NUMERICAL SIMULATION OF TURBULENT FLOW OVER THE FUSELAGE OF

A SMALL-SIZED HIGH-SPEED AIRCRAFT

By

BATCH NUMBER : B17

AADITHYA R. 1AM15ME002
ADITHYA BHARADWAJ 1AM15ME008
AMOGH KARANTH 1AM15ME021
ASHISH V. GAD 1AM15ME029

Under the Guidance of:

Mr. SHAIK NASSER
Associate Professor

Date: 22/11/2018 (Thursday)

 ABSTRACT
• Turbulent flow over the fuselage of a small-sized high speed aircraft is to be investigated for
analysis of the drag and lift characteristics of the aircraft.
• The commercially available Fluent-Gambit software will be used for the investigation.
• The numerical results obtained will be studied to understand the design of the aircraft. Any
inconsistencies discovered in the design will be subjected to analysis resulting in corrective
measures.
• Pre-processing of the model will be done in GAMBIT software.
• Fluid flow simulations are obtained with FLUENT software.
• Creation of a finite computational domain, segmentation of this domain into discrete intervals,
applying boundary condition are a challenge.
 PROBLEM IDENTIFICATION
• The geometry of a flying object is one of the important factors deciding the lift and drag properties of the flying body.

Investigation of the high-speed flow behavior is possible these days with the help of available flow simulators.

• Such an investigation will prove to be fruitful in a number of ways.

• Acquisition of the skill to use flow solvers to investigate, design of industrial products such as bodies immersed in fluids

etc.

• Study of turbulent flow around small high speed aircraft.

• Comparison of computational results with measurement data and with the stated capabilities of the machine.

• Simulating turbulent flow over the aircraft fuselage.

• Use of non-commercial software for simulation.

 OBJECTIVE OF THE PROJECT WORK
• The main objective of the present work is to study the effect of an external flow over a supersonic
fighter aircraft.
• This project also highlights the use of CFD techniques involved for the purpose of fluid flow
simulation of the aircraft especially performing the meshing techniques, pre and post processing
techniques and finally the evaluation of the simulation.
• The ability to use different flow solvers for different processes in the industry.
• Solution optimization.
 INTRODUCTION
• CFD is the use of applied mathematics, physics and computational
software to visualize how a gas or liquid flows and how the presence
of the object affects it.
• In this project we are concerned with the external flow (Turbulent)
over a body, i.e. fuselage of a small-sized high speed aircraft.
• The successful prediction of the performance of a new or modified
aircraft depends on the availability of an accurate estimate of the
configuration's lift and drag characteristics.
 LITERATURE SURVEY
• Srinivas G. et al.
This paper deals with Numerical simulation flows around aircraft fuselage was conducted to investigate the
aerodynamic interaction of main body and other components such as control device and tail. For this determination,
a three-dimensional in viscid flow solver has been established based on unstructured meshes. An overset mesh
technique was used to describe the relative motion between the main body and other components too. As the
application of the present method, calculations were made for the fuselage aerodynamic interaction. Comparison of
the computational results was made with measured time-averaged and instantaneous fuselage surface pressure
distributions and thrust distribution and available experimental data.
• Fabrizio Nicolosi
FUSELAGE AERODYNAMIC DRAG PREDICTION METHOD BY CFD
This report was made by an Associate Professor in University of Naples Federico II, the aim of this work is the
development of a new methodology to predict fuselage aerodynamic drag through CFD aerodynamic calculations.
The investigation has been focused on typical large turboprop fuselage geometry. The geometry has been divided into
three main components: nose, cabin, and fuselage tail. Fuselage fineness ratio, windshield angle (Ψ), and upsweep
angle (θ), have been used as independent (geometric) variables to derive the drag prediction methodology.
This paper presents new preliminary design methodologies to estimate the drag aerodynamic coefficient of transport
large turbopropeller aircraft fuselage. Method has been developed by numerical aerodynamic analyses performed
and it has been focused on the estimation of aerodynamic drag coefficients.
 METHODOLOGY
• Literature survey.

• Pre-processing and meshing in GAMBIT.

• Boundary types are to specified in GAMBIT.

• Exporting the model to FLUENT.

• Boundary conditions will be defined in the solver. Convection scheme, turbulence model, Reynolds numbers
to be specified in Fluent.

• Solution is obtained after convergence.

• Post processing.

• Solution optimization.
 CONCLUSIONS / EXPECTED OUTCOME
• The objective of the project is to test the design of an existent aircraft
model and to critically analyse the same and to propose refined design.
• CFD simulation is an important tool for investigating the flow
characteristics around the aircraft fuselage.
• This method can be useful in the preliminary design phase of an aircraft.
• CFD analysis could be employed to predict the lift and drag properties in
flight depending on the shape of the fuselage, velocity and pressure
distribution.
• In this study, the computational analysis of the flow over aircraft fuselage is
carried out to study the flow behaviour and FLUENT solver is found to be
appropriate for this analysis.
• The obtained computational results will be validated against measurement
data.
 REFERENCES
• https://www.irjet.net/archives/V4/i1/IRJET-V4I140.pdf
• https://www.ijirset.com/upload/2014/october/77_CFD.pdf
• Bhardwaj, M. K., Kapania, R. K., Reichenbach, E., Guruswamy, G. P.: Computational Fluid
Dynamics/Computational Structural Dynamics Interaction Methodology For Aircraft Wings. AIAA
Journal, Vol. 36, No. 12, 1998, p. 2179–2185.
• Tomaro,R.F.,Witzeman,F.C.,StrangW.Z.:Simulation Of Store Separation For The F/A-18c Using
Cobalt. Journal of Aircraft, Vol. 37, No. 3, 2000, p. 361–367.
• Prewitt, N. C., Belk, D. M., Maple, R. C.: Multiple-Body Trajectory Calculations Using the Beggar
Code. Journal of Aircraft, Vol. 36, No. 5, 1999, p. 802–808.
• Brock, J. M. Jr, Jolly B. A.: Application of Computational Fluid Dynamics at Elgin
AirForceBase.SAE985500,1988.
• Shanker, V., Malmuth, N.: Computational And Simplified Analytical Treatment Of Transonic
Wing/Fuselage/Pylon/Store Interaction. Journal of Aircraft, Vol. 18, No. 8, 1981, p. 631–637.
ANY QUESTIONS?
THANK YOU