An experimental investigation of airfoils and cylinders interacting with turbulent inflows.*

Turbulence interaction with solid objects (such as airfoils and cylinders) significantly impacts the aerodynamic and vibroacoustic performance of engineering systems. Hence, it is desirable to understand these turbulence interactions and the underlying physical mechanisms controlling them. Here, we examine this flow configuration using an experimental framework designed to measure both the flow field using particle image velocimetry and the unsteady surface pressure using a remote microphone technique. Experiments are conducted on a NACA 0012 airfoil immersed in isotropic turbulent inflow generated by passive turbulence grids—similarly, cylinders placed in a tandem configuration are employed where an upstream cylinder is used to generate the turbulent inflow. Preliminary results on characterising the turbulent inflow conditions for each configuration will be presented. Further, results on the distortion of the turbulent flow structure are investigated in the near vicinity of the leading edge of the airfoil and the downstream cylinder.