Purpose This paper aims to investigate numerical solution of transonic flow around NACA0012 airfoil under sinusoidal pitch oscillation. Accordingly, effects of the amplitude and frequency of oscillations on aerodynamic coefficients are evaluated and the efficiency of the turbulent models, K-ω shear-stress transport (SST), scale adaptive simulation (SAS) and delayed detached eddy simulation (DDES), in simulation of the nonlinear phenomena – i.e. the interaction between shock and boundary layer and the shock oscillations – is studied. Design/methodology/approach K-ω SST, SAS and DDES models are used as turbulence approaches. The numerical results are compared with available experimental and numerical information. Findings According to the results inside the buffet boundaries, the DDES turbulent model expresses results that are more appropriate; however, SAS and SST models are not efficient enough in evaluating the characteristics of nonlinear flow. Originality/value In this research study, hybrid RANS-LES turbulence model is engaged to simulate transonic flow around pitching NACA0012 airfoil, and results are compared to the SAS and Reynolds Average Navier–Stocks simulations as well as available numerical and experimental data. In addition, effects of the amplitude and frequency of oscillations on aerodynamic coefficients are evaluated in buffet regions.

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Purpose In this paper, the applicability of shear stress transport k-ω model along with the intermittency concept has been investigated over pitching airfoils to capture the laminar separation bubble (LSB) position and the boundary layer transition movement. The effect of reduced frequency of oscillations on boundary layer response is also examined. Design/methodology/approach A two-dimensional computational fluid dynamic code was developed to compute the effects of unsteadiness on LSB formation, transition point movement, pressure distribution and lift force over an oscillating airfoil using transport equation of intermittency accompanied by the k-ω model. Findings The results indicate that increasing the angle of attack over the stationary airfoil causes the LSB size to shorten, leading to a rise in wall shear stress and pressure suction peak. In unsteady cases, both three- and four-equation models are capable of capturing the experimentally measured transition point well. The transition is delayed for an unsteady boundary layer in comparison with that for a static airfoil at the same angle of attack. Increasing the unsteadiness of flow, i.e. reduced frequency, moves the transition point toward the trailing edge of the airfoil. This increment also results in lower static pressure suction peak and hence lower lift produced by the airfoil. It was also found that the fully turbulent k-ω shear–stress transport (SST) model cannot capture the so-called figure-of-eight region in lift coefficient and the employment of intermittency transport equation is essential. Practical implications Boundary layer transition and unsteady flow characteristics owing to airfoil motion are both important for many engineering applications including micro air vehicles as well as helicopter blade, wind turbine and aircraft maneuvers. In this paper, the accuracy of transition modeling based on intermittency transport concept and the response of boundary layer to unsteadiness are investigated. Originality/value As a conclusion, the contribution of this paper is to assess the ability of intermittency transport models to predict LSB and transition point movements, static pressure distribution and aerodynamic lift variations and boundary layer flow pattern over dynamic pitching airfoils with regard to oscillation frequency effects for engineering problems.

To consider stall flutter in the design procedure of a blade, accurate models of flow loading are needed. This paper first presents a numerical simulation of an airfoil undergoing a deep dynamic stall employing a computational fluid dynamics code. Overset and polyhedral grid techniques are adopted to accurately simulate the flow field at high angles of attack. Having validated the simulation, the occurrence of stall flutter over a pitching airfoil with an increase in amplitude and frequency of oscillations is examined. The results express that the amplitude of the lift and pitching moment depends on the amplitude of the forced oscillation and there are higher harmonics of the pitching moment compared to the forced oscillation frequency content, both indicating the nonlinearity of aerodynamic lift and pitching moment. Subsequently, a nonlinear reduced model of the dynamic stall is derived using a fuzzy inference system (FIS) and the adaptive network-based FIS (ANFIS). Due to the unsatisfactory results of modeling, especially at post-stall angles of attack, the Gram–Schmidt orthogonalization technique is used to construct a more complex structure of the input variables. The new higher-order input variables have been re-employed by FIS and ANFIS. The results show that excellent modeling is achieved by ANFIS between the new structure of the inputs and the corresponding aerodynamic coefficients using only 10% of input–output data. Having found an appropriate relation, the proposed reduced-order model could properly predict the aerodynamic response of the pitching airfoil at two reduced frequencies.

Supercritical airfoils have an unknown behavior at incompressible flow regime and Reynolds numbers lower than those related to their design point at transonic condition. In this work, boundary layer transition is studied over a supercritical airfoil by means of hot-film and pressure measurements completed with numerical simulations. The experiments are performed at chord-based Reynolds number of [Formula: see text]and Mach number of [Formula: see text] at different angles of attack. Hot-film measurement over the upper surface of the supercritical airfoil is carried out and the transition points are computed using the standard deviation of the signals. The upper surface pressure is also recorded and a peak in its second derivative is presented as the transition point generated by the laminar separation bubble mechanism. Moreover, an appropriate time-frequency analysis is applied to the hot-film signals to get an insight into the spectral content and development of the transitional boundary layer structures. On the other hand, two numerical codes are employed and the transition points obtained from numerical simulations are compared with the experimental outcomes. Results express a rapid change of the bubble position over the upper surface, as the angle of attack is increased to the value of [Formula: see text]. Laminar separation bubble is observed in the surface pressure distribution data and is well identified using its second derivative along the streamwise direction. The spectral characteristics of the boundary layer are satisfactorily explored including the streamwise fluctuations within the laminar flow, intermittent behavior of the transitional zone and the wide range of the spectrum in turbulent flow, thanks to the time-frequency analysis. A promising agreement is observed between the transition points computed by both the numerical and experimental studies and confirms the accuracy of findings achieved by the second derivative of surface pressure data, hot-film measurements and the reliability of the employed numerical transition models for optimization studies.