Experimental Study Of Flow Around Airfoil Using Dielectric Barrier Discharge Plasma Actuator

• Main Author: Zainuddin, Farah Ayiesya
• Format: Thesis
• Language: English; English
• Published: 2019
• Subjects: T Technology (General); TA Engineering (General). Civil engineering (General)
• Online Access: http://eprints.utem.edu.my/id/eprint/24495/1/Experimental%20Study%20Of%20Flow%20Around%20Airfoil%20Using%20Dielectric%20Barrier%20Discharge%20Plasma%20Actuator.pdf; http://eprints.utem.edu.my/id/eprint/24495/2/Experimental%20Study%20Of%20Flow%20Around%20Airfoil%20Using%20Dielectric%20Barrier%20Discharge%20Plasma%20Actuator.pdf; http://eprints.utem.edu.my/id/eprint/24495/; https://plh.utem.edu.my/cgi-bin/koha/opac-detail.pl?biblionumber=116920
• Institution: Universiti Teknikal Malaysia Melaka

Dielectric barrier discharge (DBD) plasma actuator has become a popular device in the aerodynamic flow control applications. The number of application of DBD plasma actuator increases due to its special features such as no moving parts, quick response and extremely low mass. For example, plasma actuators have been applied for flow control on airfoil, flow control around circular cylinders, delaying separation on turbine blades and improving the aerodynamic performance on cars. This study deals with the enhancement of aerodynamic performance on NACA 0015 airfoil when a DBD plasma actuator is mounted near the leading edge by using steady actuation method. Flow visualization test, lift and drag force test and pressure distribution test on upper surface airfoil test were conducted to investigate the effectiveness of DBD plasma actuator. A study on a NACA 0015 is performed to improve its aerodynamic performance particularly focused on the flow distribution visualized over an airfoil body, the evaluation and correlation of lift (CL), drag (CD) and pressure coefficient (CP). The results were compared between the base case (DBD plasma actuator OFF) and actuation case (DBD plasma actuator ON). Experimental works were performed in the wind tunnel test section at Reynolds number (Re) approximately 0.63 × 105 to 2.52 × 105 with external airflow 5 m/s for flow visualization test while 15 m/s and 20 m/s for lift and drag force test. The DBD plasma actuator was installed on NACA 0015 airfoil with 190 mm chord length and 260 mm span length at x/c = 0.025, where x is the vertical distance measured from leading edge and c was the chord length. The DBD plasma actuator consists of two copper tape electrodes with 10 mm width and 50 μm thick that arranged parallel with 1 mm overlap. For the dielectric material, a Kapton film with 100 μm thickness was attached between these electrodes. A high voltage AC current was used where the output of the circuit can reach up until 6 kV with frequency 16 kHz. The result showed that actuation case was able to increase the aerodynamic performance of an airfoil by increasing lift coefficient about 22 % for 15 m/s and 49 % for 20 m/s, reducing the drag coefficient about 19 % for 15 m/s and 49 % for 20 m/s and recovering the pressure distribution about 1 %. These results were supported by flow visualization result which conducted at angles of attack α = 15° to α = 18°. These angles of attack are the important phases for airfoil during stall control condition (α = 15°), stall point (α = 16°) and high angle of attack (α = 17° and 18°). It is noticed that the actuation case results avoids a massive flow detachment from leading edge by producing strong vortices from plasma generation. The strong vortices flow near the airfoil surface and as a result, the CL for actuation case may increase. Therefore, the DBD plasma actuator became a better device to replace other mechanical devices especially in aeronautical field.