Ensuring safe descend of reusable rocket stages – Numerical simulation and experiments on subsonic turbulent air flow around a semi-circular cylinder at zero angle of attack and moderate Reynolds number

Abstract Two-dimensional flow around semi-circular cylinder at zero angle of attack and at Re = 50000 during the self-oscillatory regime has been extensively studied within the URANS method with the use of different-structure grids (multiblock, structured overlapping, unstructured composite), the SST turbulence model and its versions (1993) and (2003) considering the streamline curvature influence modified within the Rodi–Leschziner–Isaev approach and numerical different-approximation methods realized in two codes (VP2/3, Fluent). Experiments have been made on flow around a semi-circular cylinder in the wind tunnel of the Lomonosov Moscow State University, Institute of Mechanics to obtain data for verification of numerical predictions. The double-mode character of a periodic time history of a drag force caused by a periodically forming and disappearing jet flap and acting upon a body is explained. With increasing compressibility at a Mach number ranging from 0 to 0.5, it is observed that periodic flow around the semi-circular cylinder is restructured, and the time history of the drag force acting upon it is described by a dependence close to a sinusoidal one. It is found that, as the Mach number is increased, pressure field distortions in the form of concentric cylindrical waves propagating from the semi-circular cylinder and the vortex street behind it grow over the infrasonic range.

[1]  C. Rhie,et al.  A numerical study of the turbulent flow past an isolated airfoil with trailing edge separation , 1982 .

[2]  S. A. Isaev,et al.  Modeling the increase in aerodynamic efficiency for a thick (37.5% chord) airfoil with slot suction in vortex cells with allowance for the compressibility effect , 2015 .

[3]  B. Launder,et al.  The numerical computation of turbulent flows , 1990 .

[4]  Kemal Hanjalic,et al.  Modelling Turbulence in Engineering and the Environment: Second-Moment Routes to Closure , 2011 .

[5]  Yao Zheng,et al.  A novel approach of three-dimensional hybrid grid methodology: Part 1. Grid generation , 2003 .

[6]  Nickolay Smirnov,et al.  Supercomputer predictive modeling for ensuring space flight safety , 2015 .

[7]  P. Spalart,et al.  On the sensitization of turbulence models to rotation and curvature , 1997 .

[8]  C. Rhie,et al.  Numerical Study of the Turbulent Flow Past an Airfoil with Trailing Edge Separation , 1983 .

[9]  J. P. V. Doormaal,et al.  ENHANCEMENTS OF THE SIMPLE METHOD FOR PREDICTING INCOMPRESSIBLE FLUID FLOWS , 1984 .

[10]  Yousef Saad,et al.  Iterative methods for sparse linear systems , 2003 .

[11]  Katsumi Aoki,et al.  Flow Characteristics around a Circular Cylinder with Grooves. , 1998 .

[12]  Joel H. Ferziger,et al.  Computational methods for fluid dynamics , 1996 .

[13]  S. A. Isaev,et al.  Verification of the Shear-Stress Transfer Model and its Modifications in the Calculation of a Turbulent Flow Around a Semicircular Airfoil with a Zero Angle of Attack , 2016 .

[14]  S. V. Guvernyuk,et al.  SIMULATION OF PERIODIC VORTICAL STRUCTURES IN THE AIRFOIL WAKE , 2014 .

[15]  S. A. Isaev,et al.  Comparative analysis of the calculation data on an unsteady flow around a circular cylinder obtained using the VP2/3 and fluent packages and the Spalart-Allmaras and Menter turbulence models , 2005 .

[16]  B. Launder,et al.  THE NUMERICAL COMPUTATION OF TURBULENT FLOW , 1974 .

[17]  B. V. Leer,et al.  Towards the ultimate conservative difference scheme V. A second-order sequel to Godunov's method , 1979 .

[18]  S. A. Isaev,et al.  Simulation of the Turbulent air Flow Over a Circular Cavity with a Variable Opening Angle in an U-Shaped Channel , 2015 .

[19]  S. A. Isaev,et al.  Numerical Modeling of a Turbulent Incompressible Viscous Flow Along Bodies of a Curvilinear Shape in the Presence of a Mobile Shield , 1998 .

[20]  S. A. Isaev,et al.  Analysis of errors of multiblock computational technologies by the example of calculating a circulation flow in a square cavity with a moving cover at Re = 103 , 2013 .

[21]  S. A. Isaev,et al.  Numerical study of the bleeding effect on the aerodynamic characteristics of a circular cylinder , 2002 .

[22]  Hrvoje Jasak,et al.  Error analysis and estimation for the finite volume method with applications to fluid flows , 1996 .

[23]  B. P. Leonard,et al.  A stable and accurate convective modelling procedure based on quadratic upstream interpolation , 1990 .

[24]  S. A. Isaev,et al.  Controlling the Turbulent Flow Past a Thick Airfoil by Means of Flow Enhancement in Vortex Cells Using Suction from Central Body Surfaces , 2003 .

[25]  T. Igarashi.  Flow Characteristics around a Circular Cylinder with a Slit : 1st Report, Flow Control and Flow Patterns , 1977 .

[26]  Florian R. Menter,et al.  Sensitization of the SST Turbulence Model to Rotation and Curvature by Applying the Spalart–Shur Correction Term , 2009 .

[27]  Florian Menter,et al.  The SST Turbulence Model with Improved Wall Treatment for Heat Transfer Predictions in Gas Turbines , 2003 .

[28]  T. Taylor,et al.  Computational methods for fluid flow , 1982 .

[29]  Wolfgang Rodi,et al.  Calculation of Annular and Twin Parallel Jets Using Various Discretization Schemes and Turbulence-Model Variations , 1981 .

[30]  Meng-Sing Liou,et al.  Advance in overset grid schemes - From Chimera to DRAGON grids , 1995 .

[31]  S. A. Isaev,et al.  Correction of the Shear-Stress-Transfer Model with Account of the Curvature of Streamlines in Calculating Separated Flows of an Incompressible Viscous Fluid , 2014 .

[32]  A. Roshko.  Experiments on the flow past a circular cylinder at very high Reynolds number , 1961, Journal of Fluid Mechanics.

[33]  S. Hoerner.  Fluid-Dynamic Lift , 1985 .

[34]  S. A. Isaev,et al.  Analysis of extremal lift behavior of a semicircular airfoil in a turbulent airflow at a near-zero angle of attack , 2015 .