Passive noise control for a tandem NACA 65-710 airfoil configuration is experimentally investigated by applying leading-edge serrations on the rear airfoil. With a sliding side-plate mechanism that allows the rear airfoil to move in the vertical direction relative to the front airfoil, the position of maximum turbulence interaction noise is first identified from the far-field noise measurements. Subsequently, detailed static surface pressure distribution and unsteady surface pressure fluctuations are acquired to shed more light on the physical phenomenon and underlying noise-reduction mechanism of the leading-edge serrations. The far-field noise measurements confirm that a notable turbulence interaction noise reduction can be achieved from 600 Hz < f < 3000 Hz, agreeing well with the previous literature on the effectiveness of the leading-edge serrations. The near-field hydrodynamic analyses obtained using remote-sensing techniques of the fluctuating pressure fields over the airfoil show that a significant reduction in the surface pressure fluctuation levels up to 20 dB/Hz can be observed at the serrated-tip plane of the rear serrated airfoil close to the leading-edge regions, over the range of frequencies investigated. Although reduction can also be observed on the serrated-root plane, the magnitude is much less significant. The present results suggest that the modification of the unsteady loading on the rear airfoil by the leading-edge serrations plays a crucial role in the reduction of turbulence interaction noise in the tandem airfoil configuration, which may find practical application for noise reduction in aerodynamic systems involving rows of airfoils, such as contra-rotating open rotors and outlet guide vanes.

A numerical investigation is conducted on aerodynamic noise of flow past a circular cylinder with different spanwise lengths (0.5πD, πD, 2πD, and 4πD) at Re = 10 000, where D is the diameter of the cylinder. The near-field pressure and velocity fields are predicted through Large Eddy Simulation, and then, the acoustic analogy is used to obtain the far-field noise. The results show good agreements for both the near and far field with the data from in-house experiments and the literature. Though the spanwise length has limited influence on the power spectral density of the near-field velocity and pressure fluctuations at different spanwise locations, substantial differences are observed for the spanwise pressure coherence and near-wake structures. The 0.5πD case shows primarily two-dimensional flow features immediately behind the cylinder compared to the other three cases, resulting in the overprediction of the spanwise pressure coherence, which has strong implications for the far-field noise prediction. With the spanwise length correction, the differences in overall noise magnitudes of the different cases diminish. Nevertheless, the 2πD and 4πD cases better capture the first and second harmonics of the vortex shedding and its associated directivities than the other two cases, showing the importance of sufficient spanwise lengths in predicting noise from flow past a cylinder.

Biologically inspired finlet treatments have been shown to effectively reduce the trailing-edge noise of a flat plate and hence are a viable noise-suppression technology for engineering applications. The present work performs a thorough experimental investigation on the near-field dynamics of finlet surface treatments applied to a flat plate. To examine the underlying noise-reduction mechanism, the manipulated flow field is analysed using data from detailed static, unsteady wall-pressure as well as velocity measurements and their correlations. Specifically, the densely populated dynamic transducers allow for the tracking of the turbulent boundary-layer development from upstream to the wake of the finlet-treated area (see supplementary movies), which elucidates the formation of ‘finlet-induced turbulence’ through flow–finlet interaction. Associated turbulence structures are found to further develop within the treated area and structures shed from the top of the finlets are observed to mix and merge with the turbulence being channelled through the space between the finlets in the finlet wake. While the mixing process increases the spanwise turbulence length scale, it significantly attenuates the unsteady wall-pressure fluctuation at the trailing edge and thus leads to broadband reduction of the trailing-edge noise. Moreover, it corroborates the findings of earlier studies suggesting that there exists an optimal distance between finlets and trailing-edge where the mixing effects are most beneficial.

This paper experimentally characterises the far-field noise emissions of a rotor operating in reverse non-axial inflow conditions. Specifically, experiments were undertaken at a range of rotor tilting angles and inflow velocities to investigate the effects of negative tilting on rotor acoustics and their correlation with aerodynamic performance. The results show that the forces and moments experienced by the rotor blades change significantly with increasing inflow velocity and increasing negative tilting angle. Correspondingly, distinct modifications to the far-field acoustic spectra are observed for the negatively tilted rotor when compared to the edgewise condition, with the broadband noise content notably increasing. Moreover, for a given tilting angle, the broadband noise component is accentuated with increasing inflow velocity, similar to when the negative tilting angle is increased. With reference to the flow-field surveys conducted in the literature and a preliminary in-house flow measurement, the increase in broadband content can possibly be attributed to the heightened level of ingestion of blade self-turbulence, i.e., the ingestion of turbulent wake generated by the upstream portion of the rotor by the downstream portion. At lower inflow velocities, the magnitude of the blade passing frequency at each of the observer angles is found to change minimally with negative tilt. In contrast, at higher inflow velocities, the directivity pattern and intensity of both the blade passing frequency and the overall sound pressure level are shown to change with increases in magnitude, particularly at downstream observer locations with negative tilt. These findings have important ramifications for the design and suitable operational profile of aerial vehicles for future urban air mobility applications.

The growing demand for urban air mobility necessitates the development of quieter and more efficient electric vertical takeoff and landing aircraft. This study presents numerical simulations of large-scale turbulence in the wake of a cylinder being ingested by a propeller in forward flight. The computational fluid dynamics solver SIMULIA PowerFLOW is employed to investigate both the flow field dynamics and aeroacoustics of the configuration, and the numerical setup mirrors an earlier experimental campaign, providing validation to the current numerical framework. The results demonstrate that turbulence ingestion leads to a significant increase in the far-field broadband noise components from mid to high frequencies. Interestingly, multiple tonal side-peaks emerge around the fundamental blade passing frequency as a result of the interaction between the propeller and shed vortices from the cylinder, partly attributed to the non-linear turbulent mixing. Flow field results reveal that the significant blade-turbulence interaction modifies the flow downstream of the propeller, particularly a rapid turbulent mixing between the turbulent inflow and the tip vortices, intensifying the asymmetric unsteady loading on the blade. Noise source decomposition identifies the leading edge as the dominant contributor to tonal noise and the broadband component in low-to-mid frequencies, while sources from the trailing edge become significant at higher frequencies.