Abstract
Drag reduction is one of main concerns for commercial aircraft companies than ever because fuel price has been tripled in ten years. In this research, Natural Laminar Flow airfoil is designed and tested to reduce drag at cruise condition, $c_l$=0.3, Re=3.4${\times}$10$^6$ and M=0.6. NLF airfoil is characterized by delayed transition from laminar to turbulent flow, which comes from maintaining favorable pressure gradient to downstream. Transition is predicted by solving Boundary Layer equations in viscous boundary layer and by solving Euler Equation outside the boundary layer. Once boundary layer thickness and momentum thickness are obtained, $e^N$-method is used for transition point prediction. As results, KARI's NLF airfoil is designed and shows better characteristics than NLF-0115. The characteristics are tested and verified at low Reynolds numbers, but at high Reynolds numbers, laminar flow characteristics are not obtainable because of fully turbulent flow over airfoil surfaces. Precious experiences, however, relating NLF airfoil design, subsonic and transonic tests are acquired.
