Drag Reduction Due to Cut-Corners at the Front-Edge of a Rectangular Cylinder With the Length-to-Breadth Ratio Being Less Than or Equal to Unity

Abstract

The flow past a rectangular cylinder with small cut-corners at the front-edge is investigated to discuss a relation between drag reduction and the cutout dimension. The rectangular shape is selected in eleven kinds of the length-to-breadth ratio from 2/6 to 6/6 (square prism) with the small rectangular-shaped cut-corners at the front-edge. The wind tunnel experiment is carried out to obtain time-averaged hydrodynamic forces measured by the force transducer at Re≈50,000. The contour map of the hydrodynamic coefficients with respect to the cutout dimension are shown to investigate the relation between the drag reduction and the cutout shape. In the contour map for the zero angle of attack, the region of the effective drag reduction achieved, in which the value of the drag coefficient is less than that of a circular cylinder at the same Reynolds number, is observed to become wide with the increase in the length-to-breadth ratio and it is independent of the angle of attack, α, within α being small. Furthermore, it is shown that there is a condition in which the drag reduction of CD⪅1.5 can be achieved even when the Strouhal number is less than 0.2.