Leading-edge modifications for stall delay

My final-year project. Wind-tunnel tests and CFD to find out how leading-edge modifications delay stall on a wing.

Year: Year 3
Module: Individual Project XE636
Period: Oct 2026 – present
Team: Individual
Status: In progress

The idea I’m testing: a wing whose leading edge is wavy, like a humpback whale’s flipper, against a straight one. Section B–B is the NACA 4415 aerofoil pitched to angle of attack α.

Tubercle parameters varied, one at a time

0.25c

Pivot point for angle-of-attack changes

The question

A wing stalls when the flow separates from its upper surface and lift collapses. A wavy leading edge can delay this. The bumps, called tubercles, copy the ones on a humpback whale’s flippers. My project measures how far modifications like these, together with sweep, push the stall angle back.

Method

Rebuild a published base case in ANSYS Fluent and check my results against the paper, so I know the CFD set-up is sound.
Change one tubercle parameter at a time: amplitude, wavelength, length, wave shape and mounting orientation (vertical or horizontal). Run each across a range of angles of attack, with the wing pivoting about its quarter-chord point.
Test the same configurations in the university wind tunnel and compare lift, drag and stall angle with the CFD.

Starting points

Fan, Sun, Dong and Li (2022), Renewable Energy 200, 154–168. Tubercles on a NACA 4415 aerofoil, studied with CFD and water-tunnel dye visualisation at Re = 2 × 10⁴.
Ali et al. (2024), Heliyon 10, e32148. A turbulence-model comparison for a NACA 0021 wing with tubercles at Re = 120,000.