Supersonic laminar flow past a blunt fin: duality of numerical solution

The results of a numerical solution of the problem of supersonic flow past a blunt fin mounted on a plate with a developing boundary layer are presented. Generally, the case considered corresponds to the flow configuration used in the experimental and computational study by Tutty et al. (2013), in which the laminar air flow with the freestream Mach number of 6.7 is considered. The simulation was performed for different values of Reynolds number ranging from 5.0 $\times$ 10$^3$ to 2.0 $\times$ 10$^4$. Two stable solutions corresponding to metastable flow states with different configurations of the vortex structure were predicted within some range of Reynolds number. The bifurcation diagrams showing the main horseshoe vortex center location and the length of separation region versus the Reynolds number is presented, critical Reynolds number corresponding to occurrence of the second isolated solution is evaluated.