Computational Fluid Dynamics Analyses of a Wing with Distributed Electric Propulsion

The efficiency increase that distributed propulsion could deliver for future hybrid-electric aircraft is in line with the urgent demand for higher aerodynamic performances and a lower environmental impact. Several consolidated proprietary tools (not always available) are developed worldwide for distributed propulsion simulation. Therefore, prediction and comparisons of propeller performances, with computational fluid dynamic codes featuring different implementation of solvers, numerical schemes, and turbulence models, is of interest to a wider audience of research end-users. In this framework, the paper presents a cross-comparison study among different CFD solvers, the SU2 Multiphysics Simulation and Design Software, the CIRA proprietary flow solver UZEN, and the commercial ANSYS-FLUENT code, for the simulation of a wing section with a tractor propeller at different flow attitudes. The propeller is modelled as an actuator disk according to the general momentum theory and is accounted for in the flow solvers as a boundary condition, for the momentum and energy equations. In this study, a propeller with a fixed advance ratio J = 0.63 is considered, while propeller performances are assumed variable along with the radius. To perform the comparisons among the solvers, an in-house procedure, which provides the input thrust and torque distributions in a unified format among the three solvers, is developed. Steady RANS simulations are performed at Re-infinity = 1.7x10(6) and M-infinity = 0.11, for the flowfield of an isolated propeller. Successively, a wing section with a fixed forward-mounted propeller configuration with no nacelle, is studied at alpha=0 degrees,4 degrees, and 8 degrees angles of attack. The comparisons in terms of the lift coefficient show a good agreement among the three flow solvers both in power-off and power-on conditions. Simulations also evidenced the strong stability preserving property of upwind schemes, applied to propeller simulation at low-Mach number. Some discrepancies in the drag coefficient are observed and related to different levels of numerical diffusion between the three codes, which affects the downstream wake. Differences in flow properties in near disk region are observed and explained considering the different hub implementations.