Computational Study of Aerodynamic Performance of a Spinning Projectile with Different AFT-Body Configurations

Minimizing the aerodynamic drag has been a major concern in the field of ballistics in order to increase the performance of projectiles and missiles. The reason behind the increase in aerodynamic drag acting over the projectile is due to the flow separation occurring at the rear end of the body leading to the formation of wake. Hence, the main objective in our current study is to develop an efficient method to minimize the aerodynamic drag. In our study, we explore how the lift and drag coefficients behave for various geometrical modifications carried out on the standard projectile. The Standard M549 155 mm projectile was chosen for our study. The optimum M549 155 mm projectile is modified and analysed in ANSYS Fluent for multiple Mach numbers. The boattail after body is being replaced by shape optimizations such as multistep after body and splitter plates which are expected to minimize the vortices generated at the rear end of the projectile. Non-spinning cases of multistep after body and splitter plates are included in the current paper.