2013 Volume 8 Issue 3 Pages 396-406
The single dielectric barrier discharge plasma actuators (PAs) are known to be effective for flow control process. This study investigated the winglet-type thin and small PAs, which were suspended in the quiescent air flow. We conducted the PIV measurements and flow computations for the PA induced flow. The induced flow was discussed on three regions: a radial flow toward the covered electrode, a wall shear flow downstream from the covered electrode, and a jet-like flow downstream from the winglet. When the electrode was located at the leading edge of the winglet PA, the streamwise flow was effectively enhanced on the covered electrode. On the other hand, when the electrode was located at the trailing edge, the friction loss was minimized for the near-wall high shear flow over the winglet, and thus the highest momentum integral was obtained for the downstream jet-like flow. From these results, the most effective flow actuation was suggested to be achieved by the short winglet that had the exposed electrode at a leading edge and the covered electrode at a trailing edge.