Abstract
This paper investigates the unsteady flow field around the NACA 63-215 hydrofoil. Computational fluid dynamics (CFD) study is followed by tomographic particle image velocimetry (TomoPIV) experiments in a closed-loop water channel at Reynolds number of approximately 2.9 × 104. The k-ω SST turbulence model results, namely the performance metrics such as lift and drag coefficients, are within 2% of the published values in the literature. There is also a good agreement between the numerical and experimental flow filed characteristics (i.e. average total velocity) around the studied NACA 63-215 hydrofoil; a maximum difference of 2% is observed. The difference in the results is mainly from the implemented boundary condition constraints in the CFD model. Longitudinal variations of streamwise velocity (i.e. u component) deficit from CFD are within 5% of the experimental values. In contrast with 2D measurements, the TomoPIV captures the 3D phenomena such as out of the plane velocity gradients. The results from this work supports both fundamental and applied research areas such as studying the development of high-performance and cost-effective ocean current turbine array models.
