Improving Lift Characteristics of Supercritical Airfoil via Upper Airfoil Section Modification

Abstract

The research shown examines changes in the lift performance of a super-critical airfoil by varying the airfoil upper section thickness. This research is motivated by new approaches in dynamic wing re-configuration studies initiated by NASA, where configuration via mechanical wing movement was successfully implemented in military aircraft. FLUENT software is used with ANSYS Workbench in order to develop numerical simulation for compressible transonic flows (Mach number 0.7-0.9). The baseline simulations have been successfully compared with published data and selected experimental results. Preliminary findings point to improvements in airfoil lift characteristics as a result of increasing the upper section thickness of the airfoil.