Tracking of raindrops in flow over an airfoilThe splashback that occurs when raindrops impact an airfoil results in an 'ejecta fog' of small droplets around the leading edge. Acceleration of these droplets by the air flow field is a momentum sink for the air flow and has been hypothesized to contribute to the degradation of airfoil performance in heavy rain. Presented here is a one-way coupled Eulerian-Lagrangian particle tracking scheme to evaluate droplet number densities and momentum sink terms around a NACA 64-210 airfoil section for three rainfall rates. A laminar air flow field is determined with a standard CFD code and input to the particle tracking algorithm. Raindrops are assumed to be non-interacting, non-deforming, non-evaporating, and non-spinning spheres and are tracked through the curvilinear grid used by the air flow code. A simple model is used to simulate impacts and the resulting splashback on the airfoil surface.
Document ID
19930038605
Acquisition Source
Legacy CDMS
Document Type
Conference Paper
Authors
Valentine, James R. (NASA Langley Research Center Hampton, VA, United States)
Decker, Rand (Utah Univ. Salt Lake City, United States)
Date Acquired
August 16, 2013
Publication Date
January 1, 1993
Subject Category
Aerodynamics
Report/Patent Number
AIAA PAPER 93-0168
Meeting Information
Meeting: AIAA, Aerospace Sciences Meeting and Exhibit