Investigating 3-D Flow Characteristics of Wind Turbine Airfoils using Delayed Detached Eddy Simulations at High Reynolds Numbers

Abstract

This numerical study investigates the 3-D flow field and aerodynamic characteristics of DU 00-W-212 wind turbine airfoil at high Reynolds numbers. The Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) simulations are performed at Reynolds number of 3 million at three different angles of attack for the pre-stall, stall, and post-stall conditions, by using an open source CFD solver SU2. The Delayed Detached Eddy Simulations (DDES) with the Spalart-Allmaras (SA) turbulence model and Langtry-Menter (LM) transition model are performed to address the challenge of predicting unsteady flow characteristics with transition, particularly on the suction side of the airfoil. The 3-D DDES with SA results with and without LM transition model are compared with the 2-D RANS with SA simulations and available experimental data.