Valeriu Drãgan et al.
/ (IJAEST) INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF ADVANCED ENGINEERING SCIENCES AND TECHNOLOGIES
A parametric study on ambient pressure effects on
super circulation over a simple ramp
Valeriu Drãgan
―
POLITEHNICA‖ University Bucharest, Faculty of Aerospace Engineering Str. Gheorghe Polizu, nr. 1, sector 1, 011061,
Bucharest, Romania
E-mail: drvaleriu@gmail.com1
Abstract— This paper describes a study of the lift effect
obtained by super circulation, an aerodynamic effect discovered
by Henri Coandã that relies heavily on the Coandã effect.
A parametric two dimensional CFD study has been carried out
with two goals in mind, the primary goal was to see the impact of
the ambient pressure on the super circulation effect and also a
secondary goal to investigate the super circulation processes
themselves. Early parametric studies have been performed by
various authors however the parameterizations provided in the
available literature is applicable only to some particular aircraft
configurations. The value of this study is that it provides a bare
geometric parameterization that can be used in a wider variety of
applications from aircraft lift and actuators to fluidic actuators
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and machinery. The tests showed no dependency between the
ambient pressure and the super circulation effect which
encourage us to state that an aeronautical application – that must
operate both at high and low altitudes- is feasible. Further study
has shown that the injector fluid is accelerated by the curved
ramp at higher velocities than those of the injector, providing
more leads for further refinement of our understanding of the
phenomenon itself.
Keywords-super circulation, Coandã effect, k-omega SST
I. INTRODUCTION
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In 1932, the Romanian aerodynamicist Henri Coandã
proposed a new heavier than air lift concept, the ― lenticular
aerodyne‖. The principle used to achieve lift is now called
― super circulation‖ and it is, in part, owed to the Coandã effect
that helps maintain a stream of fluid to a nearby wall.
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Although the Coandã effect is necessary to achieve super
circulation, it is not sufficient, i.e. in order to achieve a
favorable pressure gradient we need to use curved surfaces
such as cylinders.
During the years, many attempts have been made to
blend the lenticular aerodyne’s concept into conventional
tube-wing aircraft, the most famous examples are the Antonov
An-72 and An-74 and the Boeing YC-14. These aircraft used
the cold by pass flow of their turbofan engines to generate a
combined Upper Surface Blow (USB) that provides significant
lift, yielding lower take off and landing velocities.
Even if such aircraft have proved their commercial-
and often military- use, the lack of publicly available
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Vol No. 5, Issue No. 1, 094 - 104
parametric studies prevents the use of concept to it’s fullest
potential.
Data provided in [1] and [2] are of significant value
as starting points, however they can only model one aircraft
configuration and offering little details on how the
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mechanisms of super circulation work. Thuslly, in order to
generalize the applications of lift achieved by super
circulation, parametric tests have to be made to insure at least
a semi-empirical set of basic design equations.
Perhaps one of the most famous equations used to
describe super circulations is the momentum coefficient :
Where
Cμ=T/qS (1)
T represents the static thrust of the engine
providing the USB system
q is the dynamic pressure of the free stream
S is the super circulated surface aria
The denominator includes the dynamic pressure of
the free stream of air, which means it is more suitable for
describing aircraft landing and taking off than the hovering
capability of Coandã’s original demonstrator – a lot of the
times this equation proves very valuable when dimensioning a
blown flap system, per se.
Key aspects such as injector stream velocities,
curvature radii, ambient pressure must be taken into account in
determining weather or not a super circulation application is
preferable to a conventional lift system and under what
circumstances it is viable over the flight envelope of the
application.
Another aspect that make parameterization of this
aerodynamic effect difficult is numerically modeling the
detachment of the boundary layer from the cylindrical ramp.
It is common knowledge that a turbulent boundary
layer is less likely to detach from a wall than a laminar
boundary layer, therefore various viscous models will yield
various points of flow separations.
In this paper we will try to investigate the influence
of the ambient pressure, at zero true air speed (TAS) on the
pressure decrease over the super circulated ramp, considering
the same injector velocity using various viscosity models by
Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD).
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II. THE CFD SIMULATION
A. The setup of the CFD tests
Although it is not the intended purpose of this paper,
a brief analysis of the viscosity models has been made prior to
the full test in order to insure as much accuracy as a
conventional viscosity model can offer.
In the literature [3], [4]. the viscosity model most
commonly considered to predict boundary layer separation is
the k-omega. This model has a lower turbulent production
than the k-epsilon and therefore can capture more accurately
the detachment of the boundary layer.
The general layout of the test can be seen in Fig.1,
where we can observe the pressure outlet walls, the injector
defined as a velocity inlet and the cylindrical ramp.
A 90° arc was selected due to practicality reasons:
1.from past experience, a 100m/sec flowing jet will
not stay attached for much longer than the 90° of the ramp
2.if we were to consider that there is an even pressure
distribution across the ramp’s span,
the resulting force will not be useful, as its lateral components
will nullify each other as seen in Fig.4.
A sensible argument can be made that the higher the
curvature, the higher the pressure gradient we will most likely
obtain, however an optimum will be reached because of the
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fact that a fast flowing jet will become detached quicker on a
highly curved wall than on a lower curved wall therefore the
parameter to be optimized in this case will have to be the
product between the pressure gradient obtained and the
circumferential length of the attached fluid.
Knowing the influence of the ambient pressure over
the pressure gradient obtained over the span of the ramp
trough super circulation is important in two key aspects:
1.Calculating the effectiveness and efficiency of a
super circulation system with altitude
2.Calculating the prospect of having the super
circulation effect used by high pressure pneumatic systems
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such as fluidic actuators as described in [9].
The injector inlet velocity was intended as high as
possible while within the incompressible domain of the
working fluid-which generally is though to be below a Mach
number of 0.3, resulting in our case in an injector velocity of
100 m/sec. Hence a pressure based solver was employed.
The high of the injector for this, two dimensional
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study, was chosen to be h=10 cm and the ramp radius R=50
cm, being close to 12.7% of the ramp span.
Four viscosity models were initially tested and briefly
analyzed before the full test in order to decide which one
would most likely give the best approximation for the flow
separation.
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Vol No. 5, Issue No. 1, 094 - 104
B. Discutions on the viscosity models
K-epsilon RNG with pressure gradient effect near wall
treatment
The flow immediately begins to split in two regions: a region
that attaches itself to the curved ramp and another one, clearly
affected by the pressure outlet boundary proximity. On first
glance, the re-attached flow may be neglected giving the false
impression that this turbulence model predicts flow separation
quicker than the k-omega, which is counter intuitive. Upon
closer inspection we can observe that the re-attached flow has
significant effects, remaining attached to the ramp for its
entire span – which was to be expected from this model.
One indicator that shows this is not the best way to model the
flow is the fact that the boundary effect is quite intense, hence
the necessity to generate a larger domain which in turn implies
a higher time expense.
A final remark that needs to be made is that the rapid pressure
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drop visible at 72 cm of the ramp’s span is caused by a vortex
meaning that, perhaps a more precise result may be obtained
by a nonstationary simulation.
Reynolds stress 5 equation model with pressure
gradient effect near wall treatment
The pressure plot indicates multiple vortices forming in the
immediate vicinity of the injector. It is the sensible thing to
assume that vortices are an expression of the Kelvin-
Helmholtz interaction that manifests when two fluids with
different velocities have a common interface. This is the prime
noise generating mechanism for jet engines. Experience has
shown that a time dependent nonstationary analysis yields
more accurate results.
Positive aspects of this model are the lack of influence both
from the boundaries and from the underside of the ramp.
However, the model does not predict attachment to the curved
wall at this velocity of 100 m/sec. Knowing that the velocity
of the injected air is critical in achieving lift trough super
circulation, lowering it further from 100 m/sec makes little
sense.
Spalart Allmaras strain/vorticity based production
In this model, the boundary effect is virtually nonexistent, the
fluid gets practically no parasitic influence from the pressure
outlets.
The underside of the ramp has also no parasitic effect, leaving
the flow unaltered.
Also, it is remarkable that the fluid remains completely
attached to the ramp for it’s entire span and that the drop in
static pressure generated almost identical to that predicted by
the k-omega SST model.
Apart form the fact that it cannot predict flow separation, this
model is very close to the k-omega.
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K-omega Menter (shear stress transport SST)
This viscosity model is the most commonly used to model the
Coandã effect and related phenomena because it can predict
both the attachment of the flow to the ramp and it’s eventual
separation from it.
In this case we can observe some degree of boundary effect on
the flow as it exits the ramp however it has no practical
influence on the pressure gradient obtained on the ramp itself.
The trajectory of the fluid as it exits the ramp is not along the
tangent line to the ramp’s curve at the separation point but
rather slightly diverted away from the ramp. This is because of
the influence of the jet thickness that will be discussed further.
Also the vortex near the right hand side of the domain
influences the exit trajectory in a converse manner.
III. RESULTS
A first observation that can be made is that the ramp
accelerates the injector fluid in a region of approximate one
by the ambient pressure variations. It also has shown to be
independent of the ambient pressure both at low pressures and
at high pressures.
Another remarkable fact is that the lift calculated for
this super circulated ramp is significantly greater than the
thrust of the injector bare flow. The significance of this
finding can potentially be greater than just augmenting
aerodyne lift, it could open the way for new types of jet engine
nozzles, although experimental confirmation will be required
before further speculating on this last prospect.
Further studies are required and may include non
stationary analysis, thinner injector jets, ramp rugosity effects,
temperature effects.

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third of the total jet thickness. The velocity increase is of
approximate 5-7% of the initial injected velocity.
Close observation of the pressure and velocity plots
shows close correlation between the velocity increase and the
pressure drop on the ramp.
Detachment of the flow is most likely influenced by

inertia of the other two thirds of the flow.

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the thickness of the injector jet, primarily because of the

An interesting aspect of super circulation is the high

lift obtained, i.e. the lift of the super circulated ramp is higher
than the thrust provided by the injector jet – which is
considered to be fully expanded and hence has only impulse
component.

In this particular case, the calculations give:

Lift by super circulation=1690.2172 [N]
Injector thrust=1202.03125 [N]
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As the title suggests, the focus of this study was to
appreciate the impact of the ambient pressure on the super
circulation effect. The results are shown in Fig.22, 23 and24,
clearly indicating the independence of pressure gradients Figure 1. Computational domain discretisation
across the super circulated ramp with ambient pressure.
IV. REMARKS AND CONCLUSIONS
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The main goal of this investigation was to determine

weather or not ambient pressure has an effect on the lift
obtained by super circulation at zero velocity of the far field.
There were no significant differences between the
pressure drop obtained across the ramp at any of the tested
ambient pressures, meaning that any optimal geometry
calculated for one particular ambient pressure will, most
likely, be an optimum for any other ambient pressure.
This is a remarkable property because it opens the
way for large aeronautical applications as the super circulation
lift is proven not to fluctuate its efficiency with altitude.
Total pressure plots have been made in order to
insure that the energy within the injected flow is not affected Figure 2. Injector-ramp discretisation refinement

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Figure 3. Injector disctretisation
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Figure 4. Lift distribution over a 180° ramp
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Figure 5. K-epsilon pressure plot Figure 7. K-epsilon velocity plot
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Figure 6. K-epsilon static pressure detail Figure 8. K-epsilon velocity detail

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Figure 11. Reynolds stress velocity plot
Figure 9. Reynolds stress pressure plot
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Figure 12. Reynolds stress velocity detail

Figure 10. Reynolds stress static pressure detail

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Figure 13. S-A stress pressure plot
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Figure 16. S-A velocity detail
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Figure 14. S-A stress pressure detail

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Figure 19. K-omega SST velocity plot
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Figure 17. K-omega SST pressure plot
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Figure 20. K-omega SST velocity detail

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Figure 18. K-omega SST pressure detail

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Figure 21. Ramp static pressure distribution by viscosity models
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Figure 22. pressure distribution over a supercirculated ramp k-omega SST
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Figure 23. Pressure drop at various ambient pressures perfectly overlap

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Figure 24. Pressure drop plots at low ambient pressure also overlap

A. Authors and Affiliations

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―POLITEHNICA‖ University Bucharest, Faculty of
Aerospace Engineering Str. Gheorghe Polizu, nr. 1, sector 1,
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