Thickness Effect on Low-Aspect-Ratio Wing Aerodynamic Characteristics at a Low Reynolds Number

Abstract This paper presents the study of aerodynamic performance about low-aspect-ratio wings at a low Reynolds number in wind tunnel testing. The aerodynamic properties, including lift, total drag, lift-to-drag ratio and induced drag were measured and analyzed for detailed investigations. Two forms of nonlinear equations of lift curves were reported for comparison. The effect of airfoil thickness was found to be significant on aerodynamic characteristics for all wings tested. The lift due to tip vortices was prominent for wings of AR =1.0 and their stall angles were all larger than 20°, which was mainly augmented by tip vortices shed from the wing tips.