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Numerical simulation of wake vortices of crop

spraying aircraft close to the ground

Article in Biosystems Engineering May 2016

DOI: 10.1016/j.biosystemseng.2016.02.014

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Research Paper

Numerical simulation of wake vortices of crop

spraying aircraft close to the ground

Bin Zhang a,b,c, Qing Tang b,c, Li-ping Chen b,c, Min Xu a,*
a
School of Astronautics, Northwestern Polytechnical University, Xi'an, Shaanxi, 710072, PR China
b
National Research Center of Intelligent Equipment for Agriculture, Beijing, 100097, PR China
c
Beijing Key Laboratory of Intelligent Equipment for Agriculture, Beijing, 100097, PR China

article info
A study of the velocity field of the wake of a Thrush 510G carrying out spray application
Article history: close to the ground was investigated. The aircraft normally operates in extreme ground
Received 13 October 2015 effect and wake vortices play a major role in the dispersal and deposition of pesticide spray
Received in revised form released behind the aircraft. The evolution of wake vortices over time, and their interaction
7 January 2016 with the ground were simulated using computational fluid dynamics (CFD) techniques. The
Accepted 26 February 2016 simulation was initialised with meteorological data from a field experiment. Information
given by CFD simulation included the trajectory of the wake vortices as well as circulation,
which indicates the strength of vortex. This information provided insights into the velocity
Keywords: field in the wake, including the upwash near the wing tips and the downwash in between.
Aerial application The effect of turbulence intensity as well as crosswind on the wake vortices and the
Spray drift resulting velocity field were investigated.
Wake vortices 2016 IAgrE. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Crosswind
Computational fluid dynamics

behaviour. Wind is a primary aerodynamic factor that con-

1. Introduction
Aerial spray application has a history of more than a century,
and is one of the major forms of pesticide application. Drift of
pesticide has a potential impact on environment and human
health, and the efficiency of aerial spray application is a major
concern for the users, legislators and the public. Drift is
currently unavoidable, and great effort has been put to predict
and minimise drift (Hilz & Vermeer, 2013).
Aerial spray drift is primarily a function of particle size,
background atmospheric conditions and aircraft wake
tributes to the pesticide drift. However, drift occurs even when
there is no wind, since wingtip vortices play a significant role
in the behaviour of the spray shortly after release (Reed, 1953).
Wingtip vortices are a natural consequence of lift genera-
tion and aircraft flight. Vortex sheet roll-up downstream of
the aircraft wing and merge into two or four major counter-
rotating vortices that depend on the configuration of the
aircraft. Materials that are released close behind the aircraft
are entrained and transported by the vortices. The counter-
rotating vortices produce an upwash velocity near the wing

* Corresponding author. Tel.: 86 13709183940; fax: 86 029 88494614.

E-mail addresses: zhangbinastro@mail.nwpu.edu.cn (B. Zhang), tangq@nercita.org.cn (Q. Tang), chenlp@nercita.org.cn (L.-p. Chen),
xumin@nwpu.edu.cn (M. Xu).
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.biosystemseng.2016.02.014
1537-5110/ 2016 IAgrE. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
 b i o s y s t e m s e n g i n e e r i n g 1 4 5 ( 2 0 1 6 ) 5 2 e6 4 53

Nomenclature Sij mean strain-rate tensor, s1

t time, s
ABL atmospheric boundary layer
Dt time step, s
AGDISP agricultural dispersal model
t* dimensionless time
ATC air traffic control
Ta temperature, K
CFD computational fluid dynamics
U; V; W velocity component in the x, y and z direction,
DNS direct numerical simulation
ms1
FSCBG forest service Cramer-Barry-Grim model
UCW speed of crosswind, ms1
FVM finite volume method
u* friction velocity, ms1
PISO pressure-implicit with splitting of operators
u' fluctuation velocity vector, dimensionless
scheme
v0 initial vortex pair descent velocity, ms1
PRESTO! pressure staggering option
vq tangential velocity of vortex, ms1
QUICK quadratic upstream interpolation for convective
v average velocity vector, dimensionless
kinematics
v' fluctuation velocity vector, dimensionless
RANS Reynolds-averaged NaviereStokes
w' fluctuation velocity at z direction, ms1
SDTF spray drift task force
x; z distance along and perpendicular to the wind
b span of aircraft, m
direction, m
b0 initial spacing of wake vortex pair, m
Dx; Dz size of mesh, m
cp specific heat capacity, Jkg1 K1
x* ; z* dimensionless coordinate
C1 variable in realisable k  model
z0 height of roughness element, m
C2 constant in realisable k  model
zBL height of vortex-induced boundary layer, m
Cm constant in realisable k  model
G circulation of vortex, m2 s1
g gravitational acceleration, dimensionless
G0 initial circulation of vortex, m2 s1
Gk the generation of turbulence kinetic energy due to
turbulence dissipation rate, m2 s3
the mean velocity gradients, dimensionless
h variable in realisable k  model, dimensionless
H sensible heat flux, Jm2 s1
k Karman constant, dimensionless
I unit tensor
m molecular viscosity, dimensionless
k turbulent kinetic energy, m2 s2
mt turbulence viscosity, dimensionless
L Obukhov length, m
r density, dimensionless
p average static pressure, dimensionless
sk , s constants in realisable k  model, dimensionless
r radial distance from vortex centre, m
t average viscous stress tensor, dimensionless
rc radius of vortex where the vq is maximum, m
b
t viscous stress tensor, dimensionless
S strain-rate magnitude, s1

tips where the particles are convected upwards beyond the
wing tips. Whereas a downwash velocity field exists in be-
tween the wing tips, which moves particles downwards
thereby enhancing the deposition.
Under mutual interaction, the vortex pair descends to-
wards the ground. Close to the ground, a boundary layer is
formed and contra-rotating vorticity detaches from the
boundary layer to merge into secondary vortices. Under the
influence of secondary vortices, the primary vortices rebound
and loop for a while. Sometimes multiple rebounds are
observed. The entire process may last from 100 s to 200 s. This
phenomenon was originally predicted by Harvey and Perry
(1971). Trailing vortex movement is an instructive phenome-
non in fluid mechanics (Spalart, 1998) and its prediction and
control close to the ground is very important in air traffic
control (ATC).
A number of models have been developed to predict the
drift and deposition of aerial spray application. Two of them
are widely accepted, i.e., the Forest Service Cramer-Barry-
Grim (FSCBG) model and the AGricultural DISPersal (AGDISP)
model. FSCBG was developed by Dumbauld, Bjorklund, and
Saterlie (1980) who made use of Gaussian method to simu-
late finite line source release with droplet evaporation.
Additional features include penetration of droplets into can-
opies and simple expressions for wake effects. The Gaussian
model was more suited for predicting long-range drift and
simulating the effects of atmospheric stability.
In contrast, AGDISP model is based on a Lagrangian
approach that solves equations of wake vortex motion
developed by Reed (1953). Vortex swirling behaviour was
quantified by a simple model that combined with the local
wind speed, propeller effects and gravity. The model was
more capable of capturing the near-wake ( < 0.5 km) flow-
fields and it subsequently became the near-wake model for
FSCBG. Improvements have been made to AGDISP over de-
cades (Teske, Bilanin, & Barry, 1993; Teske et al., 2002, 2011)
and a regulatory version of AGDISP, AgDRIFT was developed
by the Spray Drift Task Force (SDTF).
Secondary vortices and subsequent vortex bounce are not
considered in AGDISP. To approximate the advection of
wingtip vortices it used a logarithm profile for wind speed
above the ground. AGDISP cannot be used in the absence of
crosswind.
Both of the models are based on empirical and simplified
equations of motion. Due to the fleeting, variable nature of the
atmospheric conditions, their effects on the drift and
54 b i o s y s t e m s e n g i n e e r i n g 1 4 5 ( 2 0 1 6 ) 5 2 e6 4

dispersion of aerial sprayed droplets are difficult to address

with field studies. There is therefore a need for a physical
representation of the velocity field and the droplet trans-
portation in the near wake and far wake of an aircraft. This
could be achieved through the use of computational fluid
dynamics (CFD) techniques. The advantage of CFD is that in
the numerical simulation, the influential factors (i.e., ambient
wind speed and direction, atmospheric stability, wake
vortices and turbulence, and other meteorological parame-
ters) are controllable, thus their effects on drift and dispersion
can be studied in isolation.
Ryan, Gerber, and Holloway (2013) simulated the three-
dimensional near-field wake of the Air Tractor AT-802, for
an approximate period of 3 s (200 m). The simulation results
demonstrated significant entrainment of droplets in the air- Fig. 1 e Tangential velocity along the vortex centerline.
craft's wingtip vortices. The droplets were moved outwards as G0 61 m2s1, rc 0.6 m.
well as lifted upwards by the wingtip vortices. The presence of
crosswind complicated the structure of trailing vortices. This
increased the spatial imbalance of the mass flow distributions most widely used model for wake vortex application. The
and it was noted that the gradient of the crosswind was tangential velocity vq is given by
shown to have little effect up to a distance of 200 m behind the
G0 r2
aircraft. Their simulation was restricted to the near-field of vq r (1)
2pr r r2c
2
aircraft wake out of ground effect. Simulation of flow field in
the far wake is critical to the understanding of the long-term where r is the radial distance to the vortex centre. rc is the
evolution of wake vortices and the fate of pesticides in the vortex radius that is defined at the position where the
wider environment. tangential velocity is maximum, and vortex radius was cho-
The Thrush 510G monoplane is currently widely used for sen to be rc 0:052$b0 . b0 p$b=4 is the initial vortex spacing,
aerial spraying in China. The typical spray height is 5 m above and b is the span of aircraft. G0 61 m2 s1 is the vortex cir-
the ground, which is regarding as being in extreme ground culation. The predicted tangential velocity is shown in Fig. 1.
effect. The drift and deposition are affected by the crosswind, Fig. 2 illustrates the configuration of wake vortices and the
wake vortices and their interaction with the ground, which induced downwash velocity distribution. The two vortices are
makes the content of the present investigation. As a pre- of equal strength but of opposite direction of rotation. Each
liminary step, the paper focuses on the velocity field, as well has a strong circulation proportional to the weight of aircraft
as its temporal evolution during spray application. The in- and a significant size in relation to the wing span. The circu-
clusion of sprayed droplets and their drift and deposition are lation of a single vortex as a function of radial distance from
scheduled for a subsequent paper. the vortex centre can be defined in terms of the tangential
The paper is organised as follows. Section 2 briefly de- velocity.
scribes the computational model and the CFD method used
Gr 2prvq r (2)
for simulation. Then in Section 3 the Thrush 510G wake
vortices evolution in extreme ground effect without cross- The quantity b0 is taken as the length scale. v0 G=2pb0 is
wind is illustrated, and the effect of turbulence on the trans- taken as the velocity scale and v0 =b0 is the time scale.
port of wake vortices is investigated. In Section 4, a field
measurement of the velocity field in the wake of Thrush 510G
is described and simulation cases with crosswind are given.
The motion of wake vortices and their influence on the ve-
locity field is analysed in detail. Section 5 gives our
conclusions.

2. Model description

The Thrush 510G is widely used for aerial spray application. It

has a span of 14.5 m, and has a typical cruise speed of 55 ms1 .
The typical flying height during aerial spray application is 5 m
above target.

2.1. Model of wake vortices

The wake vortex was initialised using the BurnhameHallock Fig. 2 e Diagrammatic representation of the upwash and
model (Ahmad, Proctor, Duparcmeur, & Jacob, 2014). It is the downwash velocity induced by wake vortices of aircraft.
 b i o s y s t e m s e n g i n e e r i n g 1 4 5 ( 2 0 1 6 ) 5 2 e6 4 55

Fig. 3 e Validation of numerical method. cal refers to the results calculated in the present paper using laminar model. ref
refers to the calculation using DNS (direct numerical simulation) by Duponcheel (2009). exp refers to the experimental
results of Duponcheel (2009).

2.2. Computational fluid dynamics

  2
rv'  v' mt Vv VvT  rkI (6)
The Reynolds-averaged incompressible NaviereStokes (RANS) 3
equations are: Where mt is the turbulent viscosity, I is the unit tensor, and
Mass conservation:
1
k v' $v' (7)
V$rv 0 (3) 2

Momentum conservation: is the turbulent kinetic energy.

The solution of the RANS models was obtained with ANSYS
v Fluent (ver. 15.0, ANSYS, Canonsburg, PA, USA). The governing
rv V$rv  v Vp V$b
t rg (4)
vt equations are discretised using the finite volume method
Where p is average static pressure, b
t is the stress tensor, rg is (FVM) and converted into a set of algebraic equations (ANSYS,
the gravitational body force. The stress tensor is given by 2013).
  Pressure based solver allows the flow problem to be solved in
b
t t  rv'  v' m Vv VvT  rv'  v' (5) a segregated manner. The PISO (pressure-implicit with splitting
of operators) scheme was used to solve the pressureevelocity
Where m is the molecular viscosity. Reynold stress rv'  v' is coupling equation. The least squares cell-based method was
generated by the averaging operation. Employing Boussinesq used to compute the gradients. The PRESTO! (pressure stag-
approximation, we have: gering option) scheme was used to interpolate the pressure

Fig. 4 e Diagrammatic representation of the computational domain.

56 b i o s y s t e m s e n g i n e e r i n g 1 4 5 ( 2 0 1 6 ) 5 2 e6 4

Fig. 5 e Influence of turbulence intensity on wake vortices.

values at the faces of control volume. The QUICK (quadratic The modelled transport equations for k and in the real-
upstream interpolation for convective kinematics) scheme was isable k  model are:
used to compute high order value of the momentum at the
faces. Second order implicit time integration scheme was used   
v v   v m vk
to compute the time-accurate flow. The realisable k  model rk rkuj m t Gk  r (8)
vt vxj vxj sk vxj
was used to model the viscous effect. Curvature correction was
included to improve the sensitivity of the model to the effects of
and
streamline curvature and system rotation.

Fig. 6 e Time history of vorticity, u* 0.01 ms1.

 b i o s y s t e m s e n g i n e e r i n g 1 4 5 ( 2 0 1 6 ) 5 2 e6 4 57

Fig. 7 e Time history of vorticity, u* 0.1 ms1.

   In k  model, the eddy viscosity is computed from

v v   v m v 2
r ruj m t rC1 S  rC2 p (9)
vt vxj vxj s vxj k n
rCm k2
mt (10)

In the equations, Gk represents the generation of turbulence
kinetic energy due to the mean velocity gradients. A variable Cm is introduced in the k  realisable model,
p
C1 max0:43; h=h 5, h Sk= , S 2Sij Sij , C2 1:9, which is held constant in the standard model.
sk 1:0, s2 1.2 psilon rgy due to the mean velocity gradients.s The numerical method was validated using the case pre-
follows: ce is used for determination of the k e profile:. sented by Duponcheel (2009). The Reynold number is

Fig. 8 e Diffusion of vortex tangential velocity.

58 b i o s y s t e m s e n g i n e e r i n g 1 4 5 ( 2 0 1 6 ) 5 2 e6 4

Fig. 9 e Time history of downwash velocity profile.

relatively small, so a laminar model was used instead of the
k  turbulence model. The details of the set-up of experi-
ment and simulation are omitted for brevity and the com-
parison of results is made in Fig. 3. It can be observed that the
trajectory and circulation of the present simulation are close
to the reference. The slight delay of the detachment of the
secondary vortex was attributed to the constant viscosity used
in the present simulation.
3. NeS solutions of vortex pair in extreme
ground effect without crosswind
2D simulation is easy to set-up and requires relatively small
amounts of computer resources. Thus, it was primarily used
to investigate how atmospheric conditions, namely, stratifi-
cation, crosswind, and ground proximity affect the trajectory
of wake vortices. In this section, the temporal evolution of
wake vortices of Thrush 510G in extreme ground proximity
was simulated. Several important components of the aircraft
geometry were not considered in the present simulation,
including the fuselage, propeller and tail. The approxima-
tions impose limitations on the application of the results but
also they serve to accentuate the effects of the wing-tip
vortices. This simplification will be verified in future
studies. Here we focused on the trajectory and circulation of
wake vortices since they affect the velocity field directly.
Additionally, the influence of turbulence was investigated.
The computational domain was defined by
x; z277; 77  0; 55 m. The mesh density was

Fig. 10 e Field measurement of wake structure of Thrush 510G with a set of eight Gill 3-axis ultrasonic anemometers.
 b i o s y s t e m s e n g i n e e r i n g 1 4 5 ( 2 0 1 6 ) 5 2 e6 4 59

progressively clustered near the ground. The wake vortex of

Thrush 510G was approximated by the superposition of two
counter-rotating vortices. The bottom boundary was set as a
no-slip wall and the left boundary was set to velocity inlet. The
upper boundary was slip-wall and the right boundary was the
outflow. The computational domain is illustrated in Fig. 4. As
is common with investigations of vortex flow close to a
boundary, image vortices equal in strengths and opposite in
orientations were used to illustrate the effect of the ground in
the inviscid theory, in which the impermeability boundary
condition was satisfied on the wall. In order to also satisfy the
no slip boundary condition, the tangential component of ve-
locity was multiplied by the function 1  expz=zBL , where
zBL is the thickness of the vortex-induced boundary layer.
zBL 0:01$b0 was taken in the calculations. The turbulence
model was initialised through k and 2 , according to Eqs. (11)
and (12).
A grid sensitivity study was carried out. Three sets of grid
(coarse, medium, and fine) were generated, with the grid
Fig. 12 e Comparison of k profile, u* 0.406 ms1.
spacing ranging from 0.3 m, 0.15 me0.075 m. Since the radius
of the vortex is 0.6 m, the corresponding resolution at the
vortex core ranges from 4, 8 to 12.
A time step sensitivity study was also carried out. The time
step was taken from 0.5 s, 0.1 se0.05 s, corresponding to a
nondimensional time step of 0.04, 0.007, to 0.004.
Grid sensitivity study results showed that coarse grid was
fine enough to capture the main characteristics of the flow
under consideration. To ensure higher accuracy, the medium
grid was chosen to perform the simulations which were used
to simulate field conditions. Time step sensitivity study indi-
cated that the influence of time step was more pronounced
than that of grid resolution, and the results showed that at
Dt < 0:1 s the solution no longer depended on time step.
Due to symmetry of motion, only the trajectory of the
starboard vortex is shown in Fig. 5. The interval of time be-
tween each tracking dot is 2 s. The loop along the trajectory

Fig. 13 e Comparison of 2 profile, u* 0.406 ms1.

corresponds to the rebound of the primary vortex. Generally

speaking, the two-dimensional behaviour of a vortex pair in
ground effect is divided into two stages. Firstly, vortices
descend due to mutual interaction, and the ground tends to
slow down their descent and to increase their spacing. This is
an inviscid stage and the trajectory of each vortex is a hy-
perbola due to the mutual interaction of the image vortices.
The second stage has a viscous nature. As the vortices
approach the no-slip wall, boundary layers develop under the
inducement of the vortices. The resulting boundary layer
detaches and rolls-up into opposite sign secondary vortices
that induce an upward velocity on the primary vortices,
causing them to rebound away from the ground. The sec-
ondary vortices then orbit around the primary vortices giving
Fig. 11 e Comparison of mean velocity profile, a loop trajectory. This phenomenon is obvious in the
u* 0.406 ms1. Duponcheel case, as well as the present case of
60 b i o s y s t e m s e n g i n e e r i n g 1 4 5 ( 2 0 1 6 ) 5 2 e6 4
Fig. 14 e Trajectories of wake vortices with crosswind.
u* 0:01 ms1 .The temporal evolution of wake vortices is
illustrated in vorticity contour snapshots in Fig. 6, corre-
sponding to a physical time of 2 s, 10 s, 20 s, and 50 s. It can
be observed that for the case of u* 0:01 ms1 , complex
interaction of vortex with the ground occurred in the simu-
lations, including the detachment of secondary vorticity and
tertiary vorticity. In the case of u* 0:1 ms1 , which is shown
in Fig. 7. However, due to higher turbulence intensity, no
secondary vortex detached from the boundary layer, thus the
primary vortex did not rebound. Higher turbulence intensity
suppressed the detachment of secondary vorticity, leading to
the difference in trajectory.
The evolution of single vortex is illustrated in Fig. 8. The
vortex core expanded over time, and the process was
enhanced by turbulent mixing. Vorticity also decayed more
rapidly in higher turbulence.
For aerial spray application, the main interest is in the
velocity field that entrains the sprayed droplets. The position
and strength of wake vortices significantly affect the velocity
field. The x component of velocity can be regarded as ac-
counting for the lateral transport (or drift) of the sprayed
droplets with the z component of velocity accounting for the
vertical motion (or deposition). A sequence of velocity profiles
at z 3 m is given in Fig. 9. The zone of lateral velocity
concentrated around the vortex cores. It expanded as the
vortex diffused over time. The zone of downwash lied in be-
tween the vortex pair, and it expanded over time as the
Fig. 15 e Schematic diagram of crosswind gradient on
trajectory of a wake vortex pair.
separation between two vortices enlarged. The magnitudes of
peak velocity, as well as the downwash velocity, decreased as
the vortices decayed over time.
4. Vortex-ground interaction with crosswind
4.1. Description of experiment
A field experiment was conducted to investigate the wind
field during an aerial spray application. The experiment was
conducted in Kiamusze, Heilongjiang, PRC, on 25th
September, 2015. A Thrush 510G monoplane was flown 5 m
above ground at a speed of 200 kmh1 . A set of eight 3-axis
ultrasonic anemometers (WindMaster, Gill, Lymington,
Hampshire, UK) were used to measure wind speed. The
anemometer provides U, V, and W vectors of wind speed,
along with sonic air temperature and the speed of sound.
The anemometers were organised into two configurations,
i.e., vertical and horizontal, to measure the corresponding
profiles of velocity induced by wake vortices. The vertical
configuration consisted of eight anemometers evenly
located at a height from 0.5 m to 4 m. The horizontal
configuration consisted of seven anemometers in horizontal
direction and two more in vertical direction. The anemom-
eters were placed at different locations upwind and down-
wind of flight path. Fig. 10 shows the vertical configuration
of anemometers.
4.2. Characteristics of measured ABL (atmospheric
boundary layer)
Profiles of mean velocity and turbulence were obtained from
measurements. For simulation with the k  turbulence
model, the boundary conditions for the turbulence is
described in terms of the turbulence kinetic energy k and the
turbulence dissipation rate . In the present study the U-
component of the measured velocity was used for determi-
nation of the k-profile:
3 2
k u' (11)
2
 b i o s y s t e m s e n g i n e e r i n g 1 4 5 ( 2 0 1 6 ) 5 2 e6 4 61

Fig. 16 e Time histories of circulations of wake vortices with crosswind.

The turbulence dissipation rate is calculated as follows in which H rcp w' T' is sensible heat flux; u* u' w' 1=2 is
(Wu, Nie, & Fang, 2007): friction velocity; z is height; r is density; k is von-Karman
constant; g is acceleration of gravity; cp is specific heat ca-
8 u3  z z
2 1=2 z pacity; Ta is temperature.
> 
< kz 1 4 L 16 L
> ;
L
>0
  (12)
> u2
> z
1 z z 4.3. Numerical simulation
: 
13  ; <0
kz L L L
The mean wind velocity profile can be described with the log
Where L is Obukhov length, defined as:
law:
 
ru3 u z z0
L    (13) Uz ln (14)
k z0
kg cpHTa

Fig. 17 e Time history of vorticity with crosswind, u* 0.2 ms1.

62 b i o s y s t e m s e n g i n e e r i n g 1 4 5 ( 2 0 1 6 ) 5 2 e6 4

Fig. 18 e Lateral positons of wake vortices with crosswind, the positions of crosswind are plotted for comparison.

Fig. 19 e Lateral and vertical velocity profiles in the wake of Thrush 510G at z 3 m, u* 0.2 ms1.

simulation. The profiles of U, k, and , as well as their com-

u2 parison with the measurements are shown in Figs. 11e13.
kz p (15) Additionally, cases with u* 0:3; 0:2 and 0:1 ms1 were
Cm
also simulated for comparison.
u3* The computational domain was defined by
z (16)
kz z0 x; z240; 140  0; 55 m. The range in the streamwise di-
where z0 is the ABL roughness height. u* 0:406 ms1 , rection was extended since the wake vortices were trans-
Cm 0:0287, k 0:4187, z0 0:06 m were used to initialise the ported downwind. The resolution was Dx Dz 0:15 m: A
 b i o s y s t e m s e n g i n e e r i n g 1 4 5 ( 2 0 1 6 ) 5 2 e6 4
Fig. 20 e Comparison of horizontal velocity profiles at
z 3 m, results from CFD simulation (dashed line) and
from field measurement (solid line).
time step of 0.1 s was used and the maximum simulated time
was 50 s.
There are four factors affecting the trajectories: 1) magni-
tude of the crosswind, 2) gradient of the crosswind, 3) sign of
the vortices relative to crosswind, 4) boundary layer flow and
secondary vorticity.
Lateral transportation of wake vortex is a superposition of
self-induced transport and advection with the crosswind. The
self-induced transport speed depends on the altitude above
ground. The trajectories of wake vortices with crosswind are
shown in Fig. 14.
The mean crosswind profile corresponds to a negative
initial vorticity distribution (flowing from left to right), which
was imposed during the initialisation of the simulation.
Negative vorticity levels in the port primary vortex were
enhanced, whereas the starboard primary vortex exhibited
reduced positive vorticity levels eliminating symmetry. Since
the vorticity produced from the induced boundary layer was
of opposite sign to its adjacent primary vortex, the port vortex
was associated with a smaller positive vorticity boundary
layer, and the starboard vortex was associated with a
strengthened secondary vortex.
For the port vortex, the induced positive boundary layer
vorticity was suppressed by the negative crosswind vorticity.
Therefore, the rebound of the primary vortex was eliminated.
The port vortex tended to move vertically towards the ground
in the crosswind. Similar results were obtained by Corjon and
Poinsot (1997).
A schematic diagram of crosswind shear effect on the
trajectory of the wake vortices is illustrated in Fig. 15. The port
vortex was driven close to the ground, where the magnitude of
the crosswind was smaller. As for the starboard vortex, it
remained elevated and was transported further downwind
with increasing separation from the port vortex. Though the
vorticity of the vortex-induced boundary layer was strength-
ened by the crosswind, no significant detachment of the
vorticity was observed, as it was suppressed by turbulence.
63
The decay of circulation is shown in Fig. 16. It was found
that the starboard vortex decayed faster, whereas the port
vortex persisted longer. For the case of u* 0:406 ms1 , the
circulation of starboard vortex reduced to 10% of its initial
value in 10 s. Meanwhile it took approximately 20 s for the port
vortex to decay to the same value. Fig. 17 gives the temporal
evolution of wake vortices for the case of u* 0:2 ms1 . The
unequal decay rate of the two vortices is clearly shown
through the contour of vorticity. An isolated vortex has been
observed in numerical simulations and field experiments,
both in ground effect and out of ground effect (Luton, Ragab, &
Telionis, 1995; Proctor, 2014).
The temporal evolutions of lateral positions of wake
vortices are shown in Fig. 18. The positions of the crosswind
are also plotted in the figures for comparison. It can be seen
that the starboard vortex transported at a speed equal to the
speed of crosswind while the speed of port vortex was
somewhat lower. The locations of lateral positions could be
potentially used to help determine the spray swath width and
any buffer zones.
The drift of the sprayed droplets is directly affected by the
velocity field induced by the wake vortices. Apart from the
lateral transportation of wake vortices, the vertical induced
velocity field is of interest, especially in the region between
the nozzle and the target. Thus, the velocity profile and its
temporal evolution at z 3 m is shown in Fig. 19 for
u* 0:2 ms1 .
The port vortex tended to induce a negative lateral velocity
while the starboard vortex induced a positive lateral velocity.
The result will be to move particles away from the area of
deposition, increasing the swath width. The influence of
vortices on lateral velocity mainly concentrated around the
vortex cores. It is evident in Fig. 19 that a velocity gradient
exists between two vortices.
As for the vertical velocity, a favorable downwash occurred
in the region between two vortices where the nozzles were
mounted. The downwash velocity decreased as vortices
decayed and their spacing increased. The evolution of down-
wash velocity over time is plotted in Fig. 14. A comparison of
downwash velocity profiles is shown in Fig. 20. The numerical
result was chosen from the case of u* 0:406 ms1 , at the
same height of measurement.
5. Conclusions
The velocity field in the wake of fixed wing monoplane was
studied through the turbulent interactions of wake vortices in
extreme ground effect with and without crosswind. Several
conclusions can be drawn:
The trajectories of wake vortices in extreme ground effect
without any crosswind are symmetrical. Turbulence intensity
plays an important role in the motion and decay of wake
vortices. For the simulated case, a rebound of primary vortex
occurs at u* 0:01 ms1 , while at u* 0:1 ms1 , higher tur-
bulence intensity suppresses the rebound and accelerates the
decay of primary vortices.
The symmetry of the trajectories of two vortices is
disturbed by crosswind. In a crosswind both vortices are
transported downwind; the starboard vortex is transported
64 b i o s y s t e m s e n g i n e e r i n g 1 4 5 ( 2 0 1 6 ) 5 2 e6 4
faster and decays faster than the port vortex, resulting in a
long-lived, isolated vortex. The phenomenon has been
observed previously during field experiments and numerical
simulations, both in and out of ground effect. The present
results confirm the existence of the isolated vortex in
extreme ground effect.
The numerical simulation was validated by field experi-
ment. It lays as a foundation for further studies concerning
the drift and dispersion of sprayed droplets.
Acknowledgements
This work was supported by the Cultivation and Development
Special Project of Beijing Science and Technology Innovation
Base (Z151100001615016). This work was also part of the In-
ternational Cooperation Fund of Beijing Academy of Agricul-
ture and Forestry Sciences project (GJHZ2015-7) wind field
measurements and control of drift of plant protection UAV.
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