Abstract
This paper investigates the formation mechanism of the propulsive force of a flapping airfoil, which performs harmonic angular oscillations in a continuous medium flow, in the light of the recently proved general theorem on the added mass of bodies in a viscous incompressible fluid. The flow is described by the Navier–Stokes equations. The calculations were performed by the mesh-free numerical method of viscous vortex domains. This work explains the formation mechanism of a reverse vortex street in the wake behind the flapping airfoil in the forward thrust mode. The dominant contribution of the added mass force to the value of the propulsive force is detected. The obtained results reveal to some extent the hydrodynamic action mechanism of the tail fin of underwater animals.
Published Version
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