Aero-Thermal Investigation on Commuter Category Turboprop Aircraft Engine Nacelle

Abstract

In aircraft industry, the development of composite materials for increased strength and reduced weight is always a priority. The external body of aircraft, i.e. fuselage, nacelle, wings etc., is made of Al alloy and composites. A nacelle of a light turbo-prop tractor-configured aircraft, houses hot components like engine and subsystem. The nacelle is also made of thermally sensitive composite material; hence, it requires specified thermal management study. Thermal ventilation is done by inlet scoops and louvre outlet which keeps the engine and nacelle bay region in lower temperature safe for nacelle surface. Aero-thermal analysis is performed on the engine and nacelle bay ventilation, and the temperature results of the computation fluid dynamics (CFD) analysis is used in assessing the suitable material and its mechanical properties degradation with respect to temperature. For numerical study, a simplified nacelle, engine, and subsystem geometry are considered. ANSYS ICEM CFD™ and CATIA commercial software is used for geometry preparation and tetra meshing. ANSYS Fluent is used as a solver with SST k − ω viscous model to capture thermal values at the geometry surfaces. © 2024, The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd.