Due to its layout, there are difficulties in realizing heading attitude control of a flying-wing unmanned aerial vehicle. In this paper, a reverse jet control scheme has been designed: (1) to replace the resistance rudders that are used for the yaw control of a conventional flying-wing unmanned aerial vehicle, (2) to assist and optimize heading attitude control, eliminate the adverse effects of the control surface and enhance stealth performance, and (3) to promote the use of rudderless flight for flying-wing unmanned aerial vehicles. To explore the control mechanism and the flow field of the reverse jet scheme, three-dimensional numerical simulations and low-speed wind tunnel experiments were carried out. First, the numerical simulations evaluated the feasibility and effectiveness of the reverse jet control scheme and explored and optimized the excitation parameters for the scheme. Then the forces were measured in a wind tunnel, and particle image velocimetry experiments were carried out. A reverse jet actuator was independently designed to verify the results of the numerical simulation. The results show that when the reverse jet excitation is applied, the jet obstructs the mainstream, destroys the flow field at the excitation position, and causes early separation of the flow, which increases the pressure drag on the wings and produces a control effect. The control effect mainly depends on the separation degree of the leeward surface. The larger the jet momentum coefficient is, the smaller the jet angle is, and the closer the excitation position is to the leading edge, the greater the separation degree of the leeward surface is, the better the heading attitude control effect is.
This study investigates the characteristics of the shedding vortex around the Coanda surface and its impacts on the circulation control (CC) performance. Delay detach-eddy simulation based on the two-equation k-ω shear stress transport (SST) turbulence model performed to solve the flow field. The simulation results show that near the Coanda trailing edge, large vortices periodically shed from the lip above the jet slot and the shedding vortex is surrounded by a series of strip vortices during its downstream movement. The shedding vortex transfers the disturbance to the jet boundary layer and affects the near-wall velocity. Dynamic mode decomposition shows that the shedding vortex and its high-order harmonic flow structures attenuate very slowly and dominate the flow field. The mode with a sub-harmonic frequency of the shedding vortex displays the strip vortices dragged out by the shedding vortex. A larger shedding vortex can intensify the mixing of the jet shear and boundary layers, making the jet velocity decay faster. The size of the shedding vortex can be reduced by decreasing the lip height, thus slowing down the attenuation of the jet velocity and improving the CC performance.
The transient flow structures produced by a pulsed nanosecond plasma actuator and the mechanism by which they are generated are investigated experimentally and through simulations for the case of flow control on a non-slender delta wing. Phase-locked particle image velocimetry reveals a phenomenon in which, after each discharge pulse, two sub-vortices are generated in sequence and move along the shear layer regardless of the angle of attack, and this is confirmed by hot-wire anemometry. However, at high actuation frequencies ( F+ = fc/ U∞ {greater than or equal to} 6.435), this phenomenon of double sub-vortices is not observed, and only one sub-vortex is generated per period. The results of pressure measurements indicate that each sub-vortex gives rise to a distinct pressure fluctuation on the wing surface. Numerical simulations reveal a number of residual heats resulting from plasma thermal effects in the shear layer, each of which turns out to induce a corresponding sub-vortex. At low actuation frequencies ( F+ {less than or equal to} 4.29), there is a division of the initial residual heat into two independent residual heats and hence double sub-vortices per period, whereas at high actuation frequencies ( F+ {greater than or equal to} 6.435), residual heats from two consecutive periods merge into one, resulting in just one sub-vortex per period, which provides an explanation for the experimentally observed flow behavior.
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