Aerodynamic Performance of Natural Laminar Flow Airfoils

This publication identifies different natural laminar flow airfoils and assesses their validity or not for two types of applications against their 4-digit NACA equivalents: low speed and high speed. Several airfoils were analyzed and a new high-speed airfoil was designed to optimize its properties. The results show that for lower speeds the laminar airfoil wings have the best efficiency that is lower drag for the same amount of lift when considering leveled flight.