Department of Aerospace Engineering @ METU

AEE305 Numerical Methods

2023-2024 Fall
HW#3

Consider potential (inviscid, irrotational, incompressible) flows over an airfoil. Potential flows
are governed by the Laplace’s equation:
∂ 2ϕ ∂ 2ϕ
∇2 ϕ = + =0
∂x2 ∂y 2
where ϕ is called the velocity potential, whose gradient provides the velocity field and satisfies
the irrotatitonality condition:
∂ϕ ∂ϕ
V⃗ = ∇ϕ
⃗ −→ u⃗i + v⃗j = ⃗i + ⃗j ⃗ × ∇ϕ
note that ∇ ⃗ =0
∂x ∂y |{z}
⃗
V

The freestream velocity, V⃗∞ , is imposed at the farfield boundaries, while V⃗n = 0 is imposed on
the airfoil surface.

If a pseudo time derivative is introducted to the Laplace equation equation, it becomes a diffusion
equation:
∂ϕ
= ν∇2 ϕ (ν = 1)
∂t
Note that the steady state solution satisfies the Laplace equation.

1. Solve for the velocity field over the NACA0012 airfoil by Finite Volume method and plot
the streamlines at α = 0 and α > 0. Use the incomplete Matlab code and the grid data
provided.
2. Obtain the pressure coefficient distribution based on Bernoulli’s equation and plot its
contours in the solution domain. Note that Cp = 1p−p ∞
ρ∞ V 2
= 1 − (u2 + v 2 ) (V∞ = 1)
2 ∞

3. Plot the distribution of surface pressure coefficient as an x − y plot and compare against
the panel method prediction.
4. Assume ϕ = 0 as the initial condition and discuss the solution obtained.
5. For a bonus consider a bi-plane configuration.