Aeronautical Engineering

A low-speed wind tunnel can be used to study the aerodynamics of a DC-6B model aircraft. It helps measure how the airplane performs and how stable it is in flight. This type of testing is useful for understanding aircraft behavior under controlled airflow.

The model used here has a removable tail and a 6-component external aerodynamic force balance. That setup lets researchers measure lift coefficient (CL), drag coefficient (CD), pitching moment coefficient (CM), and yaw moment coefficient...

Propellers are twisted airfoils used to move aircraft and watercraft. The chord angle changes along the radial station of the propeller, which affects how the blade pushes air. Because propellers are important in propulsion systems, engineers study them to help design high-performance vehicles.

A key propeller feature is pitch, or twist. Pitch is usually measured as a length and describes the theoretical distance a propeller would move through the air in one full revolution. In real...

A Clark Y-14 airfoil is used to measure pressure distribution and estimate lift. An airfoil is a 2-dimensional wing section that helps show key wing performance features. In this demonstration, the pressure distribution around the airfoil is measured with a wind tunnel.

Pressure distribution is closely related to the lift generated by an airfoil. The Clark Y-14 model used here has a thickness of 14% and a flat lower surface from 30% of the chord length to the back. The model also includes 19...

The Clark Y-14 wing shows how flaps and slats can change airplane lift during takeoff and landing. A wing is the main part of an airplane that generates lift, and high-lift devices help improve its performance when extra lift is needed.

Flaps are located on the trailing edge of the wing. Slats are located on the leading edge. In this experiment, both devices are added to a Clark Y-14 wing so their aerodynamic effects can be studied in a wind tunnel.

The wind tunnel creates set airspeeds for...

Wind tunnel turbulence can be measured with a smooth sphere as a test model. Wind tunnel tests help engineers design vehicles and structures that will face airflow during use. The air flows are applied in a controlled way, and the model is usually a smaller version of the full-sized object.

For low-speed wind tunnel tests, the flow around the model must match the flow around the real object as closely as possible. This is called dynamic similarity, and it depends on the Reynolds number. The...

Cylinder flow in a wind tunnel shows how pressure changes around a circular object and how those changes relate to drag. The lesson focuses on cross cylindrical flow, where air moves across a cylinder and the pressure on its surface is measured. It also compares real fluid behavior with the simpler results predicted by ideal inviscid potential flow theory.

For an ideal fluid, the pressure around a cylinder is vertically symmetric. The pressure upstream and downstream of the cylinder is also...

Nozzle flow changes as the nozzle cross-section changes. A nozzle can accelerate or slow a fluid by shaping the flow path. In aerospace propulsion, nozzles are widely used to help produce thrust.

In rockets, propellant leaves the chamber and passes through a nozzle. The nozzle speeds up the propellant and creates a reaction force that moves the system forward. In jet engines, a nozzle converts energy from a high-pressure source into kinetic energy in the exhaust.

The flow in a nozzle is...

Schlieren imaging is used to show shock waves and compression waves in supersonic flow. It helps make air motion visible when the flow becomes compressible. In this demonstration, a Mach 2.0 flow over a cone is examined with a Schlieren system.

Military jet fighters and projectiles can travel faster than the speed of sound. The speed of sound is the rate at which a sound wave moves through a medium, and it is 343 m/s. Mach number compares an object’s speed to the speed of sound. An object at...

Delta wing vortex flow can be studied with a water tunnel and dye visualization. A delta wing is a common wing shape for high-speed airplanes because it performs well in transonic and supersonic flight. It has a small aspect ratio, which means the wing span is short compared with the average chord, and a high sweep angle. These features help reduce drag at high subsonic, transonic, and supersonic speeds.

A delta wing also has a high stall angle. Stall happens later than it does for a high...

Supersonic surface flow patterns can be studied with dye flow visualization. This method uses dye on the surface of a body to show how gas moves across it. The resulting streakline patterns help reveal flow paths and surface behavior.

Flow visualization is a key tool in aerodynamics research. It helps researchers study flow structure and check ideas about fluid motion. Visualization methods are often grouped into off-the-surface and surface flow techniques.

Off-the-surface methods look at the...

A Pitot-static tube measures airspeed by comparing air pressure differences. It is widely used to find unknown speeds in airflow, including airplane airspeed.

The method relies on Bernoulli's principle, which links changes in pressure to changes in airflow speed. The tube senses stagnation pressure and static pressure. Stagnation pressure is the pressure where the air is brought to rest, and static pressure is the pressure of the moving air around it.

The tube connects to a manometer or a...

A turbulent boundary layer forms near a solid surface when fluid flow becomes irregular and mixed. In this region, viscous effects and viscous shear stress dominate because friction between the fluid and the surface slows the flow. Outside the boundary layer, the flow is inviscid, which means friction, thermal conduction, and mass diffusion do not create dissipative effects.

The boundary layer idea, first introduced by Ludwig Prandtl in 1904, helps simplify the Navier-Stokes equation for flow...

Pitot-static pressure measurement calibration uses a wind tunnel, a manometer, and a pressure transducer to link flow pressure to an electrical signal. Fluid pressure is an important flow property for understanding the aerodynamics of a system. In this setup, a pitot-static probe measures stagnation and static pressure during subsonic flow.

A U-tube manometer is one of the oldest pressure measurement systems still used today. It is a U-shaped glass tube partly filled with liquid. Because it...

Autopilot flight control depends on onboard sensors that measure an aircraft’s orientation, angular velocity, and airspeed. These measurements let the system stabilize the aircraft and help it follow a flight plan from takeoff through landing.

The same kind of sensor data is used in many aircraft, including large fixed-wing transport planes and small multirotor helicopters such as quadcopters with four thruster units. When inertial position and velocity are captured with a sensor such as the...

Hexacopter thrust testing shows how a six-rotor drone produces lift and drag. Multicopters are popular for hobby and commercial use. They are commonly built as quadcopters, hexacopters, or octocopters, depending on whether they use four, six, or eight thrusters.

This study uses a small modular hexacopter platform with propulsion unit redundancy. Redundancy means the vehicle has backup capability if one motor fails. The team first measured static motor thrust with a dynamometer while changing...