Transonic Wing and Control Surface Loads Modelling for Aeroservoelastic Analysis

The exponential growth of the aviation sector combined with environmental and energy supply challenges have led companies to innovate to reduce aircraft fuel consumption. Among the many areas currently under research, this thesis investigates the possibility of making aircraft wings lighter thanks to flight load alleviation systems and more...

Autonomous Smart Morphing Wing: Development, Realisation & Validation

With the increasing desire of the aerospace industry to reduce emissions and fuel consumption, morphing wings have gained much interest due to the ability to adapt the wing shape in-flight for improved energy efficiency and aerodynamic performance. Active wing morphing is a technology that can improve aerodynamic performance continuously through...

Design and experimental analysis of an active and passive camber morphing system for rotor blades

Modern helicopters are equipped with rotor blades with exposed linkages, swashplates, and mechanical components. While such rotor blades have proved to be highly reliable, they are the leading cause to generate noise and vibration. In addition, the drag due to exposed linkages and hinges affects the helicopter performance. To overcome these...

Piezo-sensors for in-situ boundary layer monitoring on morphing wings: Development, validation and implementation

This thesis describes the development, validation and implementation of piezoelectric flow sensors. These sensors are meant to measure flow phenomena such as transition and separation in the boundary layer of an aircraft wing. Such information can be used<br/>as input variables to a control loop to push laminar-to-turbulent transition towards...

Simultaneous Optimisation of Composite Wing Structures and Control Systems for Active and Passive Load Alleviation

Future composite aircraft wing designs will exploit anisotropic material properties by aeroelastic tailoring and include active control methods for manoeuvre and gust load alleviation. The research focuses on the simultaneous optimisation of aeroelastically tailored wing structures with active manoeuvre and gust load alleviation as well as the...

Dynamic aeroelastic optimization of composite wings including fatigue considerations

The COVID-19 pandemic had a significant impact on the aviation industry with more than 60% reduction in the passenger traffic in the year 2020 compared to year 2019. The passenger traffic which is now expected to reach the 2019 level only around the year 2024 will still continue to grow but at a lower pace compared to the pre pandemic levels....

Aeroelastic Tailoring of Composite Aircraft

The process of designing an aircraft is generally divided in three phases, namely the conceptual, preliminary and detailed. The whole process is one that involves various disciplines and is subject to multiple constraints. Traditionally the different aspects of the design process are tackled separately by different departments within a company....

High-Fidelity Load and Gradient Corrections for Static Aeroelastic Tailoring of Composite Wings

Multi-disciplinary design optimization (MDO) is a field that has gained traction in recent years. It can be distinguished as a methodology that promotes a simultaneous change in design features associated to multiple disciplines in order to achieve the best possible design of a coupled multi-disciplinary problem. A typical application in...

Fast Aeroelastic Analysis and Optimisation of Large Mixed Materials Wind Turbine Blades

In this dissertation, structural wind turbine blade layouts are presented that are suitable for 10MW and 20MW wind turbine blades. This has been accomplished by using a medium fidelity static aeroelastic model embedded in an optimisation framework. The structural solutions are the result of a stiffness optimisation where the blade mass is...

Smart Wind Turbine: Analysis and Autonomous Flap

Wind turbines convert kinetic energy of the wind into electrical energy. Unfortunately, this process is everything but constant, as the wind source shows large fluctuations with high and low frequencies. This turbulence, together with the wind shear and yawed inflow, excites the turbine structure, thereby driving the loads and the design of...

Control design for two-bladed wind turbines

In the past decades wind energy has evolved into a mature source of sustainable energy such that onshore wind turbines have become cost competitive with other fossil-based energy sources. Onshore wind energy, however, faces social resistance and a lack of available locations. Offshore wind energy, on the other hand, offers vast amounts of...