Wake deceleration of a racecar multielement airfoil in ground effect

Bansal, Suraj

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https://hdl.handle.net/2142/99135 Copy

Description

Title

Wake deceleration of a racecar multielement airfoil in ground effect

Author(s)

Bansal, Suraj

Issue Date

2017-07-20

Director of Research (if dissertation) or Advisor (if thesis)

Selig, Michael

Department of Study

Aerospace Engineering

Discipline

Aerospace Engineering

Degree Granting Institution

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Degree Name

M.S.

Degree Level

Thesis

Keyword(s)

• Aerodynamics
• Multielement
• Airfoil
• Racecars
• Motorsports
• Computational fluid dynamics (CFD)
• Wake bursting
• Wake deceleration
• Ground effect

Abstract

The importance of aerodynamic downforce in competitive motorsports has been well established. Much of this aerodynamic downforce is produced from the inverted multielement wings at the front and the rear of the car. While such a high-lift system is capable of producing high downforce as a result of the interaction between flows around adjacent elements, there may exist off-the-surface flow reversal, commonly known as wake bursting, causing an adverse effect on the downforce generated. Since the phenomenon of off-the-surface flow reversal occurs as a result of retardation of a wake under adverse pressure gradients, wake bursting is also referred to as wake deceleration in this study. A steady-state two-dimensional CFD analysis of a racecar multielement airfoil was carried out to study wake deceleration characteristics in ground effect. Simulations were performed using ANSYS Fluent, which is a finite-volume method (FVM) based commercial hybrid-grid Reynolds-averaged Navier-Stokes (RANS) equations solver. Computational results were obtained using a two equation shear stress transport (SST) k–omega model coupled with a one equation intermittency transition model to predict the laminar-to-turbulent boundary layer transition. The simulations were performed for an inverted two-element airfoil consisting of a main element and a flap for a fixed Reynolds number of Re = 1.1 x 10^6. The effects of ground clearance height on the main element decelerated wake were analyzed. The effects of varying flap ratio, flap deflection, angle of attack, and gap sizes on the wake deceleration patterns have been investigated. It was found that decreasing the ground clearance led to a significant increase in the amount of the main element wake bursting. Increased wake bursting at higher angles of attack was found to have caused a drop in downforce without any surface-flow separation. Although the main element wake was strongly affected while varying each of these parameters, the size of the flap wake was not affected significantly.

Graduation Semester

2017-08

Type of Resource

text

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http://hdl.handle.net/2142/99135

Copyright and License Information

Copyright 2017 Suraj Bansal

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