A. J.

Vance
J. M. Buick
Department of Mechanical
and Design Engineering,
Anglesea Road,
Anglesea Building,
The University of Portsmouth,
Portsmouth PO1 3DJ, United Kingdom

J. Livesey
Defence College of Aeronautical Engineering
(Gosport),
in partnership with VT Flagship,
Royal Naval Air Engineering
and Survival School,
HMS Sultan,
Gosport PO12 3BY, United Kingdom

Aerodynamics of a Rugby Ball

This paper describes the aerodynamic forces on a rugby ball traveling at speeds between
5 and 15 ms1. This range is typical of the ball speed during passing play and a range of
kicking events during a game of rugby, and complements existing data for higher velocities. At the highest speeds considered here, the lift and drag coefficients are found to be
compatible with previous studies at higher velocities. In contrast to these higher speed
investigations, a significant variation is observed in the aerodynamic force over the range
of velocities considered. Flow visualizations are also presented, indicating how the flow
pattern, which is responsible for the aerodynamic forces, changes with the yaw angle of
the ball. This flow and, in particular, the position of the separation points, is examined in
detail. The angular position of the separation point is found to vary in a linear manner
over much of the surface of the rugby ball; however, this behavior is interrupted when
the separation point is close to the tip of the ball. [DOI: 10.1115/1.4005562]

Introduction

Ever since its humble beginnings at Rugby School in 1823 the

sport of rugby football has evolved with regards to its rules,
tactics, and equipment. Increasingly, aspects of the sport have
been studied and investigated in a scientific manner in order to
better understand the multitude of complex factors involved in the
game and the manner in which they interact to influence the performance of both individuals and teams. Much of the research
into the varying football codes has focused on aspects directly
related to the players such as match analysis, fitness, training and
the health of players, physiology of both playing and training,
coaching, biomechanics, nutrition, and even the method with
which ball is carried [14]. A limited number of studies have considered the aerodynamics of the rugby ball itself. An understanding of the aerodynamics of a rugby ball has two potential
applications. First, rugby players could benefit from an understanding of how the ball behaves under different conditions. This
could lead to better decision making during the passing game and,
more significantly, during the kicking game, where the accuracy
of long distance kicks can have a significant role in the outcome
of a game. Second, knowledge of the relevant aerodynamics could
be beneficial when considering rule changes concerned with the
shape and/or size of the ball, and when designing new rugby balls
in the future.
The aerodynamic forces of drag D and lift L are defined to be
the components of the aerodynamic force in the direction of the
air flow (or opposing the motion of the ball when it is in flight)
and perpendicular to the air flow, respectively. It is convenient to
define the drag and lift coefficients CD and CL as
CD

2D
Aqu2

(1)

CL

2L
Aqu2

(2)

and

where q is the air density, u is the air speed (or speed of the
moving ball), and A is the projected frontal area at 0 deg yaw
angle A pd2/4, where d is the diameter. It is also convenient
Manuscript received February 15, 2011; final manuscript received August 10,
2011; accepted manuscript posted January 31, 2012; published online February 16,
2012. Assoc. Editor: Nadine Aubry.

Journal of Applied Mechanics

to represent the air speed by the dimensionless Reynolds

number
Re

udq
l

(3)

where l is the viscosity of the air.

Early studies of the aerodynamics of sports balls [5] have concentrated on balls where a spinning motion produces swing while
the ball is in flight; for example, a cricket ball, baseball, or golf
ball. More recently, there has been considerable interest in understanding the general flight of sports balls and, in particular, determining their lift and drag coefficients. These have focused on rugby
balls [611], American footballs [12], Australian rules footballs [9],
association football or soccer balls [1315], tennis balls [16,17],
baseballs [18], cricket balls [19] and badminton shuttlecocks [20].
Alam et al. [7,911] studied the aerodynamics of a rugby ball
using both experimental and computational approaches. In the wind
tunnel, the lift and drag coefficients on a full size rugby ball were
obtained for yaw angles between 0 deg and 90 deg for a number
of wind speeds between 60 kmh1 (17 ms1) and 140 kmh1
(39 ms1). The drag and lift coefficients were found to vary only
slightly with Reynolds number for air speeds greater than 80 kmh1
(22 ms1); however, a significant difference was observed between
the measurements at 60 kmh1 and 80 kmh1. Visualization was
performed using wool tufts. These showed qualitative differences
between the flow at a yaw angle of 0 deg and 90 deg. Numerical simulations using FLUENT 6.1 were also presented. The lift and drag
coefficients determined from the simulations were broadly similar to
the experimental values, although a number of differences were
observed, including the observation that the simulated coefficients
showed considerably less variation with the Reynolds number.
Wind tunnel measurements were performed by Seo [6], who
presented values of the lift and drag coefficient measured on a full
scale rugby ball in a wind tunnel for a wind speed of 20 ms1 and
for yaw angles between 0 deg and 90 deg. These measurements
were generally similar to those of Alam et al. [7,911] although
there were qualitative differences; Seo [6] reported larger values
for the drag coefficient at the larger yaw angles and smaller values
at lower yaw angles. This work was extended [8] to consider a
range of wind speeds between 15 and 30 ms1 and for the ball
spinning at a rate of between 1 and 10 revolutions per second.
Only small differences in the coefficients were observed in this
range and therefore only averaged quantities were presented. A
polynomial expansion was also determined for the lift and drag
coefficients as a function of the yaw angle.

C 2012 by ASME
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In this study, the lift and drag coefficients are considered at lower
wind speeds. The minimum wind speed considered by Alam et al.
[7] was 17 ms1 and the value used by Seo [6] was 20 ms1. These
are close to the maximum velocities a ball would reach when kicked
at full strength, while the maximum velocity of 39 ms1 considered
in [7] is faster than you would expect in a game of rugby, corresponding to the average penalty or conversion kick lasting for less
than one second. Thus, during the majority of kicking events and
when the ball is passed from player to player, the Reynolds numbers
experienced by the ball will be less than those considered in previous
studies. Given that the existing experimental results [7,911] suggested that the lift and drag coefficients are dependent on the Reynolds number at the lower limits of the tested range, it is important to
investigate the drag and lift at lower speeds.
Additionally, we present flow visualizations at different yaw
angles. It is important to consider the air flow around the ball,
since this is responsible for the variation in the lift and drag coefficients which have been observed. The visualizations were performed using smoke tracing and give a more detailed description
of the flow around the rugby balls compared to the wool tufts
employed elsewhere [7,911]. The visualization images are then
used to investigate how the flow, and the position of the separation
point on the ball, are affected by the yaw angle.

Model Design

Lift and drag measurements were performed in a wind tunnel

and visualization experiments were carried out in a separate
smoke visualizer. Before any experiments could be undertaken,
the models had to be inserted into the test facilities. Due to the
size of these tunnels, a full size rugby ball could not be used since
it is important to ensure that there is sufficient space between the
ball and the walls of the wind tunnel, so that the proximity of the
tunnel walls does not influence the measurements. The models
were created by first producing a scan of an official STEEDEN
match rugby ball. The scanned information was then fed into Pro
Engineer Wildfire 4.0 software where it was scaled to the required
sizes to fit the relevant tunnels. One model of 180 mm in length
was prepared for the wind tunnel and a model of 90 mm in length
for the smoke visualizer. This information was then converted
into an STL (STereoLithography) file and fed into a Dimension
SST 768 3D Printer for rapid prototyping of the models, which
were built from the bottom up, one layer at a time. The layers
were created from acrylonitrile butadiene styrene (ABS), a tough,
durable plastic, through fused deposition molding. The ABS plastic was fed into an extrusion head, heated to a semiliquid state,
and accurately deposited in filament to form layers as fine as
0.178 mm. This gives the effective accuracy of the final model.
The seams connecting the panels of the rugby ball and the small
dimples on the surface of the ball were not incorporated into the
model. The orientation of the seam, including the lace binding the
ball, has been shown to have little effect on the lift and drag coefficients [6], suggesting that the emission of the details of the seam
will not significantly affect the measurements.

Results and Discussion

The lift and drag measurements are shown in Figs. 1 and 2 for
yaw angles between 0 deg to 60 deg. At higher yaw angles, some
vibration was observed in the system and thus it was not possible to
ensure accurate measurements. The scales on the bottom and left
axis represent the dimensionless quantities Re and CD or CL. The
values on the top axis represent the velocity for a full sized rugby
ball. Also shown in Fig. 1 is the measured drag coefficient for a
smooth sphere which was used to calibrate the wind tunnel. This
was done using equation (4) [21], derived from [22], which is also
shown.
CD

24
0:407
1 0:150Re0:681
Re
1 8710=Re

021020-2 / Vol. 79, MARCH 2012

(4)

Fig. 1 The measured drag coefficient (open symbols) as a

function of the Reynolds number for yaw angles between 0 deg
and 60 deg. Also shown are the measured drag coefficient (3)
and the literature values [21] for a sphere. The experimental
results of Alam et al. (2009) [9] and Seo (2004) [6] are also
shown as black and gray filled symbols, respectively.

Fig. 2 The measured lift coefficient (open symbols) as a function

of the Reynolds number for yaw angles between 10 deg and
60 deg. The experimental results of Alam et al. [9] and Seo [6] are
also shown as black and gray filled symbols, respectively.

The variation between the measured drag coefficient for the sphere
and that computed from Eq. (4) indicates the level of uncertainty in
the drag coefficient measurements. Also shown in Figs. 1 and 2 are
the results of Alam et al. [9] at a wind speed of 60 kmh1 (17 ms1)
and Seo [6] at a wind speed of 20 ms1. The results from [6] have
been interpolated to find the values at the yaw angles considered
here and are also normalized by V2/3A1 due to the different definition of the coefficients. The volume V of the rugby ball used in [6]
was taken as 4.8  103 m3 [8] while the cross-sectional area of the
ball was estimated from the maximum circumference of 620 mm.
The drag coefficients in Fig. 1 show a significant variation with
the Reynolds number for all yaw angles except the smallest two
(0 deg and 10 deg), with the magnitude of the variation increasing
with the yaw angle and decreasing with the Reynolds number. For
each value of the Reynolds number, the drag coefficient increases
slowly with the yaw angle for a < 40 deg and more rapidly for
a > 40 deg. The values of the drag coefficients are consistent with
the results of Alam et al. [9] at 60 kmh1 (16.6 ms1). There is
also general agreement with the results of Seo [6], although the
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Fig. 3 The lift to drag ratio L/D as a function of the yaw angle, a

trend of the results presented here suggests somewhat lower values

for the drag coefficients at 20 ms1, compared to [6]. This difference
may be due to slight differences in the shape of the ball [8].

The lift coefficients shown in Fig. 2 show a variation with both

the yaw angle and the Reynolds number. Over the range of the
measurements the lift coefficient decreases with increasing air
speed and decreasing yaw angle. The results also indicate that for
each yaw angle the rate of change of the lift coefficients decreases
with the Reynolds number. This is consistent with the small variation observed at higher speeds in [6,9]. The measured values of
the lift coefficients are consistent with the results of Seo [6] which
are slightly larger than the trend of the results here would suggest;
this is similar to, but smaller than, the differences observed for the
drag coefficients. This is, again, possibly due to small differences
in the shape of the ball.
The results for a yaw angle of 60 deg are consistent with the
results of Alam et al. [9]; however, the lift coefficients presented
here decrease in a more linear fashion with the yaw angle. Interestingly, this approximately linear behavior was observed by
Alam et al. [9] at higher Reynolds numbers.
The lift to drag ratio L/D is shown in Fig. 3. For each Reynolds
number, it peaks at a yaw angle of around 40 deg. This is consistent with the observations from Figs. 1 and 2 which show that the
drag coefficient increases only slowly with the yaw angle up to 40
deg, and then increases more rapidly at higher yaw angles, while
the lift coefficient increases in an approximately linear manner

Fig. 4 Smoke visualizations of the air flow around the rugby ball at yaw angles of (a) 0 deg, (b) 10
deg, (c) 20 deg, (d ) 30 deg, (e) 40 deg, (f ) 50 deg, (g) 60 deg, (h) 70 deg, (i ) 80 deg, and ( j ) 90 deg

Journal of Applied Mechanics

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Fig. 5 The positions of the separation point at the top h and

the bottom / of the ball with respect to the longitudinal axis of
the ball (subscript b) and the air direction (subscript a). The
solid lines indicate the best-fit straight lines through selected
points and the dashed line is 180 deg minus the yaw angle, representing the position of the back tip of the ball, tip Y, with
respect to the incoming air flow.

over the whole range. It is also evident that L/D decreases with
the Reynolds number indicating that the drag force increases more
rapidly than the lift force with the increasing Reynolds number.
Visualizations of the air flow around the rugby ball are shown
in Fig. 4 for yaw angles between 0 deg and 90 deg. The change in
the air flow profile can clearly be seen. At 0 deg (Fig. 4(a)), separation points can be seen close to the rear of the ball and only a
small region of separated flow is observed. This is due to the
streamlined shape of the rugby ball and explains the relatively
low drag coefficient at this angle. At 90 deg (Fig. 4( j)), separation
occurs close to the tip of the ball at an angle of approximately 90 deg
to the wind direction. Here, there is a significantly larger region of
separated flow which covers the downwind half of the ball.
The change in the size and shape of the separated flow region
can be seen for each of the intermediate angles where the asymmetry of the ball relative to the air-flow direction is mirrored in
the separated flow indicating the presence of lift. The separated
region increases in size relatively slowly with increasing yaw
angle for a < 40 deg, Figs. 4(a)4(d). For a > 40 deg, the separated region covers the majority of the downstream side of the
ball, and covers a significantly larger percentage of the balls surface compared to the smaller yaw angles. This explains the change
in the behavior of the lift coefficient at a 40 deg, which was
observed in Fig. 1 and the peak in L/D in Fig. 3. The flow visualization results are qualitatively assessed in Fig. 5, where the positions of the separation point at the top h and the bottom / of the
ball with respect to the longitudinal axis through the front tip X of
the ball (subscript b) and the air direction (subscript a) are considered. The relevant angles and the tips X and Y are defined in Fig. 6.
Figure 5 shows that the angular position of both of the separation points with respect to the air flow (ha and /a) is just over 150
deg at zero yaw angle and decreases to approximately 90 deg
when the longitudinal axis is perpendicular to the direction of air
flow. That is, when the yaw angle is zero, the separation points
are close to the rear of the ball and only a small separation region
is present (Fig. 4(a)). As the yaw angle is increased, the positions
of the separation points move forward (relative to the wind direction). The rate of this motion is different on the top and bottom.
When the yaw angle is 90 deg, the separation points occur at
around the same angle at the tips of the ball, and the separated
flow covers the back half of the ball surface. It is also clear from
Fig. 5 that, although the position of the separation points, relative
to the air direction, on the top and the bottom of the ball are the
same at 0 deg and 90 deg yaw angles, their relative positions vary
021020-4 / Vol. 79, MARCH 2012

Fig. 6 The position of the upper and lower separation points

and the angles they make with respect to the air flow and the
longitudinal axis of the ball. Tips X and Y are labeled such that
at a yaw angle of 0 deg tip X points directly upwind and tip Y,
correspondingly, points downwind.

at intermediate angles. The positions of the top and bottom separation point are consistent up to a yaw angle of 30 deg. After this angle
the separation point on the top surface occurs further forward than
the separation point on the bottom surface. This behavior can best be
understood by considering hb and /b, the positions of the upper and
lower separation points, respectively, with respect to the longitudinal
axis of the ball through tip X, where hb ha  a and /b /a a.
The value of hb decreases in a linear manner from its initial value of
around 150 deg when a 70 deg, to a minimum value of just over
0 deg at a yaw angle of a 70 deg. This corresponds to the separation point sitting just behind tip X and corresponds to the minimum
value of ha which is less than 90 deg. The linear nature of this
relationship is illustrated in Fig. 5 by the best fit straight line
(0 deg  a  70 deg) which has the equation
hb 2:173a 161

(5)

At higher values of the yaw angle, the position of the upper separation point with respect to the axis of the ball remains approximately constant just behind tip X. The position of the lower
separation point with respect to the axis of the ball increases
steadily with increasing yaw angle. The best-fit straight line
through the values of /b is shown in Fig. 5; it has the equation
/b 0:464a 151

(6)

The level of agreement between the best-fit line and the data
points is good considering the inherent uncertainty in measuring
the position of the separation point from the images. The one
point which deviates significantly from the best-fit line is at
a 50 deg. This corresponds to the yaw angle where the position
of the bottom tip Y (represented by 180  a in Fig. 5) passes
through the position of the lower separation point. This is seen in
Fig. 5 where the values of /a are below the 180  a line for
a  40 deg and above or close to the line for larger values of the
yaw angle. Once the position of the separation point moves over
tip Y it remains just behind the tip. This transition of the lower
separation point across the tip between a 40 deg and a 50 deg
is consistent with the yaw angle where a transition was observed in
Fig. 4 from a small to a large separated region and where the
maximum lift to drag ratio occurred at around 40 deg in Fig. 3.

Conclusion

The aerodynamics of a rugby ball have been investigated using

flow visualization and direct measurement of lift and drag forces
for air speeds between 5 and 15 ms1 and for yaw angles up to 60
deg. The lift coefficient showed an inverse dependence on the
Reynolds number for all yaw angles considered. The drag coefficient displayed the same general trend, although the variations
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were smaller and fairly negligible for the smaller yaw angles. The
lift to drag ratio was found to decrease with the Reynolds number
and, in each case, was found to peak at a yaw angle of around 40
deg. This peak was explained by the observation that the separated
region at the back of the ball was relatively small at yaw angles
up to 40 deg and significantly larger, covering the majority of the
downstream side of the ball, at yaw angles greater than 40 deg.
The relationship between the yaw angle and the positions of the
separation points, on the top and bottom of the ball, relative to
the longitudinal axis through the front tip (pointing upwind at an
a 0 deg) were also considered. For increasing values of the yaw
angle, corresponding to the ball rotated in a clock-wise direction,
the angular position of the upper separation point moved forward
along the ball in a linear manner until a yaw angle of 70 deg. At
this angle the separation point was just behind the forward tip
and it remained in this position for larger yaw angles. The angular
position of the lower separation point was found to move backwards along the ball, also in a linear fashion. The only exception
to this occurred at a yaw angle of around 50 deg and corresponded
to the separation point passing over the back tip (which was
originally pointing downwind at a 0 deg).

Acknowledgment
The authors would like to thank the Commanding Officer of the
Defense College of Aeronautical Engineering (Gosport) for the
use of the laboratory facilities within the Royal Naval Air Engineering and Survival School, HMS Sultan, Gosport, in support of
this project.

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