Numerical simulation with low artificial dissipation of transitional flow over a delta wing

Abstract

A low-dissipation simulation method is used to perform simulations of transitional aerodynamic flow over a delta wing. For an accurate simulation of such a flow, numerical conservation of important physical quantities is desirable. In particular, the discretization of the convective terms of the Navier–Stokes equations should not spuriously generate or dissipate kinetic energy, because this can interfere with the transition to turbulent flow. Conservation of discrete kinetic energy by the discretized convective terms can be achieved by writing the Navier–Stokes equations in square-root variables, which results in a skew-symmetric convective term. In the paper, simulations with such a low-dissipation method are presented at chord Reynolds numbers around 200,000. The results show good agreement with experimental measurements.