Airfoil Theories and Their Applications

Abstract

One of the most important design impacts in aircraft is an airfoil. This airfoil is also considered the cross-section of the wing, so the flow characteristics of air depend on the airfoil's shape. There are some airfoil theories we can consider for the design consideration while designing the wing. The airfoil theories describe the nature of fluid flow over the wing based on the angle of attack for variable speed conditions. This chapter deals with airfoil terminology and the theories of airfoil like the methodology of conformal transformation, Cauchy-Riemann relations, complex potential, Kutta-Joukowski, thin airfoil theory, and their applications. The theories mentioned above explain transformation and its applications, Kutta condition, Kelvin's circulation theorem, starting vortex creation of airfoil for variable speed considered for aircraft, and the advantages of the optimization.