High-order accurate simulations of wake and tip vortex flowfields

This paper presents an application of a high-order unsteady computational fluid dynamics algorithm to the simulation of flows dominated by vorticity. The algorithm, possessing fourth-order accuracy in both space and time, has been known to demonstrate low dissipation for unsteady flowfields. A three-dimensional Euler solver has been developed around this method, which has been used to simulate both a passive vortex and the near-wake development of a fixed wing. The effects of grid uniformity and resolution on the severity of numerical dissipation have been investigated. The near-wake simulations are compared with simulations using CFL3D, a well-known NASA CFD code. The lower numerical dissipation of the present simulation is shown to produce a stronger tip vortex that follows a trajectory closer to the experimental data.