Penetration of a blade into a vortex core: vorticity response and unsteady blade forces

Numerical calculations are performed for the problem of penetration into a vortex core of a blade travelling normal to the vortex axis, where the plane formed by the blade span and the direction of blade motion coincides with the normal plane of the vortex axis at the point of penetration. The calculations are based on a computational method, applicable for unsteady three-dimensional flow past immersed bodies, in which a collocation solution of the vorticity transport equation is obtained on a set of Lagrangian control points. Differences between this method and other Lagrangian vorticity-based methods in the literature are discussed. Lagrangian methods of this type are particularly attractive for problems of unsteady vortex-body interaction, since control points need only be placed on the surface of the body and in regions of the flow with non-negligible vorticity magnitude. The computations for normal blade-vortex interaction (BVI) are performed for an inviscid fluid and focus on the relationship between the vortex core deformation due to penetration of the blade into the vortex ambient position and the resulting unsteady pressure field and unsteady force acting on the blade. Computations for cases with different vortex circulations are performed, and the accuracy of an approximate formulation using rapid distortion theory is assessed by comparison with the full computational results for unsteady blade force. The force generated from blade penetration into the vortex ambient position is found to be of a comparable magnitude to various other types of unsteady BVI forces, such as that due to cutting of the vortex axial flow.