Kutta-Joukowski Cylinder Circulation Lift
Circulation makes pressure asymmetric around a cylinder and creates lift whose sign can be checked by integration.
Free theory articleCirculation makes pressure asymmetric around a cylinder and creates lift whose sign can be checked by integration.
Concept & interpretation
Inviscid incompressible potential flow around a cylinder reveals fundamental fluid dynamics principles. When a uniform freestream interacts with a cylinder, the superposition of a circulation term induces an asymmetric velocity field, leading to a pressure difference and the generation of lift.
experiment
You can interact with this model to see the streamlines and resulting lift for various freestream velocities and circulation values. Visit the interactive module here:
https://riano.app/module/kutta-joukowski-cylinder-circulation-lift
- Set the Stream speed to 1 and the Cylinder radius to 1.
- Change the Circulation over two pi to 1. Observe the closed streamlines starting to emerge and the calculated Lift per length becoming negative.
- Adjust the Circulation over two pi to -1. Notice that the lift per length flips sign and becomes positive.
- Change the Surface degrees to see the tangential velocity vector evaluated at different points on the cylinder surface.