Separated Flow about Cones at Incidence—Theory and Experiment

Abstract

The motivation for the work described here is the study, understanding and ultimate prediction of separated flow past bodies at incidence. The work has concentrated on modelling, mathematically, the vortical flow about slender bodies at incidences where the separation starts at the pointed apex of the body. Separation can, of course, occur further back along the body, particularly if the body is quite long, ie of high fineness ratio. However, a major interest of the work has been in understanding the development of lateral asymmetry in the flow about laterally symmetric bodies at moderate to high incidences, for cases where the separation has moved forward to the apex for typical bodies, eg an ogive-cylinder combination. The importance of the nose region in determining the development of separation asymmetry is emphasized by the fact that many of the ‘fixes’ proposed to reduce the degree of flm’l asymmetry involve modifying the nose, eg nose blunting, strakes, blowing at the apex, adding small pieces of grit very near the nose tip, etc.