Airfoil Pressures and Performance
The shape of the pressure distribution is directly related to the airfoil
performance as indicated by some of the features shown in the figure below.
Most of these considerations are related to the airfoil boundary layer characteristics
which we will take up later, but even in the inviscid case we can draw some
conclusions. We may compute the maximum local Mach numbers and relate those
to lift and thickness; we can compute the pitching moment and decide if
that is acceptable.
Whether we use the inviscid pressures to form qualitative conclusions about
the section, or use them as input to a more detailed boundary layer calculation,
we must first investigate the close relation between the airfoil geometry
to these pressures.