This week, we conducted our first test in Dr. Ukeiley’s wind tunnel lab. After verifying the fit of our components and making necessary adjustments, we installed our first top plate in the test section and mounted our manifold above it. Using two pressure transducers and a temperature sensor, we collected data to determine the mass flow bled through our 45-degree orifices. As a control, we also tested a top plate without bleed orifices.

The results indicated that we were bleeding less flow than initially expected based on our original project goals. However, we decided to redefine our objective by focusing on mass flow per orifice rather than total mass flow, considering that our test apparatus is at a smaller scale than the isolator it represents. Given the larger surface area of the isolator, additional orifices could be added to achieve the intended mass flow. Moving forward, we plan to test our 60-degree and 30-degree orifice top plates and, depending on available time, explore flipping each plate by 180 degrees or increasing the number of orifices to gather more data.

Meanwhile, our ANSYS team has been refining the initial conditions of our simulations based on feedback from our coach and previous results. With the new experimental data, they will update the simulation conditions to better reflect the lab environment and aim for similar results. This validation process will help ensure accuracy as we explore new combinations of angles and orifices in future tests.