Research Article Wind Tunnel Testing and Validation of Helicopter Rotor Blades Using Additive Manufacturing Inamul Hasan , 1,2 R. Mukesh, 3 P. Radha Krishnan , 1,2 R. Srinath, 2,4 Dhanya Prakash Babu , 1 and Negash Lemma Gurmu 5 1 Department of Aeronautical Engineering, ACS College of Engineering, Bangalore 560074, Karnataka, India 2 Department of Aeronautical Engineering, Visvesvaraya Technological University, Belagavi 590018, Karnataka, India 3 Department of Aerospace Engineering, ACS College of Engineering, Bangalore 560074, Karnataka, India 4 Department of Aerospace Engineering, Dayananda Sagar University, Bangalore 560078, Karnataka, India 5 Department of Industrial Engineering, Ambo University, Ambo, Ethiopia Correspondence should be addressed to Negash Lemma Gurmu; negash.lemma@ambou.edu.et Received 24 June 2022; Revised 2 August 2022; Accepted 20 August 2022; Published 21 September 2022 Academic Editor: K. Raja Copyright © 2022 Inamul Hasan et al. is is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. is research paper aims to validate the aerodynamic performance of rotor blades using additive manufacturing techniques. Wind tunnel testing is a technique used to find the flow characteristics of the body. Computational fluid dynamics (CFD) techniques are used for aerodynamic analysis, and validation should be done using wind tunnel testing. In the aerodynamic testing of models, additive manufacturing techniques help in validating the results by making models easily for wind tunnels. Recent developments in additive manufacturing help in the aerodynamic testing of models in wind tunnels. e CFD analysis of helicopter rotor blades was analyzed in this research, and validation was done using additive manufacturing techniques. Computational analysis was carried out for static analysis for the forward speeds of Mach numbers 0.3, 0.4, and 0.5. e results obtained were satisfactory to the previous results and were validated with wind tunnel testing. Results proved that the error percentage was lower, and the computational analysis was valid. In this research, models were designed using the FDM technique for wind tunnel testing as it is cost-effective and easy to manufacture. 1. Introduction A helicopter is a flying machine with many advantages over other flying objects, such as landing or take-off at almost any terrain, flying at a specific position (hovering), and flying backward and sidewards quickly. Helicopters can be termed any terrain vehicle as they have many advantages over aircraft [1, 2]. e helicopter is a type of rotorcraft currently used for many purposes such as rescue, firefighting, and agriculture. e helicopter’s design differs with various parameters for different applications [3]. Helicopters possess more capability than aircraft as it has the unique ability of vertical take-off and landing, and no particular runway. Helicopters have some disadvantages over aircraft in the case of speed and pilot operation. e helicopter speed is im- proved since the invention of the helicopter in recent days. Many factors are suppressing the speed of helicopters [4]. Helicopters can fly forward, backward, or sideways, stay at a position (hover), and vertically can go up or come down. In aircraft, lift is produced by the wings, and engines produce thrust. In helicopters, lift and thrust are produced by a rotor driven by one or two engines [5, 6]. CFD software is used for analyzing the aerodynamic performance of moving vehicles to assess the aerodynamic performance. CFD is widely used in many fields, and im- proving CFD techniques helps improve results and reduce errors [7]. Even though CFD software provides good results, researchers prefer to compare the results obtained from CFD with wind tunnel testing. CFD results can be validated with the previous experimental results or wind tunnel tests [8, 9]. e model was made from wood or metals for wind tunnel tests in the previous days. Models created in wood require a Hindawi Advances in Materials Science and Engineering Volume 2022, Article ID 4052208, 13 pages https://doi.org/10.1155/2022/4052208