Receptivity of the Blunt-Leading-Edge Plate Boundary Layer to Unsteady Vortex Perturbations

The response of the boundary layer on a plate with a blunt leading edge to frozen-in vortex perturbations whose vorticity is normal to the plate surface is found. It is shown that these vortices generate an inhomogeneity of the streamwise velocity component in the boundary layer. This inhomogeneity is analogous to the streaky structure developing as the degree of free-stream turbulence increases. The dependence of the amplitude and shape of the boundary layer inhomogeneity on the distance from the leading edge, the streamwise and spanwise scales, and other parameters is found for periodic and local initial perturbations. It is shown that the receptivity of the boundary layer decreases with increase in the frequency and with decrease in the streamwise perturbation scale.     

Receptivity of the inclined-cylinder attachment-line boundary layer to vortex perturbations

The receptivity of the boundary layer in the neighborhood of the attachment line of a cylinder inclined to the flow with respect to periodic vortex perturbations frozen into the stream is investigated. The problem considered simulates the interaction between external turbulence and the leading-edge swept wing boundary layer. It is shown that if the direction of the external perturbation vector is almost parallel to the leading edge, then the external perturbations are considerably strengthened at the outer boundary layer edge. This effect can cause laminar-turbulent transition on the attachment line at subcritical Reynolds numbers.Translated from Izvestiya Rossiiskoi Academii Nauk, Mekhanika Zhidkosti i Gaza, No. 6, 2004, pp. 72–85. Original Russian Text Copyright © 2004 by Ustinov.     

Excitation of controllable perturbations in the three-dimensional boundary layer using plasma actuators

Two versions of the structure of a multi-discharge plasma actuator intended to excite boundary layer perturbations in the neighborhood of the leading swept-wing edge are suggested. The actuator must prevent from appearance and development of the crossflow instability modes leading to laminarturbulent transition under the normal conditions. In the case of flow past a swept wing, excitation of controllable perturbations by the plasma actuator is simulated numerically in the steady-state approximation under the typical conditions of cruising flight of a subsonic aircraft. The local body force and thermal impact on the boundary layer flow which is periodic along the leading wing edge is considered. The calculations are carried out for the physical impact parameters realizable in the near-surface dielectric barrier discharge.     

Effect of Heat Supply on the Stability of the Supersonic Swept Atiachment-Line Boundary Layer

The stability of a boundary layer with volume heat supply on the attachment line of a swept wing is investigated within the framework of the linear theory at supersonic inviscid-free-stream Mach numbers. The results of numerical calculations of the flow stability and neutral curves are presented for the flow on the leading edge of a swept wing with a swept angle χ=60° at various free-stream Mach numbers. The effect of volume heat supply on the characteristics of boundary layer stability on the attachment line is studied at a surface temperature equal to the temperature of the external inviscid flow. It is shown that in the case of a supersonic external inviscid flow volume heat supply may result in an increase in the critical Reynolds number and stabilization of disturbances corresponding to large wave numbers. For certain energy supply parameters the situation is reversed, the unstable disturbances corresponding to the main flow-instability zone are stabilized but another zone of flow-instability with small wave numbers and a significantly lower critical Reynolds number appears.     

Effect of surface temperature on the stability of the swept attachment line boundary layer

At fairly high Reynolds numbers instability may develop on the line of attachment of the potential flow to the leading edge of a swept wing and lead to a transition to boundary layer turbulence directly at the leading edge [1, 2]. Although the first results relating to the stability and transition of laminar flow at the leading edge of swept wings were obtained almost 30 years ago, the problem remains topical. The stability of the swept attachment line boundary layer was recently investigated numerically with allowance for compressibility effects [3, 4]. Below we examine the effect of surface temperature on the stability characteristics of the laminar viscous heat-conducting gas flow at the leading edge of a side slipping wing.Translated from Izvestiya Akademii Nauk SSSR, Mekhanika Zhidkosti i Gaza, No. 6, pp. 78–82, November–December, 1990.     

Stability and Receptivity of the Swept-Wing Boundary-Layer Flow Controlled by a Periodic Sequence of Plasma Actuators

Fluid Dynamics - The process of flow control in the boundary layer on a swept wing using a span-periodic sequence of plasma actuators mounted at an angle to the leading edge is modeled. The...     

高速三维边界层的横流不稳定性

用两点四阶差分格式研究旋转圆锥超音速三维边界层的横流不稳定性和壁面冷却对稳定性的影响数值结果表明，与二维边界层相比横流使三维边界层第一模式增长率增大，对第二模式影响很小；Ｍｅ＜４３第一模式最不稳定，Ｍｅ＞４３第二模式最不稳定；三维边界层最不稳定第二模式是三维波，二维边界层则为二维波；壁面冷却对第一模式起稳定作用，对第二模式起不稳定作用     

Linear evolution of controlled disturbances in the supersonic boundary layer on a swept wing

The linear development of controlled disturbances in the three-dimensional supersonic boundary layer on a swept model wing with a sharp leading edge is experimentally investigated at the Mach number 2. The spatial-temporal and spectral-wave characteristics of the wave train of unstable disturbances are obtained. The asymmetry of these characteristics, due to the secondary flow in the three-dimensional boundary layer, is confirmed.     

Acoustic Field Effect on Laminar Turbulent Transition on a Swept Wing in the Favorable Pressure Gradient Region

The development of disturbances in a three-dimensional boundary layer on a swept wing model is studied both under natural conditions and for artificial excitation of traveling waves by an acoustic field. It is found that steady-state streamwise structures are formed in the three-dimensional boundary layer; under natural conditions a wave packet leading to turbulence is detected. When the flow is exposed to the action of an acoustic field at a frequency from the wave packet, disturbances whose velocity along the streamwise structures is equal to 0.55 of the oncoming flow velocity are formed, while the laminar-turbulent transition is displaced upstream.     

Evolution of disturbances in a laminarized supersonic boundary layer on a swept wing

Experimental data on stability of a three-dimensional supersonic boundary layer on a swept wing are presented. The experiments are performed on a swept wing model with a lenticular profile with a 40° sweep angle of the leading edge at a zero angle of attack. The supersonic boundary layer on the swept wing was laminarized with the use of distributed roughness. A pioneering study of interaction of traveling and stationary disturbances is performed. Some specific features of this interaction are identified. The main reason for turbulence emergence in a supersonic boundary layer on a swept wing is demonstrated to be secondary crossflow instability. __________ Translated from Prikladnaya Mekhanika i Tekhnicheskaya Fizika, Vol. 49, No. 2, pp. 40–46, March–April, 2008.     

Investigation of the Boundary Layer Behavior In the Vicinity of the Attachment Line on a Yawed Wing and the Possibilities of Deturbulization

The results of an experimental investigation of the effect of fuselage-generated turbulence impinging on the leading edge of a swept wing on the boundary layer flow regime are presented. The possibilities of attenuating the turbulizing effect are studied. The criteria of laminar-turbulent transition are determined.     

Subcritical spatial transition of swept Hiemenz flow

It is known from experimental investigations that the leading-edge boundary layer of a swept wing exhibits transition to turbulence at subcritical Reynolds numbers, i.e. at Reynolds numbers which lie below the critical Reynolds number predicted by linear stability theory. In the present work, we investigate this subcritical transition process by direct numerical simulations of a swept Hiemenz flow in a spatial setting. The laminar base flow is perturbed upstream by a pair of stationary counter-rotating vortex-like disturbances. This perturbation generates high- and low-speed streaks by a non-modal growth mechanism. Further downstream, these streaky structures exhibit a strong instability to secondary perturbations which leads to a breakdown to turbulence.The observed transition mechanism has strong similarities to by-pass transition mechanisms found for two-dimensional boundary layers. It can be shown that transition strongly depends on the amplitude of the primary perturbation as well as on the frequency of the secondary perturbation.     

Flow along an attachment line controlled by a near-wall body force

The problems of the control of steady three-dimensional viscous incompressible flows modeling the gas flow in the vicinity of the attachment line on the leading edge of a swept wing are considered. It is assumed that the control is realized by means of the body force action approximating the action of a periodic sequence of plasma actuators mounted perpendicular to the leading edge. The corresponding boundary value problems for the system of Navier–Stokes equations are numerically solved using the Fourier method along the longitudinal coordinate and second-order difference approximation in the vertical coordinate. An important role played by the control-induced pressure gradient is shown.     

Experimental Investigation of the Development of Secondary Perturbations on a Swept Wing

The development of traveling secondary perturbations on streamwise structures in the swept wing boundary layer is investigated when the perturbations are excited by a periodic blowing-suction through an orifice on the model surface. The streamwise structures were generated by a roughness glued to the model surface. Qualitative and quantitative results on the development of the flow instability are obtained.     

Multiple laminar-turbulent transition cycles around a swept leading edge

Certain interesting flow features involving multiple transition/relaminarization cycles on the leading edge of a swept wing at low speeds are reported here. The wing geometry tested had a circular nose and a leading edge sweep of 60°. Tests were made at a chord Reynolds number of 1.3 × 10⁶ with model incidence α varied in the range of 3°?18° in discrete steps. Measurements made included wing chord-wise surface pressure distributions and wall shear stress fluctuations (using hot-film gages) within about 10 % of the chord in the leading edge zone. Results at α = 16° and 18° showed that several (often incomplete) transition cycles between laminar-like and turbulent-like flows occurred. These rather surprising results are attributable chiefly to the fact that the Launder acceleration parameter K (appropriately modified for swept wings) can exceed a critical range more than once along the contour of the airfoil in the leading edge region. Each such crossing results in a relaminarization followed by direct retransition to turbulence as K drops to sufficiently low values. It is further shown that the extent of each observed transition zone (of either type) is consistent with earlier data acquired in more detailed studies of direct transition and relaminarization. Swept leading edge boundary layers therefore pose strong challenges to numerical modelling.     

Wave forerunners of streamwise structures in a swept wing boundary layer

In a model experiment wave packets (forerunners) have been detected for the first time in the flow regions preceding the fronts of streamwise structures in a swept wing boundary layer. The characteristics of the wave packets and the generating streamwise structures and the dynamics of their downstream development are investigated. It is shown that the forerunners can transform into turbulent spots thus leading to laminar-turbulent transition. Certain components of the forerunners are compared with a periodic instability wave.     

Boundary-layer receptivity to external disturbances using multiple scales

Non-homogeneous multiple scales are introduced to solve the resonant problem of non-parallel boundary-layer receptivity originating from the quadratic mixing of environmental disturbances. The resulting algorithm is computationally inexpensive and can be efficiently included in industrial codes for transition prediction. The mutual interactions between acoustic wave, vorticity wave, wall vibration and wall roughness are discussed in detail and the receptivity coefficient, which relates the amplitude of the excited wave to the amplitude of the exciting sources, is computed. The largest effect is found for the interaction between acoustic waves and wall roughness perturbations. Other coupling mechanisms are less effective. By comparing parallel and non-parallel results, it is found that flow non-parallelism can play a non-negligible role even in Blasius’ boundary layer, although the largest effects are evident for the three-dimensional boundary layer over an infinite swept wing. For the particular case of wall roughness—wall vibration mixing, the velocity disturbance is shown to be exactly equal to the velocity perturbation induced by wall roughness alone on a wall vibrating in the normal direction.     

Non-oscillating/Oscillating Shear Layer over a Large Deep Cavity at Low-Subsonic Speeds

The flow over a deep cavity at low subsonic velocity is considered in the present paper. The cavity length-to-depth aspect ratio is L/H = 0.2. Single hot-wire measurements characterized the incident turbulent boundary layer and show the influence of the cavity on the streamwise statistic components just downstream from the cavity. The streamwise mean and fluctuating velocity profiles are affected by the cavity. PIV measurements reveal the presence for ejection-like events responsible of local perturbations of the skewness and the flatness coefficients. Time-resolved PIV technic is also used to characterize phase properties of shear layer oscillating cycle. It is shown that for deep cavity with first Rossiter mode, only one vortical structure is formed at the cavity leading edge. Then, it grows while convecting downstream along the shear layer. A well-defined ejection process begins after the vortex impact near the cavity downstream corner. A cylinder device placed spanwisely near the cavity leading edge eliminates the resonance and highly modifies the behavior of the shear layer flow. In fact, the shear layer could be divided into upper and lower parts with different structure aspects.     

Propagation of perturbations upstream with interaction between a hypersonic flow and a boundary layer

It is shown that, for hypersonic flows with moderate and strong degrees of interaction, perturbations brought about, for example, by a bottom opening or by any other sort of obstacle are propagated up to the leading edge of a solid body. Local regions with very large pressure gradients cannot arise in the flow. This is connected with the possibility of the development of breakaway zones with a length on the order of magnitude of the size of the solid body, described in the first approximation by the equations of the boundary layer. From a mathematical point of view the problem comes down to establishing the nonsingular nature of the solution near the leading edge, and to finding eigensolutions which make it possible to satisfy the boundary conditions at the trailing edge of the solid body. It is shown that, with a weak interaction between the hypersonic flow and the boundary layer, there may arise short flow regions with free interaction and locally nonviscous flows with large pressure gradients, within the limits of which the perturbations may move upstream.Translated from Izvestiya Akademii Nauk SSSR, Mekhanika Zhidkosti i Gaza, No. 4, pp. 40–49, July–August, 1970.In conclusion, the author thanks V. V. Sychev for his evaluation of the problem.     

Receptivity of the boundary layer on a flat plate with a blunted leading edge to steady nonuniformity of the free stream

The flow past a flat plate with a blunted leading edge by a flow of a viscous incompressible fluid with a small spanwise-periodic, steady nonuniformity of the velocity profile is considered. Such a flow simulates the interaction of one type of vortex disturbances of a turbulent external flow with the boundary layer. The solution obtained predicts generation of strong disturbances in the boundary layer, which are similar to the streaky structure observed in the case of high free-stream turbulence. It is shown that the boundary-layer flow on blunted bodies is more sensitive to vortex disturbances than on a plate with a sharp leading edge. Central Aerohydrodynamic Institute, Zhukovskii, 140160. Translated from Prikladnaya Mekhanika i Tekhnicheskaya Fizika, Vol. 41, No. 4, pp. 93–100, July–August, 2000.