Black-Box Online Aerodynamic Performance Optimization for a Seamless Wing with Distributed Morphing

On-Line Black-Box Aerodynamic Performance Optimization for a Morphing Wing With Distributed Sensing and Control

Inspired by nature, smart morphing technologies enable the aircraft of tomorrow to sense their environment and adapt the shape of their wings in flight to minimize fuel consumption and emissions. A primary challenge on the road to this feature is how to use the knowledge gathered from sensory data to establish an optimal shape adaptively and...

Preliminary aeroelastic design of composite wings with distributed electric propulsion

In the development of electric aircraft, the use of distributed electric propulsion introduces a potential occurrence of propeller whirl flutter, which needs to be taken into account for wing structural design. To this end, this work extends an in-house aeroelastic optimization tool by means of including a post-processing procedure on whirl...

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...

Including aeroelastic tailoring in the conceptual design process of a composite strut braced wing

High aspect ratio strut braced aircraft can significantly reduce the induced drag. The inherent anisotropic behaviour of the composite material along with their weight saving potential can improve the performance of the aircraft during the flight. Thus, a composite strut braced aircraft is one of the promising candidates to achieve the targets...

On the Importance of Morphing Deformation Scheduling for Actuation Force and Energy

Morphing aircraft offer superior properties as compared to non-morphing aircraft. They can achieve this by adapting their shape depending on the requirements of various conflicting flight conditions. These shape changes are often associated with large deformations and strains, and hence dedicated morphing concepts are developed to carry out the...