Optimisation of a variable sweep morphing wingtip

可变后掠变形翼尖的优化

• 批准号: 2888183
• 金额: --
• 依托单位: Imperial College London
• 依托单位国家: 英国
• 项目类别: Studentship
• 财政年份: 2023
• 资助国家: 英国
• 起止时间: 2023 至 无数据
• 项目状态: 未结题
• 来源: https://gtr.ukri.org/projects?ref=studentship-2888183
• 关键词: Optimisation; variable; sweep; morphing; wingtip

In recent years, there has been a great push to reduce emissions in all sectors, creating a drive in the aviation community to create more efficient aircraft. The efficiency of an aircraft can generally be increased by lengthening its wingspan, however the span for larger aircraft is limited by a maximum value set by airports. Due to this, some large aircraft, most notably the Boeing 777X, having folding wingtips which allow them to artificially reduce their wingspan to meet airport regulations, whilst retaining the efficiency benefits. On current aircraft, such folding wingtips are used purely to reduce span and are secured "open" during flight. Research has shown potential to make wingtip hinges active during flight to improve some of the aircraft's characteristics, through either passive (free/sprung hinge) or active (actuated) control at the hinges. Current research is underway to investigate hinging the wingtips vertically, with the aim of this project being to investigate alternative geometries and kinematics of such hinged tips. Variable sweep angle has for example been applied to the whole wing in various aircraft in the past, as it allows for efficient flight at both low and high speeds. The wingtip design will involve optimisation of the wing external geometry and hinge placement for a range of required flight conditions, aiming to create a wing with increased efficiency. For aircraft with longer and more slender wings than a traditional aircraft, the wing structure has a lower bending and torsional stiffness, which leads to them demonstrating larger deformations in flight. When the deformations are significantly large, the deformed aircraft has different aerodynamic characteristics, creating a coupled problem. With very large deformations, non-linear structural models are used for the aircraft as they can simulate effects which are not present in a typical linear model, such as geometric stiffening and follower force effects. This structural and aerodynamic coupling can become very significant under some flight conditions, with effects ranging from undesirable noise to catastrophic structural failure or loss of control. The aerodynamic and structural coupling is known as aeroelasticity, and at Imperial College an open-source, non-linear solver has been created to simulate aircraft with such effects. During this project, new modules will be implemented and used on the existing tools to simulate the wingtip characteristics. The non-linear aeroelastic characteristics of the variable sweep wingtips on highly flexible wings will be analysed to ensure both static and dynamic stability across the flight envelope. A common issue with current non-linear aeroelastic solvers is they are slow to run, and so are often not practical for use in a non-research environment. An additional aim of this project is to implement data-driven methods and models with such solvers, allowing for faster generation of data with minimal accuracy loss. This involves extracting the dominant features from the aircraft's response, truncating the less significant effects to create a greatly reduced-order model of the problem. This also opens the possibility of creating real-time models, which can be used onboard aircraft for use with a control system for more optimal control strategies. The preferred strategies to achieve this are to be investigated and developed.

近年来，一直有巨大的推动力减少所有部门的排放，从而在航空社区中创造了一个驱动力，以创建更有效的飞机。通常可以通过延长飞机的翼展来提高飞机的效率，但是大型飞机的跨度受机场设定的最大价值限制。因此，一些大型飞机，最著名的是波音777倍，具有折叠式机翼，使他们能够人为地减少翼展以满足机场法规，同时保留效率。在当前的飞机上，这种折叠式机翼纯用于减少跨度，并在飞行过程中“打开”。研究表明，通过在铰链上的被动（自由/弹簧铰链）或主动（驱动的）控制中，可以使飞行过程中的机翼铰链在飞行过程中活跃起来，以改善飞机的某些特征。目前的研究正在进行垂直研究铰链，目的是研究此类铰链技巧的替代几何形状和运动学。例如，过去在各种飞机的整个机翼上都应用了可变的扫角，因为它允许在低速和高速下有效飞行。机翼设计将涉及在一系列所需的飞行条件下优化机翼外部几何形状和铰链放置，旨在创建效率提高的机翼。对于比传统飞机更长，更细长的飞机的飞机，机翼结构具有较低的弯曲和扭转刚度，从而导致它们显示出更大的飞行变形。当变形显着较大时，变形飞机具有不同的空气动力特征，从而产生了耦合问题。具有非常大的变形，非线性结构模型用于飞机，因为它们可以模拟典型线性模型中不存在的效果，例如几何僵硬和自动力量效应。在某些飞行条件下，这种结构性和空气动力学耦合可能会变得非常重要，其影响范围从不良噪声到灾难性的结构性故障或失去控制。空气动力学和结构耦合被称为航空弹性，在帝国学院，已经创建了一个开源的非线性求解器来模拟具有此类效果的飞机。在此项目期间，将在现有工具上实施并使用新的模块来模拟机翼特征。将分析可变扫描翼在高度柔韧的机翼上的非线性航空弹性特性，以确保整个飞行包膜上的静态和动态稳定性。当前非线性航空弹性求解器的一个常见问题是它们运行缓慢，因此通常在非研究环境中使用通常不实用。该项目的另一个目的是用这样的求解器实施数据驱动的方法和模型，从而使数据越来越快地生成准确的损失。这涉及从飞机的响应中提取主要特征，从而截断了较不显着的效果，以大大减少问题的模型。这也打开了创建实时模型的可能性，可以在机板上使用该模型，以与控制系统一起使用，以进行最佳的控制策略。要研究和开发实现这一目标的首选策略。