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Campbell, Richard L.

Publications and source records attributed to Campbell, Richard L..

At least 55 records · Page 3

A Method for the Constrained Design of Natural Laminar Flow Airfoils

A fully automated iterative design method has been developed by which an airfoil with a substantial amount of natural laminar flow can be designed, while maintaining other aerodynamic and geometric constraints. Drag reductions have been realized using the design method over a range of Mach numbers, Reynolds numbers and airfoil thicknesses. The thrusts of the method are its ability to calculate a target N-Factor distribution that forces the flow to undergo transition at the desired location; the target-pressure-N-Factor relationship that is used to reduce the N-Factors in order to prolong transition; and its ability to design airfoils to meet lift, pitching moment, thickness and leading-edge radius constraints while also being able to meet the natural laminar flow constraint. The method uses several existing CFD codes and can design a new airfoil in only a few days using a Silicon Graphics IRIS workstation.

Green, Bradford E.↗

Application of two procedures for dual-point design of transonic airfoils

Two dual-point design procedures were developed to reduce the objective function of a baseline airfoil at two design points. The first procedure to develop a redesigned airfoil used a weighted average of the shapes of two intermediate airfoils redesigned at each of the two design points. The second procedure used a weighted average of two pressure distributions obtained from an intermediate airfoil redesigned at each of the two design points. Each procedure was used to design a new airfoil with reduced wave drag at the cruise condition without increasing the wave drag or pitching moment at the climb condition. Two cycles of the airfoil shape-averaging procedure successfully designed a new airfoil that reduced the objective function and satisfied the constraints. One cycle of the target (desired) pressure-averaging procedure was used to design two new airfoils that reduced the objective function and came close to satisfying the constraints.

Mineck, Raymond E.↗

Demonstration of multipoint design procedures for transonic airfoils

Two multipoint design procedures were applied to reduce the wave drag of a baseline airfoil at two design points. The first procedure iteratively averages two intermediate airfoil shapes, each one redesigned at one of the two design points, to develop an improved airfoil. The second procedure iteratively averages two pressure distributions, each one obtained from an intermediate airfoil redesigned at one of the two design points, to develop an improved airfoil. Successful application of each procedure to design an improved airfoil for design points with similar chordwise pressure distributions, shock locations, and shock strengths is demonstrated. Application of a combination of both procedures to design an improved airfoil at design points with dissimilar chordwise pressure distributions, shock locations, and shock strengths is also presented. Results from wind tunnel tests of the baseline airfoil and of the improved airfoil for the dissimilar design points verified the predicted drag improvements.

Mineck, Raymond E.↗

An approach to constrained aerodynamic design with application to airfoils

An approach was developed for incorporating flow and geometric constraints into the Direct Iterative Surface Curvature (DISC) design method. In this approach, an initial target pressure distribution is developed using a set of control points. The chordwise locations and pressure levels of these points are initially estimated either from empirical relationships and observed characteristics of pressure distributions for a given class of airfoils or by fitting the points to an existing pressure distribution. These values are then automatically adjusted during the design process to satisfy the flow and geometric constraints. The flow constraints currently available are lift, wave drag, pitching moment, pressure gradient, and local pressure levels. The geometric constraint options include maximum thickness, local thickness, leading-edge radius, and a 'glove' constraint involving inner and outer bounding surfaces. This design method was also extended to include the successive constraint release (SCR) approach to constrained minimization.

Campbell, Richard L.↗

Applications of a direct/iterative design method to complex transonic configurations

The current study explores the use of an automated direct/iterative design method for the reduction of drag in transport configurations, including configurations with engine nacelles. The method requires the user to choose a proper target-pressure distribution and then develops a corresponding airfoil section. The method can be applied to two-dimensional airfoil sections or to three-dimensional wings. The three cases that are presented show successful application of the method for reducing drag from various sources. The first two cases demonstrate the use of the method to reduce induced drag by designing to an elliptic span-load distribution and to reduce wave drag by decreasing the shock strength for a given lift. In the second case, a body-mounted nacelle is added and the method is successfully used to eliminate increases in wing drag associated with the nacelle addition by designing to an arbitrary pressure distribution as a result of the redesigning of a wing in combination with a given underwing nacelle to clean-wing, target-pressure distributions. These cases illustrate several possible uses of the method for reducing different types of drag. The magnitude of the obtainable drag reduction varies with the constraints of the problem and the configuration to be modified.

Smith, Leigh Ann↗

Experimental study of a generic high-speed civil transport

An experimental study of generic high-speed civil transport was conducted in the NASA Langley 8-ft Transonic Pressure Tunnel. The data base was obtained for the purpose of assessing the accuracy of various levels of computational analysis. Two models differing only in wingtip geometry were tested with and without flow-through nacelles. The baseline model has a curved or crescent wingtip shape, while the second model has a more conventional straight wingtip shape. The study was conducted at Mach numbers from 0.30 to 1.19. Force data were obtained on both the straight wingtip model and the curved wingtip model. Only the curved wingtip model was instrumented for measuring pressures. Selected longitudinal, lateral, and directional data are presented for both models. Selected pressure distributions for the curved wingtip model are also presented.

Belton, Pamela S.↗

Experimental study of a generic high-speed civil transport: Tabulated data

An experimental study of a generic high-speed civil transport was conducted in LaRC's 8-Foot Transonic Pressure Tunnel. The data base was obtained for the purpose of assessing the accuracy of various levels of computational analysis. Two models differing only in wing tip geometry were tested with and without flow-through nacelles. The baseline model has a curved or crescent wing tip shape while the second model has a more conventional straight wing tip shape. The study was conducted at Mach numbers from 0.30-1.19. Force data were obtained on both the straight and curved wing tip models. Only the curved wing tip model was instrumented for measuring pressures. Longitudinal and lateral-directional aerodynamic data are presented without analysis in tabulated form. Pressure coefficients for the curved wing tip model are also presented in tabulated form.

Belton, Pamela S.↗

A study of land mobile satellite service multipath effects using SATLAB software

A software package is proposed that uses the known properties of signals received in multipath environments along with the mathematical relationships between signal characteristics to explore the effects of antenna pattern, vehicle velocity, shadowing of the direct wave, distributions of scatters around the moving vehicle and levels of scattered signals on the received complex envelope, fade rates and fade duration, Doppler spectrum, signal arrival angle spectrum, and spatial correlation. The data base may be either actual measured received signals entered as ASCII flat files or data synthesized using a built in model. An example illustrates the effect of using different antennas to receive signals in the same environment.

Campbell, Richard L.↗

A method for the design of transonic flexible wings

Methodology was developed for designing airfoils and wings at transonic speeds which includes a technique that can account for static aeroelastic deflections. This procedure is capable of designing either supercritical or more conventional airfoil sections. Methods for including viscous effects are also illustrated and are shown to give accurate results. The methodology developed is an interactive system containing three major parts. A design module was developed which modifies airfoil sections to achieve a desired pressure distribution. This design module works in conjunction with an aerodynamic analysis module, which for this study is a small perturbation transonic flow code. Additionally, an aeroelastic module is included which determines the wing deformation due to the calculated aerodynamic loads. Because of the modular nature of the method, it can be easily coupled with any aerodynamic analysis code.

Smith, Leigh Ann↗

Olympus receiver evaluation and phase noise measurements

A set of measurements performed by the Michigan Tech Sensing and Signal Processing Group on the analog receiver built by the Virginia Polytechnic Institute (VPI) and the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) for propagation measurements using the Olympus Satellite is described. Measurements of local oscillator (LO) phase noise were performed for all of the LOs supplied by JPL. In order to obtain the most useful set of measurements, LO phase noise measurements were made using the complete VPI receiver front end. This set of measurements demonstrates the performance of the receiver from the Radio Frequency (RF) input through the high Intermediate Frequency (IF) output. Three different measurements were made: LO phase noise with DC on the voltage controlled crystal oscillator (VCXO) port; LO phase noise with the 11.381 GHz LO locked to the reference signal generator; and a reference measurement with the JPL LOs out of the system.

Campbell, Richard L.↗

Applications of a transonic wing design method

A method for designing wings and airfoils at transonic speeds using a predictor/corrector approach was developed. The procedure iterates between an aerodynamic code, which predicts the flow about a given geometry, and the design module, which compares the calculated and target pressure distributions and modifies the geometry using an algorithm that relates differences in pressure to a change in surface curvature. The modular nature of the design method makes it relatively simple to couple it to any analysis method. The iterative approach allows the design process and aerodynamic analysis to converge in parallel, significantly reducing the time required to reach a final design. Viscous and static aeroelastic effects can also be accounted for during the design or as a post-design correction. Results from several pilot design codes indicated that the method accurately reproduced pressure distributions as well as the coordinates of a given airfoil or wing by modifying an initial contour. The codes were applied to supercritical as well as conventional airfoils, forward- and aft-swept transport wings, and moderate-to-highly swept fighter wings. The design method was found to be robust and efficient, even for cases having fairly strong shocks.

Campbell, Richard L.↗

Inverse wing design in transonic flow including viscous interaction

Several inverse methods were compared and initial results indicate that differences in results are primarily due to coordinate systems and fuselage representations and not to design procedures. Further, results from a direct-inverse method that includes 3-D wing boundary layer effects, wake curvature, and wake displacement are represented. These results show that boundary layer displacements must be included in the design process for accurate results.

Carlson, Leland A.↗

Attenuated direct and scattered wave propagation on simulated land mobile satellite service paths in the presence of trees

Measurements were made of direct path with no trees, attenuated direct, and tree scattered signal levels at 1.3 GHz. Signals were received in two small groves of mixed hardwood trees. In the groves studied, average total signal levels were about 13 dB below adjacent no-trees locations, with attenuated direct signal levels about 14.6 dB below the no-trees case and scattered signals about 17.3 dB below the no-trees case. A simple model for land mobile satellite service (LMSS) propagation in groves of trees is proposed. The model assumes a constant scattered signal contribution at 17 dB below no-trees levels added to an attenuated direct signal which varies, depending on the number and density of trees in the direct path. When total signal levels are strong, the attenuated direct signal dominates. When total signal levels are more than 15 dB below no-trees levels, the scattered signals dominate.

Campbell, Richard L.↗

A transonic-small-disturbance wing design methodology

An automated transonic design code has been developed which modifies an initial airfoil or wing in order to generate a specified pressure distribution. The design method uses an iterative approach that alternates between a potential-flow analysis and a design algorithm that relates changes in surface pressure to changes in geometry. The analysis code solves an extended small-disturbance potential-flow equation and can model a fuselage, pylons, nacelles, and a winglet in addition to the wing. A two-dimensional option is available for airfoil analysis and design. Several two- and three-dimensional test cases illustrate the capabilities of the design code.

Phillips, Pamela S.↗

Design of the low-speed NLF(1)-0414F and the high-speed HSNLF(1)-0213 airfoils with high-lift systems

The design and testing of Natural Laminar Flow (NLF) airfoils is examined. The NLF airfoil was designed for low speed, having a low profile drag at high chord Reynolds numbers. The success of the low speed NLF airfoil sparked interest in a high speed NLF airfoil applied to a single engine business jet with an unswept wing. Work was also conducted on the two dimensional flap design. The airfoil was decambered by removing the aft loading, however, high design Mach numbers are possible by increasing the aft loading and reducing the camber overall on the airfoil. This approach would also allow for flatter acceleration regions which are more stabilizing for cross flow disturbances. Sweep could then be used to increase the design Mach number to a higher value also. There would be some degradation of high lift by decambering the airfoil overall, and this aspect would have to be considered in a final design.

Viken, Jeffrey K.↗

Design and test of an NLF wing glove for the variable-sweep transition flight experiment

Gloves for M = 0.7 and 0.8 design points were computationally designed and analyzed at conditions over the proposed flight test envelope. The resulting computational pressure distributions were analyzed in a boundary layer stability code. These results indicate that the available pressure distributions offer a wide range of combinations of cross flow and Tollmien-Schlichting N-factors. The glove designs along with the baseline configuration were tested in an entry into the National Transonic Facility. Analysis of the force and moment data showed no significant differences in the performance and stability and control characteristics between the baseline and gloved configurations. The rolling moment constraint was met over the entire flight test envelope for the gloved configuration. Pressure distributions for the NTF test confirmed the design pressure distributions were achieved. However, it was decided that with minor modifications to the inboard region of the glove, useful available data could be significantly increased by adding another row of pressure orifices at span station 167.

Waggoner, Ed G.↗

Design of transonic airfoils and wings using a hybrid design algorithm

A method has been developed for designing airfoils and wings at transonic speeds. It utilizes a hybrid design algorithm in an iterative predictor/corrector approach, alternating between analysis code and a design module. This method has been successfully applied to a variety of airfoil and wing design problems, including both transport and highly-swept fighter wing configurations. An efficient approach to viscous airfoild design and the effect of including static aeroelastic deflections in the wing design process are also illustrated.

Campbell, Richard L.↗