Numerical study on aerodynamic and noise performance of bionic asymmetric airfoil with surface grooves

Based on the asymmetric NACA4412 baseline airfoil, a bionic airfoil with surface grooves is presented. For the bio-inspired airfoil, non-smooth grooves are placed on the trailing edge of NACA4412 airfoil. To reveal the effects of non-smooth structures of the trailing edge on the aerodynamic and noise performance of airfoil, large eddy simulation and Ffowcs Williams–Hawkings acoustic analogy are adopted to investigate the aerodynamic performance and acoustic characteristics of the baseline NACA4412 airfoil and bionic airfoil at the chord-based Reynolds number, Re = 1.2 ×105. The numerical results show that the aerodynamic performance of the bionic airfoil is better than that of the baseline airfoil when the angle of attack is 14°. For all the sound frequencies studied in this study, the overall sound pressure level of the bionic airfoil is reduced by 2.0 dB at angle of attack is 14°. At the same time, the mechanisms of flow control and noise reduction of non-smooth surface grooves at the trailing edge are also revealed. As a result, the presence of surface grooves near the trailing edge of the airfoil can effectively improve the aerodynamic performance and reduce the aerodynamic noise of the traditional asymmetric airfoil, especially at high angles of attack.