Experimental Studies on Transitional and Closed Cavity Configurations Including Flow Control

An experimental study was conducted to show transitional and closed cavity configurations including flow control. The experiments took place in the Plint TE25/A Supersonic wind tunnel. The supersonic cavity models are four cubic models designed to fit to the access window of the tunnel with diameter 128 mm. The L=D ratios chosen to cover transitional and closed cavity flows are 11 and 18. There are 33 static-pressure tappings; 17 of them are located inside the cavity and 16 outside the cavity on the circular plate. Average pressures inside and around the cavities were obtained through the aid of SenSym part number ASDX015 pressure transducers with a range 0-15 psi. Oil flow technique was employed to visualize the surface flow inside and around the cavity, using a mixture of titanium dioxide with linseed oil and silicon. The study showed that transitional and closed cavity flows are highly dependent on the Mach number and the L=D ratio. For the transitional cavity case L/D = 11, the wedges did not affect the flowfield as much as for the closed cavity case.