A Numerical and Experimental Study of an Airfoil in a Transonic Wind Tunnel

Transonic wind tunnels are sophisticated tools for the investigation of flows with Mach numbers of order one. The most characteristic feature of a facility such as this is, for sure, the openings in the walls of the test section. The openings in the walls permit the proper relief effect, and this, on the other hand, makes possible the experimentation at the transonic range. The results to be presented in this paper represent the start of a program to develop a kind of “check list” of the many aspects of the PTT, the Brazilian pilot transonic wind tunnel. To this end we have installed a NACA 0012 profile in the tunnel. The pressure distributions were investigated for Mach numbers in the range 0.6 - 0.8 and angles of attack from 0⁰ up to 8⁰. Besides, the flow about the airfoil inside the tunnel was simulated numerically considering the walls with and without slots. The experimental and numerical results are finally compared and checked also against literature data.