Analysis of Different Turbulence Models in Simulation of Hypersonic Flow in the Wind Tunnel

In the current paper, we investigated the hypersonic flow in the wind tunnel at the Mach number 8. For this purpose, the effects and performance of three different turbulence models SST/k-ω, RNG/k-e and Realizable/k-e on flow simulation are evaluated. Mesh sensitivity analysis is conducted and our results are validated against the existing experimental data with good accordance. To better phenomenological study on the hypersonic flow behavior, distributions of static pressure, total pressure, Mach number and streamlines at nozzle, diffuser and test chamber are investigated. We found that the SST/k- ω turbulence model is more efficient and accurate compared to two other turbulence models in simulation of hypersonic flow in the wind tunnel at high Mach numbers.