Prediction of dynamic stall onset for oscillatory low-speed airfoils

This research presents some common features of oscillatory airfoils, and the method for indicating dynamic stall onset for the unsteady process. Under deep stall conditions, the stall-onset angle in oscillation is independent of the mean angle of the oscillatory motion, and by combining the reduced frequency and the amplitude of the oscillatory motion, the equivalent reduced pitch rate is an analog of this motion to the constant reduced pitch rate of the ramp-up motion. By correlating with the measured data, and with the ramp-up results, the equivalent reduced pitch rate can be defined as a representation for the oscillatory motion. Accordingly, the triple-parameter problem of an oscillation (mean angle, reduced frequency, and amplitude) degrades into the single-parameter problem (equivalent reduced pitch rate). Based on these foundations, an extension of the stall-onset criterion is then made for oscillatory airfoils: a method of extracting the stall-onset parameters directly from oscillatory test data, and an indication of stall onset for the oscillatory airfoils. The results from the new proposed method have shown the consistency with the data of Glasgow University and the public data.