WHAT MAKES THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN SHOCK BOUNDARY-LAYER INTERACTION ONAN AIRFOIL AND ON A SWEPT WING

Swept wing flows are characterized by the curvature of the streamlines in the projection to the wing plan and by the skewing of the velocity profile in the boundary layer. The aerodynamic performance of supercr itical wings at transonic speeds is strongly influenced by the interac tion between a weak shock front and a turbulent boundary layer. The ch aracteristic elements of this interaction are the precompression, the post-shock expansion, and the shock diffusion. The differences between the interactive flow over an airfoil and over a swept wing are elabor ated by the comparison between the two-dimensional case and the flow w ith superposed tangential velocity.