Abstract
The objective of this work is to obtain better understanding of the flow over a combination of bluff bodies in close enough proximity to strongly interact with each other. This interaction is often beneficial in that the drag of the overall system is reduced. Proto-types for this problem come from tractor- trailer and missiles, and from various add-on devices designed to reduce their drag. Thus, an experimental investigation was carried out by placing conical frontal bodies having a base diameter of 0.65-cylinder diameter with different vertex angles (30°, 50°, 70°, and 90°). It was found that, the bluffer cone with 90° vertex angle gives the best minimum drag, which is 31% lower than the drag of the isolated cylinder. Also an interesting phenomenon was observed in that, the minimum drags for all combinations are obtained at the same gap ratio (i.e.at g/d2= 0.365).