Flexible Composite Propeller Design for Optimized Performance in Propulsive and Regenerative Operating Conditions

The ever-growing aerospace industry's urgent need to reduce greenhouse gas emissions has ignited a surge of interest in hybrid or fully electric propulsion systems. The electrification of aircraft introduces the possibility for energy to be recovered during phases of flight where no power input is required, and previous research has demonstrated...

Application of Aeroelastic Tailoring for Load Alleviation on a Flying Demonstrator Wing †

This article presents the application of aeroelastic tailoring in the design of wings for a flying demonstrator, as well as the validation of the design methodology with flight test results. The investigations were performed in the FLEXOP project (Flutter Free Flight Envelope Expansion for Economical Performance Improvement), funded under the...

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...

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....

Geometrically Nonlinear High Fidelity Aerostructural Optimisation for Highly Flexible Wings

In the past decade, MDO researchers have developed capabilities to simultaneously optimise the shape and internal structure of aircraft based on coupled high fidelity Computational Fluid Dynamics and Finite Element Analysis. However, to date the finite element methods used for the structural analysis are typically linear and are known to be...

Investigations of passive wing technologies for load reduction

Wings of modern aircraft have to be designed to give optimal response with respect to loads, comfort and performance. An essential part of the wing development is thus a design process which can take all these aspects into consideration. In the “Adaptive Wing” work package of the CleanSky “Smart Fixed Wing Aircraft” project, a multi-fidelity...

The effects of a full-aircraft aerodynamic model on the design of a tailored composite wing

This paper discusses the effects of the aerodynamic model on the design of a composite wing via aeroelastic tailoring. The classic framework for analysis and optimization of composite wings developed at Delft University of Technology adopts panel method aerodynamics to calculate static and dynamic loads. The current work expands the...

Aeroelastic tailoring of flexible composite aircraft

This paper presents a unified framework for aeroelastic tailoring of fully-flexible free-flying composite aircraft. A continuous-time state-space model is used to describe the flow. The 3D composite wing structure is condensed into a Timoshenko beam model utiliz-ing a cross-sectional modeler. The aerodynamic and structural models are tightly...

FLEXOP – Application of aeroelastic tailoring to a flying demonstrator wing

This paper presents the application of aeroelastic tailoring in the design of flying demonstrator wings. The work is part of the Flutter Free Flight Envelope eXpansion (FLEXOP) project, funded under the Horizon 2020 framework. The project involves the design, manufacturing and flight-testing of a UAV toward two principle goals: i) to demonstrate...

Aeroelastic Modelling and Design of Aeroelastically Tailored and Morphing Wings

In order to accommodate the growth in air traffic whilst reducing the impact on the environment, operational efficiency is becoming more and more important in the design of the aircraft of the future. A possible approach to increase the operational efficiency of aircraft wings is the use of aeroelastic tailoring, by taking advantage of the...

Numerical and experimental investigations of bend-twist coupling effects for a small wind turbine blade

Material bend-twist coupling has been widely studied in the research community as a passive control mechanism for a wind turbine. However, there is a lack of research in incorporating it in the rotor design process, with little research being conducted for its application to small wind turbines. The present study focuses on this issue by...

Aeroelastic tailoring for static and dynamic loads with blending constraints

In the present paper the authors want to investigate the effect of different load configuration in order to identify the ones driving the optimization. A set of static loads, gust loads and static loads with maneuver load alleviation (MLA) are tested. Gust loads have been included in the optimization via an equivalent static load (ESL)....

A novel dynamic aeroelastic framework for aeroelastic tailoring and structural optimisation

Driven by a need to improve the efficiency of aircraft and reduce the fuel consumption, composite materials are applied extensively in the design of aircraft. A dynamic aeroelastic framework for the conceptual design of a generic composite wing structure is presented. The wing is discretised in several spanwise sections, where each section has a...

Medium Fidelity Aeroelastic Wingbox Optimisation

In aeroelastic research the interaction between the structural wing and the aerodynamics is investigated. Currently the wingbox structures, as other components, are manufactured out of composite materials to replace the metallic airplanes. Composites have the ability to be designed by defining the orientation and thickness of a laminate. This...

Design and testing of an aeroelastically tailored wing under manoeuvre loading

The design methodology and testing of an aeroelastically tailored wing subjected to manoeuvre loads is presented in this paper. The wing is designed using an aeroelastic analysis tool that is composed of a closely coupled nonlinear beam model and a vortex lattice aerodynamic model. The globally convergent method of moving asymptotes is used to...

Aeroelastic tailoring and structural optimisation using an advanced dynamic aeroelastic framework

Driven by a need to improve the efficiency of aircraft and reduce the fuel consumption, composite materials are applied extensively in the design of aircraft. A dynamic aeroelastic framework for the conceptual design of a generic composite wing structure is presented. The wing is discretized in several spanwise sections, where each section has a...

Aeroelastic tailoring using lamination parameters: Drag reduction of a Formula One rear wing

The aim of the present work is to passively reduce the induced drag of the rear wing of a Formula One car at high velocity through aeroelastic tailoring. The angle-of-attack of the rear wing is fixed and is determined by the required downforce needed to get around a turn. As a result, at higher velocity, the amount of downforce and related...