Flexibility Effect on Static Aeroelastic Behavior of Large Aspect Ratio Composite Wing
摘要
In aerospace engineering, the composite materials are found ideal for lightweight structural design. The important aspects of composite design are achieving high stiffness to density ratio and high stiffness to strength ratio. Keeping in view these advantages of composite materials, especially for building lightweight UAV structures, is promising. Currently, the focus on building UAV airframes is to have a lightweight structure with high stiffness characteristics. In particular, the UAV research on MALE (Medium Altitude Long Endurance), HALE (High Altitude Long Endurance), and HAPS (High Altitude Pseudo Satellite) has been focused on making high aspect ratio composite wings to have long endurance. To achieve this performance, energy and inertia management must be optimized with the help of various functional systems, including the airframe. If the wing is reasonably large (highly flexible), it can support the vehicle to glide with minimum propulsion. However, the flexibility in the high aspect ratio wing brings nonlinearity and makes the aerodynamic flight configuration a structurally dependent design. Therefore, the conventional rigid aerodynamics load-based structural design is not suitable for very large aspect ratio wing (HAPS). The computation of flexible air loads and static aeroelastic criteria-based airframe design become necessary. Added to these requirements, the classical Quad laminate [0/90/ ± 45] type of composite construction may pose structural weight challenges to realize a lightweight, flexible airframe. In recent times, the double-double [θ/− ψ/− θ/ψ] laminate design concept is emerging as a simplified, homogenized composite construction that provides both cost and weight benefits. This concept is employed to design the laminate with required divergence criteria to address the composite flexibility effect on a large aspect ratio composite wing.