Interactive simulation 001

NACA 0012 flow lab

Read one solved flow three ways: evenly released tracers show motion, calibrated vectors show local velocity, and color shows the magnitude of speed change from freestream.

Geometry NACA 0012

Solver Solving…

Model 2D · inviscid

Visible layers Particles Material lattice Velocity vectors Streamlines

Particles Vector palette Lattice Streamlines

Angle of attack4.0° Above 10°, the display switches to a labeled qualitative separation and stall demonstration. Freestream speed30 m/s Zero stops the flow; increasing speed raises dynamic pressure, lift, and lattice motion. Air density1.225 kg/m³ Changes dynamic pressure and lift, not the velocity pattern in this incompressible model. Tracer latticeMedium Display density only: equal release spacing and cadence upstream.

Lift coefficient: —
Lift per unit span: —
Dynamic pressure: —

Read the model correctly

A useful idealization, not CFD

The browser solves a constant-strength source-panel model with one circulation unknown and a trailing-edge Kutta condition. Streamlines and tracers use second-order midpoint integration through that velocity field. Pressure coefficient follows the steady, incompressible Bernoulli relation.

Limits: two-dimensional, steady, incompressible, and inviscid. It does not predict a boundary layer, separation, skin-friction drag, compressibility, or stall. Above 10°, the lab therefore replaces computed loads with a visibly labeled qualitative separation overlay; it is an educational regime cue, not CFD or a stall predictor.

Reference context: NASA Glenn — Bernoulli’s equation, NASA Glenn — the lift equation, and NASA TM-100019 — NACA 0012 wind-tunnel assessment.