INCOMPRESSIBLEFLOW OVER

FINITE WINGS

Lecture 5

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 Introduction: Downwash And Induced Drag
 We discussed the properties of airfoils, which are the
same as the properties of a wing of infinite span;
indeed, airfoil data are frequently denoted as "infinite
wing" data.
 However, all real airplanes have wings of finite span,
and the purpose of the present chapter is to apply our
knowledge of airfoil properties to the analysis of such
finite wings.
Question: Why are the aerodynamic characteristics of a
finite wing any different from the properties of its airfoil
sections?
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 …Cont
 Indeed, an airfoil is simply a section of a wing, and at
first thought, you might expect the wing to behave
exactly the same as the airfoil.
 However, the flow over an airfoil is two-dimensional.
In contrast, a finite wing is a three-dimensional
body, and consequently the flow over the finite wing
is three-dimensional; i.e., there is a component of
flow in the spanwise direction.
 Examine Fig. below, which gives the top and front
views of a finite wing.

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 …Cont

Fig. Finite wing. In this figure, the curvature of the streamlines

over the top and bottom of the wing is exaggerated for clarity.
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 …Cont
 The physical mechanism for generating lift on the
wing is the existence of a high pressure on the
bottom surface and a low pressure on the top
surface. The net imbalance of the pressure
distribution creates the lift.
 However, as a by-product of this pressure imbalance,
the flow near the wing tips tends to curl around the
tips, being forced from the high-pressure region just
underneath the tips to the low-pressure region on
top.

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 …Cont
 On the top surface of the wing, there is generally a span
wise component of flow from the tip toward the wing root,
causing the streamlines over the top surface to bend toward
the root, as sketched on the top view shown in Fig. above.
 Similarly, on the bottom surface of the wing, there is
generally a span wise component of flow from the root
toward the tip, causing the streamlines over the bottom
surface to bend toward the tip.
 Clearly, the flow over the finite wing is three dimensional,
and therefore you would expect the overall aerodynamic
properties of such a wing to differ from those of its airfoil
sections.

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 …Cont
 The tendency for the flow to "leak" around the wing
tips has another important effect on the
aerodynamics of the wing. This flow establishes a
circulatory motion which trails downstream of the
wing; i.e., a trailing vortex is created at each wing tip.
/ Refer fig below/
 The tip vortices are essentially weak "tornadoes"
that trail downstream of the finite wing. (For large
airplanes such as a Boeing 747, these tip vortices can
be powerful enough to cause light airplanes
following too closely to go out of control.

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 …Cont

Fig. Schematic of wing-tip vortices.

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 …Cont
 Such accidents have occurred, and this is one reason
for large spacing's between aircraft landing or taking
off consecutively at airports.) These wing-tip vortices
downstream of the wing induce a small downward
component of air velocity in the neighborhood of the
wing itself.
 The two vortices tend to drag the surrounding air
around with them, and this secondary movement
induces a small velocity component in the downward
direction at the wing. This downward component is
called down wash, denoted by the symbol w.

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 …Cont
 In turn, the downwash combines with the free
stream velocity to produce a local relative wind
which is canted downward in the vicinity of each
airfoil section of the wing, as sketched in Fig. below

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 …Cont

Fig. Effect of down wash on the local flow over a local airfoil
section of a finite wing.

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 …Cont
 The presence of downwash, and its effect on inclining
the local relative wind in the downward direction, has
two important effects on the local airfoil section, as
follows:
1. The angle of attack actually seen by the local airfoil
section is the angle between the chord line and the local
relative wind.
This angle is given by in Fig. below and is defined as
the effective angle of attack. Hence, although the wing
is at a geometric angle of attack the local airfoil
section is seeing a smaller angle, namely, the effective
angle of attack .
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 …Cont
 The local lift vector is aligned perpendicular to the
local relative wind, and hence is inclined behind the
vertical by the angle , as shown in Fig. above.
 Consequently, there is a component of the local lift
vector in the direction of ; that is, there is a drag
created by the presence of down wash. This drag is
defined as induced drag, denoted by .
• Hence, we see that the presence of down wash over
a finite wing reduces the angle of attack that each
section effectively sees, and moreover, it creates a
component of drag-the induced drag Di
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 …Cont
• The tilting backward of the lift vector shown in Fig.
above is one way of visualizing the physical generation
of induced drag. Two alternate ways are as follows:

1. The three-dimensional flow induced by the wing-tip

vortices shown in Figs. above simply alters the pressure
distribution on the finite wing in such a fashion that a
net pressure imbalance exists in the direction of the
free stream velocity ( ; i.e., drag is created. In this sense,
induced drag is a type of "pressure drag.“

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 …Cont
2. The wing-tip vortices contain a large amount of
translational and rotational kinetic energy. This
energy has to come from somewhere; indeed, it is
ultimately provided by the aircraft engine, which is
the only source of power associated with the
airplane.
 Since the energy of the vortices serves no useful
purpose, this power is essentially lost. In effect, the
extra power provided by the engine that goes into
the vortices is the extra power required from the
engine to overcome the induced drag.

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 …Cont
 we note that the total drag on a subsonic finite wing
in real life is the sum of the induced drag Di , the skin
friction drag Df , and the pressure drag Dp due to flow
separation. The latter two contributions are due to
viscous effects,
 The sum of these two viscous-dominated drag
contributions is called profile drag. The profile drag
coefficient Cd can be given by,

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 …Cont
…… And the induced drag coefficient as

 The total drag coefficient for the finite wing, CD , is

given by

 The value of Cd is usually obtained from airfoil data,

and The value of can be obtained from finite-
wing theory as presented in this chapter.

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 The Vortex Filament, The
Biot-savart Law, And
Helmholtz's Theorems
 A vortex filament can be curved, as shown in Fig.
below. Here, only a portion of the filament is
illustrated. The filament induces a flow field in the
surrounding space.

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 …Cont
 If the circulation is taken about any path enclosing the
filament, a constant value , is obtained. Hence, the
strength of the vortex filament is defined as
• Consider a directed segment of the filament dl, as
shown in Fig. above. The radius vector from dl to an
arbitrary point P in space is r. The segment dl induces
a velocity at P equal to

 this Equation is called the Biot-Savart law and is one of

the most fundamental relations in the theory of inviscid,
incompressible flow. Its derivation is given in more
advanced books 19
 …Cont
 Let us apply the Biot-Savart law to a straight vortex
filament of infinite length, as sketched in Fig. below

• Hence, the velocity induced at P by the entire vortex

filament is

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 …Cont
 From the definition of the vector cross product, the
direction of V is downward in refer previous Fig. The
magnitude of the velocity, V = /V/, is given by

 let h be the perpendicular distance from point P to

the vortex filament. Then, from the geometry

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 …Cont
 Substituting above Eqs. will result

 Which is the velocity induced at a given point P by

an infinite, straight vortex filament at a perpendicular
distance h from P .
N.B. The velocity induced by a point vortex in two-
dimensional flow was given by

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 …Cont
 Consider the semi-infinite vortex filament shown in
Fig. below. The filament extends from point A to .
Point A can be considered a boundary of the flow. Let
P be a point in the plane through A perpendicular to
the filament.
 Then, by an integration similar to that above (try it
yourself), the velocity induced at P by the semi-
infinite vortex filament is

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…Cont

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 …Cont
Helmholtz's vortex theorems:
1. The strength of a vortex filament is constant along
its length.
2. A vortex filament cannot end in a fluid; it must
extend to the boundaries of the fluid (which can be
)or form a closed path.

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 …Cont
 Now let us introduce the concept of lift distribution
along the span of a finite wing.
 Consider a given span wise location Y1, where the
local chord is C, the local geometric angle of attack is
, and the airfoil section is a given shape.
 The lift per unit span at this location is Now
consider another location Y2 along the span, where c,
and the airfoil shape may be different.
 N.B. Most finite wings have a variable chord, and
many wings are geometrically twisted so that is
different at different spanwise locations-so-called
geometric twist.
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 …Cont

Fig . Sketch of the lift distribution along the span of a finite wing
 Note from Fig. that the lift distribution goes to zero at the
tips; this is because there is a pressure equalization from the
bottom to the top of the wing

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 PRANDTL'S CLASSICAL
LIFTING-LINE THEORY

From the wing tips to infinity, as also shown in Fig. below. This
vortex (the bound plus the two free) is in the shape of a
horseshoe, and therefore is called a horseshoe vortex.

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Cont

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 …Cont
 A single horseshoe vortex is shown in Fig. below.
Consider the downwash w induced along the bound
vortex from -b/2 to b/2 by the horseshoe vortex.
Examining Fig., we see that the bound vortex induces
no velocity along itself; however, the two trailing
vortices both contribute to the induced velocity along
the bound vortex, and both contributions are in the
downward direction (-w).
 If the origin is taken at the center of the bound
vortex, then the velocity at any point y along the
bound vortex induced by the trailing semi-infinite
vortices is,
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 …Cont
 In above Eq. , the first term on the right-hand side is
the contribution from the left trailing vortex (trailing
from -b/2), and the second term is the contribution
from the right trailing vortex (trailing from b/2).
The above Equation reduces to

 Note that , w approaches as y approaches -b/2

or b/2.

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 …cont
 The single horseshoe vortex shown in Fig. above does
not realistically simulate that of a finite wing.
 So let us superimpose a large number of horseshoe
vortices, each with a different length of the bound
vortex, but with all the bound vortices coincident
along a single line, called the lifting line.
 This concept is illustrated in Fig. below where only
three horseshoe vortices are shown for the sake of
clarity.

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…Cont

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 We now have a series of trailing vortices distributed
over the span, rather than just two vortices trailing
downstream of the tips.
• Note that the strength of each trailing vortex is equal
to the change in circulation along the lifting line.

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 …Cont
 Let us extrapolate the previous Fig. to the case where
an infinite number of horseshoe vortices are
superimposed along the lifting line, each with a
vanishingly small strength, This case is illustrated
in Fig. below.
 Let us single out an infinitesimally small segment of
the lifting line, dy, located at the coordinate y as
shown in Fig.

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 …Cont

Fig. Superposition of an infinite number of horseshoe

vortices along the lifting line,
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 …Cont
 The circulation at y is and the change in
circulation over the segment dy is in
turn, the strength of the trailing vortex at y must
equal the change in circulation along the lifting
line;
 Consider more closely the trailing vortex of strength
which intersects the lifting line at coordinate y,
as
shown in Fig. Also consider the arbitrary location
along the lifting line

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 …Cont
 Any segment of the trailing vortex, dx, will induce a
velocity at Yo with a magnitude and direction given by
the Biot-Savart law, In turn, the velocity dw at Yo
induced by the entire semi-infinite trailing vortex
located at y is given by

 The total velocity w induced at Yo by the entire trailing

vortex sheet is the summation of above Eq. over all the
vortex filaments, i.e., the integral from -b/2 to b/2:

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• Recall fig below which shows the local airfoil section of a finite
wing. Assume this section is located at the arbitrary spanwise
station Yo. the induced angle of attack is given by

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 …Cont
 Obviously w is much smaller that the free stream
velocity, For small angles,

 Substituting in to the above

equation will give

i.e., an expression for the induced angle of attack in

terms of the circulation distribution along the wing.
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 …Cont
 is the angle of attack actually seen by the local
airfoil section. Since the downwash varies across the
span, then is also variable; The lift
coefficient for the airfoil section located at Y = Yo is

 From the definition of lift coefficient and from the

Kutta-loukowski theorem, we have, for the local
airfoil section located at Yo,

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 …Cont

 But,
Therefore

 the fundamental equation of Prandtl' s lifting-line theory; it

simply states that the geometric angle of attack is equal to
the sum of the effective angle plus the induced angle of
attack.
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 …Cont
 The solution obtained from above Eq. gives
us the three main aerodynamic characteristics of a
finite wing, as follows:

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 …Cont
 3. The induced drag is obtained by inspection of
previous Fig. The induced drag per unit span is,

 The total induced drag is obtained by integrating

above Eq. over the span:

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 …Cont
 In turn, the induced drag coefficient is..

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 End
Thank you!!

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