costs can be reduced by limiting the number of transonic unsteady aerodynamic calculations for small changes in airfoil geometry or angle of attack