Modeling and CFD Analysis of Flow Over Aircraft Split Winglet and Blended Winglet

Abstract

A winglet is a device used to improve aircraft efficiency by lowering the induced drag caused by wingtip vortices. A preliminary Computational Fluid dynamics (CFD) study was conducted to compare the wingtip vortices and induced drag generated by different wingtip configurations. The geometry of different winglets was modeled in CATIA and numerically analyses using ANSYS Fluent solver. The results produced detailed contour and streamlines of the wingtip vorticity magnitude created by each wingtip configuration. Using the design tool, two different designs were created one is split and the other is blended winglet and comparison is made from the two configurations and found lift and drag coefficients at different angles of attack.