Effects of Synthetic Jets on Swirl Inflow in a Variable- Geometry Twin Air-Intake

Abstract

Air intakes are an integral part of contemporary passenger and military aircraft engines. Their impact on aerodynamic performance across the entire flight envelope is critical to aircraft flight safety, efficiency, and maneuverability, especially at high Mach numbers due to shock waves. The high demand for reduction in aircraft weight and size and enhancement of durability, comfort, and thermal and radar signatures compels researchers and engineers to explore new designs and develop efficient air intakes for high-performance aircraft engines. Although a number of studies on air intake have been conducted and reported in the open literature, there is little information available in the public domain on bifurcated twin air intakes using synthetic jet. As a result, the primary goal of this research is to use high-fidelity computational fluid dynamics modelling to investigate the effects of synthetic jets on swirl inflow variable geometry twin air intake aerodynamic performance over a range of Reynolds numbers. Some important parameters (distortion coefficient, non-uniformity index, swirl coefficient, and static and total pressure coefficients) were investigated. Both static and total pressure recovery have been increased at all swirl numbers. A significant decrease in distortion coefficient and swirl coefficient has also been achieved, reaching 67% in both cases. The reduction in the non-uniformity index is achieved by 62% for the controlled flow case. The findings show that the synthetic jets are effective in controlling the flow separation in the twin air-intakes and enhancing aerodynamic performance.