Parametric analyses on dynamic stall control of rotor airfoil via synthetic jet

The effects of synthetic jet control on unsteady dynamic stall over rotor airfoil are investigated numerically. A moving-embedded grid method and an Unsteady Reynolds Averaged Navier-Stokes (URANS) solver coupled with k-omega Shear Stress Transport (SST) turbulence model are established for predicting the complex flowfields of oscillatory airfoil under jet control. Additionally, a velocity boundary condition modeled by sinusoidal function has been developed to fulfill the perturbation effect of periodic jet. The validity of present CFD method is evaluated by comparisons of the calculated results of baseline dynamic stall case for rotor airfoil and jet control case for VR-7B airfoil with experimental data. Then, parametric analyses are conducted emphatically for an OA212 rotor airfoil to investigate the effects of jet control parameters (jet location, dimensionless frequency, momentum coefficient, jet angle, jet type and dual-jet) on dynamic stall characteristics of rotor airfoil. It is demonstrated by the calculated results that efficiency of jet control could be improved with specific momentum coefficient and jet angle when the jet is located near separation point of rotor airfoil. Furthermore, the dual-jet could improve control efficiency more obviously on dynamic stall of rotor airfoil with respect to the unique jet, and the influence laws of dual-jet's angles and momentum coefficients on control effects are similar to those of the unique jet. Finally, unsteady aerodynamic characteristics of rotor via synthetic jet which is located on the upper surface of rotor blade in forward flight are calculated, and as a result, the aerodynamic characteristics of rotor are improved compared with the baseline. The results indicate that synthetic jet has the capability in improving aerodynamic characteristics of rotor. (C) 2017 Production and hosting by Elsevier Ltd. on behalf of Chinese Society of Aeronautics and Astronautics.