A Review on Surface Modification of Airfoils Using Dimples

Abstract

An airfoil is a cross section of airplanes wings. Wings of airplanes produce lift by creating pressure difference between upper and lower surface of wings. This so called lift enables the airplanes to fly helps them remain high in the sky. One of the major problems that an airplane experienced is flow separation .Which causes the reduction of lift and increment of drag. Drag is the resisting force of air. A lot of researchers working hard since few decades to minimize this flow separation effect. As a result of their hard working concept of vortex generator have been developed .Which delays the boundary layer separation. Though there are various types of vortex generators. In the present review a special type of vortex generator namely dimple is focused. Since last half of decades investigations related to dimples grew the attention of many researchers .A lot of numerical and experimental investigations have been conducted by several researchers around the world related to dimples effect on airplanes wings cross section or airfoils. The outcomes of those investigations are extremely tremendous. Those outcomes indicate that dimples of different size and shape can play a vital role in designing of airplanes wings. This present study or review try to sum up all of those researches in a nut shell.