Design for urban vertical-axis wind turbines: balancing performance and noise

In urban areas, vertical-axis wind turbines (VAWTs) show promise due to their omnidirectional design, addressing challenges faced by traditional horizontal-axis turbines (HAWTs). Despite significant progress in urban VAWTs, extensive multidisciplinary research is needed to optimise their efficiency and use in such environments. <br/><br/>This...

Soap bubbles for large-scale PIV: Generation, control and tracing accuracy

Particle Image Velocimetry (PIV) relies upon the introduction of particle tracers that scatter sufficient light and follow the flow accurately. The use of submillimetre helium-filled soap bubbles (HFSB) as flow tracers for PIV is investigated for the purpose of enabling velocity measurements in large-scale industrial wind tunnels. That soap...

Aerodynamics of Propellers in Interaction Dominated Flowfields: An Application to Novel Aerospace Vehicles

This research is on the aerodynamics of propellers in interaction. As a propeller is dependent on the flowfield it encounters, any disturbance in that inflow results in changes in loading on the propeller. This can result in propulsive efficiency changes and affect stability through generation of in-plane forces and out-of-plane moments. The...

Ducted wind turbines revisited: A computational study

Ducted Wind Turbines (DWTs) are one of the many concepts that have been proposed to improve the energy extraction from wind in comparison to bare wind turbines. In reviewing the DWT studies, investigations based on the combined use of theoretical, computational, and experimental techniques have been presented. Although indicated in these studies...

Aerodynamics of flapping-wing Micro-Air-Vehicle: An integrated experimental and numerical study

The interest in Micro Air Vehicles (MAVs) has stimulated continuous research activities, in view of their potential in civilian and military applications. An autonomous MAV with dedicated onboard sensors would be capable of executing mission in closed environments, such as surveillance, in door inspection in support of rescue operations and...

The near wake of the VAWT: 2D and 3D views of the VAWT aerodynamics

The analysis, modeling and design of the lift-driven Vertical Axis Wind Turbine (VAWT) has challenged the wind energy community for many decades; this limited progress in knowledge has severely impaired the development of the VAWT, giving rise to the myth that the VAWT rotor is inherently inefficient (in comparison with the more conventional...

Tomographic particle image velocimetry and its application to turbulent boundary layers

Tomographic Particle Image Velocimetry is a new experimental method developed to study three-dimensional motion in turbulent flows. The technique is an extension of standard PIV and makes use of several simultaneous views of illuminated tracer particles and their three-dimensional reconstruction as a light intensity distribution by means of...

Improving BEM-based Aerodynamic Models in Wind Turbine Design Codes

Prediction of a tail downwash, ground effect and minimum unstick speed of jet transport aircraft

A design tool has been developed to estimate the horizontal tail size of a jet transport aircraft during the preliminary design phase with regard to the minimum unstick requirement. The ground effect has been modelled analytically using lifting line theory. The minimum unstick manoeuvre has been simulated numerically and is embedded in the...

Vortex flow and Vortex breakdown above delta wing in high subsonic flow

The aerodynamics of horizontal axis wind turbine rotors explored with asymptotic expansion methods

Multigrid and defect correction for the steady Navier-Stokes. application to aerodynamics