Effects of RANS Turbulence Models on Aerodynamics of Slender-Bodied Launch Vehicles with Protuberance

• Published in: International journal of aeronautical and space sciences Vol. 23; no. 4; pp. 670 - 679
• Main Authors: Tsutsui, Fumiya, Kitamura, Keiichi, Nonaka, Satoshi
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Seoul The Korean Society for Aeronautical & Space Sciences (KSAS) 01.09.2022; 한국항공우주학회
• Subjects: Aerospace Technology and Astronautics; Engineering; Fluid- and Aerodynamics; Original Paper; 항공우주공학; Supersonic flow; Turbulent flow; Numerical analysis; Vortex
• DOI: 10.1007/s42405-022-00482-3
• ISSN: 2093-274X

A slender-bodied vehicle with asymmetrically arranged protuberance generates strong side force due to asymmetric vortices, even at a low angle-of-attack. We investigated effects of the well-known RANS turbulence models [SA-R ( C rot  = 0.0, 1.0, and 2.0), SST, and SST-2003] by comparing the numerically obtained side force values on supersonic slender-body, along with the flow structure. As a result, all the SA-R models showed good agreement with the experiment regardless of the C rot (which controls the degree of modification from the original SA model), although a separation point on the protuberance side slightly changed depending on the C rot value. On the other hand, as for the SST models, when the vorticity was used to evaluate eddy viscosity (original SST) the side force exhibit 44% deviation from the experiment, whereas SST-2003, in which the strain rate was employed instead, significantly reduced the discrepancy to 0.7%.