MIDDLE EAST TECHNICAL UNIVERSITY

DEPARTMENT OF AEROSPACE ENGINEERING

AE341 AERODYNAMICS I

LABORATORY REPORT III:

MEASUREMENT OF DRAG OF A SYMMETRICAL AIRFOIL

Submitted by:

1942812 / Oğuzhan AYDIN

1949346 / Kerim Erdem ALP

Assistants : Harun Levent Şahin

Süleyman Altınışık

Professor : Assoc. Prof. Dr. Dilek Funda Kurtulus

ABSTRACT

This experiment involved the calculation of the drag coefficient and drag force of the
symmetric wing, which was actually NACA 0012 using the simple balance method.
In the experiment, the drag force values for the constant velocity of the free flow were
obtained while changing the angle of attack. Drag force values were evaluated by
simple mass balancing. After the experiment, calculations were made with the Xfoil
and Matlab program and the drag coefficient for the experiment was plotted against
the angle of attack.

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 1. INTRODUCTION

Every object moving in the air feels the effect of the drag force. Drag force on airplane
wings, component of aerodynamic force parallel to free flow. Since the drag force
counteracts the thrust, it affects fuel consumption in the power unit and must be
reduced as much as possible to achieve the desired cruising speed at reduced cost.

An angle of attack should be given to the airfoil to obtain more lift. To obtain drag
forces at different attack angles, an experiment should be conducted in a wind tunnel
to obtain the effect of the attack angle on the drag force acting on this airfoil. In such
an experiment, the total pressure Pt and the static pressure Pstatic and the
atmospheric pressure for each of the different attack angles Patm. For the drag
coefficient CD, a simple balancing mechanism is used and the airfoil is balanced by
this mechanism at each different attack angle. By measuring the balancing weights
placed on the simple balance mechanism, the drag force was obtained. Then, after
using the appropriate formulas, the attack angle and the calculated drag coefficients
were plotted to discuss the drag force against the attack angle and then the effect on
the stagnation phenomenon.

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 2. THEORY
2.1. What is Kutta condition? Explain briefly its importance for
aerodynamics.
Example of in text reference:

This particular method can clearly be seen in [1].

2.2. What is Kelvin’s circulation theorem? Explain briefly its

importance for aerodynamics.

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 2.3. Derive lift and pitching moment coefficients (about leading
edge) for a symmetric airfoil for incompressible, steady flow with no
friction. (Use classical thin airfoil theory.)

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 2.4. What is drag? Explain both parasitic drag and induced drag. Is
there a way to estimate the drag coefficient using thin airfoil theory?

2.5. Comment on the behavior of the 𝑪𝑫 vs 𝜶 curve and stall

phenomenon. What happens if angle of attack is very large? Can you
predict the stall angle from drag measurements?

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 3. RESULTS

Dynamic pressure is calculated by subtracting the static pressure from the total pressure. Since
they were measured in mm water unit, they were converted to Pascal by multiplying them by 9,
80665. As a result, the dynamics pressure is found as 500,1392 Pascal for the first case where we
have 245 mm water total pressure and 194 mm water static pressure. For the second case, it is
88.26 Pascal.

Using the ideal gas relation (p = ρ R T), the air density is calculated as 1.1915 kg/m^3.

Incoming velocities for both cases are calculated according to Equation 1. In first case (near
maximum), it Is 28,9749 m/s and in the second case ( medium velocity) it is 12,1719 m/s.

2∗Pdynamic
𝑉=√ --- Equation 1
Rhoair

Reynold’s numbers are calculated according to Equation 2. They are 122185 and 51328
respectively.

𝜌∗𝑉∗𝑐
𝑅𝑒 = --- Equation 2
𝜇

The experimental drag coefficients are found using drag coefficient formula and
measured weights. See, equations 3 and 4.

𝑀𝑒𝑎𝑠𝑢𝑟𝑒𝑑 𝑤𝑒𝑖𝑔ℎ𝑡−𝑊𝑒𝑖𝑔ℎ𝑡𝑜𝑓𝑎𝑖𝑟𝑓𝑜𝑖𝑙
𝑀𝑒𝑎𝑠𝑢𝑟𝑒𝑑 𝐷𝑟𝑎𝑔 = ( ) ∗ 𝑔 --- Equation 3
1000

Note that what we call measured weights are actually masses in grams. So, first we
converted it to kilogram then to Newton by multiplying them by gravitational acceleration.

𝐷
𝐶𝑑 = 𝑃 --- Equation 4.
𝑑𝑦𝑛𝑎𝑚𝑖𝑐 ∗𝑐ℎ𝑜𝑟𝑑∗𝑠𝑝𝑎𝑛

In Equation 4, the wing area is found by multiplying the span with chord.

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We calculated the theoretical drag coefficients from alpha -8 to 20 by using Xoil. To do
this, first we calculated the Mach number according to Equation 5

𝑉
𝑀= --- Equation 5.
√1.4∗𝑇∗𝑅

Reynold’s number was already calculated before. So these two Mach number and
Reynold’s number values are entered to Xfoil Program and obtained the results. We used
only Reynold’s number of the first case for the theoretical calculation which is 122185.

All results are tabulated and shown below in Table 1.

Alpha (degree) W_measured (grams) D_experimental (N) Cd_experimental Cd_theoretical

-8 46 0,24516625 0,162101878 0,02651
-6 36 0,14709975 0,097261127 0,01754
-4 32 0,10787315 0,071324826 0,01402
-2 30 0,08825985 0,058356676 0,01307
0 28 0,06864655 0,045388526 0,01522
2 28 0,06864655 0,045388526 0,01307
4 28 0,06864655 0,045388526 0,01402
6 27 0,0588399 0,038904451 0,01824
8 25 0,0392266 0,0259363 0,02026
10 27 0,0588399 0,038904451 0,0415
12 30 0,08825985 0,058356676 0,0671
14 32 0,10787315 0,071324826 0,2508
16 36 0,14709975 0,097261127 0,16639
18 38 0,16671305 0,110229277 0,18623
20 42 0,20593965 0,136165577 0,20938
Table 1: angle of attack, measured weights, drag force and measured and theoretical drag coefficients

Also for the second case, where the Reynold’s number is 51328, different measured Cd
coefficients are found. They are tabulated in Table 2.

Alpha (degree) Cd_exp ( Re1) Cd_exp (Re2)

-8 0,162101878 0,330687831
-6 0,097261127 0,293944738

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-4 0,071324826 0,220458554
-2 0,058356676 0,146972369
0 0,045388526 0,110229277
2 0,045388526 0,110229277
4 0,045388526 0,073486185
6 0,038904451 0,036743092
8 0,0259363 0,036743092
10 0,038904451 0,073486185
12 0,058356676 0,110229277
14 0,071324826 0,146972369
16 0,097261127 0,183715461
18 0,110229277 0,220458554
20 0,136165577 0,330687831
Table 2: alpha, drag coefficients for Reynold’s number first and second case

To see the difference better, a plot of alpha versus drag coefficients for different Reynold’s
numbers are given below in Figure 1.

Figure 1: alpha vs Cd for different Reynold’s numbers

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Note that Re1 is slightly bigger than Re2.

From the Figure 1, we can say that for lower Reynold’s number, we get higher drag coefficient as
expected. The reason is that if the Reynold’s number is large, the viscosity effect is small. Also, as
we expect, the drag coefficients increases with increase in angle of attack. This is because of
separation of flow from the body occurs when angle of attack increases.

Also, angle of attack versus theoretical and measured drag coefficients values plotted and shown
in Figure 2 below.

Figure 2: Alpha versus Cd for theoretical and measured values for case 1.

When we do the experiment and draw the graph, we can say that the coefficient of friction Cd
increases at a low rate as angle of attack increases to a value of 12º from 0 º. After reaching 12º
and passing, the coefficient of friction Cd begins to increase sharply as the angle of attack

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increases. There are some fluctuating on theoretical graph after this dramatic increase in drag
coefficient (so drag force) which is caused by stall, the separation phenomenon.

As it is seen from the graph clearly, there are some difference between theoretical and measured
values. Seems like theoretical values are more accurate and reasonable because it is expected
the drag coefficient should be symmetric around zero degree since it is a symmetric airfoil. On
the other hand, measured values are not symmetric around zero angle of attack. This difference
can be caused by error of measurement devices, modeling error, human error etc. The error is
very high especially after stall. However the general shapes of theoretical and measured graph
are similar which make us able to say that the experiment is consistent with theory and it is
reliable.

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 4. CONCLUSION

The calculation of the drag coefficient on a body with simple balancing methods seems like an
easy and fast way to test it. In each phase, only four data and drag coefficient calculation results
were obtained.

As the first stage results are expected. The higher the attack angle of a wing, the greater the drag
coefficient. This is due to the effect of a separation on a body in fluid flow with a high attack
angle. The high attack angle creates a greater drag force on a body even if the free flow velocity
is kept constant

Moreover, Reynold’s number has an important effect on drag coefficient. High Reynold’s number
causes small skin friction.

As a final comment on this experiment, there are some errors between measured and theoretical
values, the general tendency of drag coefficient graphs were similar till the stall. So, the
experiment is reliable.

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 5. REFERENCES

Anderson J. D., Fundamentals of Aerodynamics, 4 th edition, McGraw-Hill Book Company, 2007

Munson B. R.,Okiishi T.H.,Fundamentals of Fluid Mechanics ,John Wiley & Sons,2013

Lab Presentation.

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 6. APPENDIX
Maltab code:

P_total_mm1=245
P_total_mm2=194
P_staticmm1=194
P_staticmm2=185
T_airK=25+273
R=287
g=9.80665
vis_air=1.780*10^(-5)
P_atmosmb=1019
Rho_water=1000
chord=6.3/100
span=4.8/100
weight_wing0=21
P_total_pa1=P_total_mm1*9.80665
P_total_pa2=P_total_mm2*9.80665
P_static_pa1=P_staticmm1*9.80665
P_static_pa2=P_staticmm2*9.80665
P_atmos_pa=P_atmosmb*100
P_dynamic_pa1=P_total_pa1-P_static_pa1
P_dynamic_pa2=P_total_pa2-P_static_pa2
Rho_air=P_atmos_pa/(R*T_airK)
V_incoming1=sqrt((2*(P_total_pa1-P_static_pa1))/Rho_air)
V_incoming2=sqrt((2*(P_total_pa2-P_static_pa2))/Rho_air)
Mach1=V_incoming1/sqrt(1.4*R*T_airK)
Mach2=V_incoming2/sqrt(1.4*R*T_airK)
Re1=(Rho_air*V_incoming1*chord)/vis_air
Re2=(Rho_air*V_incoming2*chord)/vis_air
q1=0.5*Rho_air*(V_incoming1)^2
q2=0.5*Rho_air*(V_incoming2)^2
Drag1=((weight_1-weight_wing0)/1000)*g
Drag2=((Weight_2-weight_wing0)/1000)*g
Cd1=Drag1./(q1*chord*span)
Cd2=Drag2./(q2*chord*span)

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