An Aerodynamic Model for Vane-Type Vortex Generators

A new, physics-based model is presented for flows around vortex generators. The model uses a modified lifting-line method with added physics to account for boundary layer flow. The lifting-line method is extended to also include a vortex lift component and these two components are used to calculate the strength of a vortex shed from an isolated vortex generator. The circulation model is developed further to be used within a CFD framework in a source term approach. Validation is presented, first for the circulation model against a suite of experimental tests for isolated vortex generators where the vortex strength is measured. Excellent agreement is shown that is of the order of the experimental error; 5%. Second, the source term model is validated on a at plate mounted vortex generator problem, and compared to fully-gridded simulations and the commonly used Bender-Anderson-Yagel model. Again, the new method shows excellent agreement, matching well the circulation decay and velocities downstream of the VG.