Lightweight airfoil
AssigneeAirflow Research and Manufacturing Corporation
InventorsC. Kent Greenwald, Leslie M. Gray, R. Bart Read, William Stevens
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
An airfoil having a suction surface and a pressure surface, the surfaces joined together at leading and trailing portions of the airfoil, the pressure surface converging toward the suction surface at a corner, the surface converging at the corner by an angle approximately equal to or greater than at least 30.degree., such that an air stream flowing from the leading edge and over the pressure surface separates from the pressure surface at the corner. The fan therefore has a thick nose section and is substantially thinner over the majority of its chord length. One or more guide ribs extend from the pressure surface to control the flow of boundary layer air.
Claims9
An airfoil comprising a suction surface and a pressure surface, said surfaces joined together at landing and trailing portions of said airfoil, said pressure surface converging toward said suction surface by an angle approximately equal to or greater than 30.degree. to form an abrupt corner wherein during operation an air stream flowing from said leading edge and over said pressure surface separates from said pressure surface at said corner and reattaches to said pressure surface at a section of said pressure surface substantially closer to said trailing edge and wherein said abrupt corner is characterized by an abrupt change in the slope of said pressure surface at said corner and appears in a cross-sectional view of the airfoil to be formed by the intersection of a first and a second line wherein said first line corresponds to the pressure on one side of the abrupt corner and the second line corresponds to the pressure surface on the other side of the abrupt corner.
An airfoil comprising a suction surface and a pressure surface, said surfaces joined together at leading and trailing portions of said airfoil, said pressure surface converging toward said suction surface by an angle approximately equal to or greater than 30.degree. to form an abrupt corner, wherein said abrupt corner is characterized by an abrupt change in the slope of pressure surface at said corner and appears in a cross-sectional view of the airfoil to be formed by the intersection of a first and a second line wherein said first line corresponds to said pressure surface on one side of the abrupt corner and the second line corresponds to said pressure surface on the other side of the abrupt corner, and wherein during operation an air stream flowing from said leading edge and over said pressure surface separates from said pressure surface, said pressure surface comprising at least one guide rib on a portion of said pressure surface from which said air stream has separated to control the flow boundary layer air on said portion of said pressure surface.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.