Aerodynamics of a wing body with different Winglet Cant Angle

Abstract

Current aircraft was designed with winglet at the tip. Winglets reduce the drag and improve fuel efficiency and range. The winglets have been in use for nearly 90 years, but it have been remained fixed. This paper presents the effects of winglet Cant angle on the aerodynamic characteristics of the wing. Winglet Cant Angle (WCA) is the angle between the vertical exis and the winglet. Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) has been used to simulate the Cant angles at constant angle of attack of 0⁰. In this paper the Cant angle was varied from 105⁰, 88⁰, 75⁰, 60⁰, 50⁰, 45⁰, 35⁰ and the simulation works were performed at three different Flight levels of Sea level, 10000 and 15000 meters. The analysis analysis at 100 m/s velocity shows that Cant angle of 45⁰ is the best performing Winglet while Cant 60⁰ is the lowest performance in overall lift to drag Ratio. Similar results were obtained when Turbulent Kinematic Viscosity were measured at 20 m behind the wing. Flow visualization also showed the similar results Cant angle 450 is the best performance compared to other angles. For the best performing winglet, the lift to drag Ratio was lowest for perpendicular crosswinds. This study shows the effect of only winglet cant angle, however other factors involved to impact the performance of winglet are, Winglet height, winglet sweep angle, Winglet Cant angle, Winglet Toe angle, and crosswinds. To implement the best overall drag coefficient winglet, the optimization must be done mid-air. While calculating the parameters, the best most optimized winglet can be chosen for cruising flight level.