Numerical studies of the Airfoil Effect on the Large Elongation Wing Aeroelastic Deformations

Aeronautical and Space-Rocket Engineering


Аuthors

Pavlenko O. V.1*, Kudryavtsev O. V.1**, Rostom R. 2***

1. Central Aerohydrodynamic Institute named after N.E. Zhukovsky (TsAGI), 1, Zhukovsky str., Zhukovsky, Moscow Region, 140180, Russia
2. Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology (National Research University), 9, Institutskiy per., Dolgoprudny, Moscow region, 141701, Russia

*e-mail: olga.v.pavlenko@yandex.ru
**e-mail: kudryavtsevov@gmail.com
***e-mail: rafat.rostom.1992@ yandex.com

Abstract

Lately, many countries are developing and improving the high-altitude unmanned aerial vehicles powered by solar energy, which are capable of making long-term flights in the stratosphere. Competitive aviation engineering should possess many advantages, particularly a high aerodynamic quality of the aircraft and ensuring the static elasticity security are necessary, which ensures the right forecasting and accounting for the elasticity effect on the total and distributed aerodynamic loads while designing. 
An increase in wing elongation enhances the aircraft aerodynamic quality and leads to changes in the wing aeroelastic properties, increasing its flexibility. To improve the aerodynamic quality and the solar panels application efficiency when creating a high-altitude aircraft, its wing is usually made extra-long and straight in plan, whereupon the problems of strength and aeroelastic deformations are being observed. 
The aeroelastic deformations of the wing, causing its bending and twisting, affect the aircraft balancing and the frequency of the wing vibrations, depending on the flexibility of its structure. Correct forecasting of the wing elastic deformations effect on aerodynamic characteristics is an urgent task, since accounting for the wing aeroelastic deformation allows the accuracy improving of determining the aircraft aerodynamic characteristics.
Modern computational programs allow studying the aeroelastic deformations impact on the extremely flexible wings, as well as optimizing the surface and internal structural properties of the wing to ensure improved performance due to a compromise between bending and torsional stiffness. Numerical methods application at the early stage of preliminary design and timely information acquisition, such as a change in the profile thickness distribution along the chord stipulated by the aerodynamic optimization, may lead to a significant change in the dynamics of the structure and affect the wing flutter, allow preventing serious design changes at a later stage of the detailed design.
The authors performed numerical studies of the profile shape effect on aeroelastic deformations of the wing of large elongation (λ = 20). Three profiles were selected for the numerical study of the wing: the symmetrical NACA 0012 wing profile, the asymmetrical CLARK Y+ profile, and the asymmetrical high-bearing wing profile for a solar-powered aircraft. For the more correct comparison, straight wings without tips with different profiles, but with the same parameters such as chord, profile height, the same position along the chord of the profile height and wingspan were elaborated. The aeroelastic deformations comparison was conducted in the modes with the same aerodynamic load.
To determine the effect of the airfoil shape on the high-elongation wing susceptibility to aeroelastic deformations, numerical studies were performed by the ANSYS Fluent and ANSYS Static Structure programs in ANSYS Workbench. 
At aerodynamic loads tip sections of the wing with asymmetric airoils are subjected to twisting, while bending deformations are much less that this of the wing with symmetric airfoil. Aeroelastic deformations reduce the drag and increase the wing aerodynamic quality of all the considered wings.

Keywords:

aerodynamic profiles of the wing, aeroelastic deformations of the wing, aerodynamic characteristics of the wing, CFD methods

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