Flow over a Complete Airplane

We end this section by noting a history-making calculation. In Reference 57, a solution of the complete Navier-Stokes equations for the flow field over an entire airplane was reported—the first such calculation ever made. In this work, Shang and Scherr carried out a time-dependent solution using MacCormack’s method—just as we have discussed it in Section 16.4. See Reference 57 for the details. Also, a lengthy

Figure 20.3 Curvilinear, boundary-fitted finite-

difference grid for the solution of the flow over an airfoil. (Source: Kothari and Anderson, Reference 56.)

description of this work can be found in Chapter 8 of Reference 55. Shang and Scherr applied their calculation to the hypersonic viscous flow over the X-24C hypersonic test vehicle. To illustrate the results, the surface streamline pattern is shown in Figure 20.5, as calculated in Reference 57. In reality, since the flow velocity is zero at the surface in a viscous flow (the no-slip condition), the lines shown in Figure 20.5 are the surface shear stress directions.