CFD simulation of dimpled sphere and its wind tunnel verification

Abstract

Paper deals with problems of CFD simulating airflow over a dimpled spherical surface and its verification by the wind tunnel measurement. The low-cost simulation approach was applied to be run on a common PC using the commercial software ANSYS CFX. The wind tunnel testing has been performed in the laboratory of aerodynamics at the Department of Air Force and Aircraft Technology of the University of Defence. Measured results of the drag coefficient versus the Reynolds number for smooth and dimpled spheres were compared and discussed. Presented simulation corresponds adequately to the experimental results. It can be stated that the CFD simulation is suitable for simulating the flow over the dimpled surfaces similar to sphere.