Computational Study of Transonic Buffet

Figure 1: Snapshot of airfoil from CFD simulation. Background and Research Goals

Transonic buffet is a dynamic fluid instability which, for sufficiently high Mach numbers and angles of attack, produces a limit cycle oscillation in the coefficient of lift. This limit cycle generates dynamic loads on the aircraft which constrain the flight envelope. The goal of this research is to better understand the flow conditions and modeling parameters which lead to buffet onset using computational fluid dynamics (CFD). In particular, I am interested in capturing sustained buffet in the transonic range by directly solving the Navier-Stokes equations without a turbulence model. This research is conducted at Duke Univeristy as part of the Aeroelasticity Group.