International Journal of Civil Engineering and Technology (IJCIET)

Volume 8, Issue 5, May 2017, pp.842–850, Article ID: IJCIET_08_05_093

Available online at http://iaeme.com/Home/issue/IJCIET?Volume=8&Issue=5
ISSN Print: 0976-6308 and ISSN Online: 0976-6316

© IAEME Publication Scopus Indexed

DESIGN AND ANALYSIS OF WINGLET

Alka Sawale
Department of Aeronautical Engineering, MLR Institute of Technology, Hyderabad, India.

MD Khaleel
Department of Aeronautical Engineering, MLR Institute of Technology, Hyderabad, India.

S. Jaswanth
Student, Department of Aeronautical Engineering, MLR Institute of Technology Hyderabad,
India.

ABSTRACT
The project is focused on the modeling and analysis of winglet of aircraft. In
aerodynamic engineering, drag reduction is a big challenge. To reduce drag a device
called winglet which is placed vertically at set of angle on the end of aircraft wing.
Winglet design will reduce the fuel consuming by reducing the aircraft drag and
makes the aircraft more stable during flight, also it will give the aircraft engine
longer life by reducing the load on the engine thrust. The aim is to design and
simulate a model of winglet for aircraft by using software such as CATIA -V5 which is
used to construct the winglet models and ANSYS is used to test and simulate the
winglet model. With winglet and without winglet is analyzed by changing the cant
angles, results are compared and plotted. Winglets are an important part of an
aircraft because it lowers the amount of drag and increases the fuel efficiency by
using less energy by reducing wing-tip vortices. Winglet played very important role in
improving the aircraft performance.
Key words: Winglet, wingtip vortices, Comparison
Cite this Article: Alka Sawale, MD Khaleel and S. Jaswanth Design and Analysis of
Winglet. International Journal of Civil Engineering and Technology, 8(5), 2017, pp.
842–850.
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1. INTRODUCTION
A winglet is a device used to improve the efficiency of aircraft by lowering the lift induced
drag caused by wingtip vortices. It is a vertical or angled extension at the tips of each wing.
Winglets improve efficiency by diffusing the shed wingtip vortex, which in turn reduces the
drag due to lift and improves the wing’s lift over drag ratio Winglets increase the effective
aspect ratio of a wing without adding greatly to the structural stress and hence necessary
weight of its structure.

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 Alka Sawale, MD Khaleel and S. Jaswanth

Winglets increase an aircraft's operating efficiency by reducing what is called induced

drag at the tips of the wings. An aircraft's wing is shaped to generate negative pressure on the
upper surface and positive pressure on the lower surface as the aircraft moves forward. This
unequal pressure creates lift across the upper surface and the aircraft is able to leave the
ground and fly.
Winglets, which are airfoils operating just like a sailboat tacking upwind, produce a
forward thrust inside the circulation field of the vortices and reduce their strength. Weaker
vortices mean less drag at the wingtips and lift is restored. Improved wing efficiency
translates to more payloads, reduced fuel consumption, and a longer cruising range that can
allow an air carrier to expand routes and destinations.

2. MODELING
CATIA means (Computer Aided Three-Dimensional Interactive Application) started as an in-
house development in 1977 by French aircraft manufacturer Avions Marcel Dassault, at that
time customer of the CAD/CAM CAD software to develop Dassault's Mirage fighter jet. It
was later adopted in the aerospace, automotive, shipbuilding, and other industries. Initially
named CATI (Conception Assistee Tri dimensional Interactive – French for Interactive Aided
Three-dimensional Design), it was renamed CATIA in 1981 when Dassault created a
subsidiary to develop and sell the software and signed a non-exclusive distribution agreement
with IBM.

2.1 Design of Winglet

Goal: Generate enough lift while maintaining the lowest possible drag, Should not stall
before wing during low speed flight, and the Geometry driven by aerodynamic
characteristics of the airfoil.
Chord Distribution: If the Chord Distribution is too small then the airfoil will require a large
lift coefficient and when it is too big then the high winglet loading causes outboard
section of wing to stall prematurely.
The Elliptical plan form will help with load distribution over a large range of flight
regimes.
Winglet Height: The Height of the Winglet is determined by the optimal induced drag and
profile drag relationship.
Twist/Sweep: The Twist /Sweep angles have similar effects on the winglet and They Tailor
the load distribution.
Toe Angle: It controls overall loading on winglet, Effects the load distribution on main wing
and it is only optimum for one flight condition.

Figure 1 Geometric quantities used to define a winglet

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 Design and Analysis of Winglet

3. WING SELECTION
3.1. Wing Dimensions
• Tapered wing
• Chord length : 7000mm
• span : 35800mm

3.2. Type of winglet

Blended winglet

Figure 2 Winglet parts

3.3. Geometry of Winglet

• Airfoil : NACA 2412
• Chord distribution : Root chord - 1600mm; Tip chord - 864mm
• cant angle : 15 deg
• sweep angle : 25deg

3.4. Wing Modeling

3.4.1. Winglet at 150

Figure 3 winglet at cant angle 150 Figure 4 3D view winglet at cant angle 150

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 Alka Sawale, MD Khaleel and S. Jaswanth

3.4.2. Winglet at 300

Figure 5 winglet at cant angle 300

3.4.3. Winglet at 600

Figure 6 winglet at cant angle 600

3.5. Without Winglet

The wing without winglet is designed by taking the above model and removing the winglet

Figure 7 Without Winglet

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 Design and Analysis of Winglet

4. ANALYSIS
ANSYS provides a comprehensive suite of computational fluid dynamics software for
modeling fluid flow and other related physical phenomena. It offers unparalleled fluid flow
analysis capabilities, providing all the tools needed to design and optimize new fluids
equipment and to troubleshoot existing installations. The primary ANSYS products in the
fluids area are ANSYS Fluent and ANSYS CFX.

4.1 Meshing
4.1.1. Mesh Procedure
The mesh details of the as follows:
• Element type : Unstructured Tetra elements
• Total elements : 2757733
• Total nodes : 491323
• Geometry
• physics preference: CFD
• Solver Preference: Fluent
• Select all the surface required to carry the mesh

Figure 9 Domain with winglet Figure 10 Mesh

Apply front geometry for two sides as air inlet and air outlet as show in fig., after meshing
the selection of boundary conditions is made. The selected boundary conditions are
represented in the Table below.

Table 1 Boundary conditions for wing with winglet

component Boundary type
Inflow Velocity Boundary
Outflow Pressure Outlet
Aircraft Wall
Far field Slip
Symmetry Symmetry option

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 Alka Sawale, MD Khaleel and S. Jaswanth

5. RESULTS
These are the ANSYS result .For wing with winglet at different angles

5.1 Winglet at Cant angle 150

5.1.1 Velocity: 180 m/s

Figure 11 Contour of Pressure

5.1.2. Velocity: 220 m/s

Figure 12 Contours of Pressure

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 Design and Analysis of Winglet

5.2. Winglet at Cant angle 450

5.2.1. Velocity: 180 m/s

Figure 13 Contours of Pressure

5.2.2. Velocity: 220 m/s

Figure 14 Contours of pressure

The calculations are calculated for the induced drag, which were done using the Excel sheet
for the results obtained from the ANSYS software 15.0. The results are calculated to study
the changes of induced drag for the NACA 2412 airfoil for the different Cant angles for a
same winglet of the airfoil. The tabular column below is drawn for the assistance to calculate
the induced drag of the airfoil. The table has different mach. no ranging from 0.5 and 0.6. For
the parameters which are used in the calculation for induced drag such as Lift, Coefficient of
lift, Drag, Coefficient of drag, lift to drag ratio, and for different cant angles.

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 Alka Sawale, MD Khaleel and S. Jaswanth

Table 2 Mach no and parameters

M 0.5 0.6
V 180 m/s 220 m/s
Cant Angle w/o 15 45 w/o 15 45
Lift 9.11E+06 9.04E+06 9.04+06 1.35E+07 1.32E+07 1.32E+07
CL 0.8215648 0.8160285 0.815757 0.815603838 0.797604 0.797321
Drag 569388.5 571508.9 587733.9 844153.1875 871575.9 947338.8
CD 0.051374 0.051566 0.05303 0.076166243 0.078641 0.085476
L/D 15.991598 15.82488 15.38292 10.70820617 10.14241 9.327954

M=0.5
0.0336 With Winglet
0.0335
Without Winglet
0.0334
CDi

0.0333
0.0332
0.0331
0.033
0 20 40 60 80
CANT ANGLE

The graph is plotted for KC_L^2 and Cant angles

M=0.6
0.0335 Without
Winglet
0.033
With Winglet
0.0325
CDi

0.032
0.0315
0.031
0 20 40 60 80
CANT ANGLE

The graph is plotted for KC_L^2 and Cant angles

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 Design and Analysis of Winglet

6. CONCLUSION
Based on the CFD results for NACA 2412 and swept back when used blended winglets we
observed 4 to 10 percent reduction for Mach regime 0.5 and 0.6, however we observed the
overall aerodynamic efficiency and change in lift production for both with and without
winglets are minimum. We observed induced drag reduced 10 to 15 percent linearly for 50
percent we observe slight increase in L/D compared to its prior to its preceding cant angles
(that at 50 deg). However wing configuration with winglets has less induced drag compared
to wings without winglets. Further work has to be done on other winglets such as sharklets,
spoired winglets etc and compare those results with these results and with theirs and
evaluated best winglets for certain configuration and flow regime. Similarly other type of
wing configuration and airfoil need to be studied and understood. Especially all the above
activities had to be carried out close to transonic and supersonic regimes where necessities of
winglets are much required.

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