In this paper, a systematic study of the triple shock confluence point is presented for the case of an overexpanded jet which impinges on a perpendicular flat plate at small displacements from the nozzle. The jet is uniform upstream of the free jet shock wave. Non-homentropic effects are taken into account and lead to modifications to the accepted flow patterns at a triple point for the case of strong incident shock waves. Where more than one thermodynamically possible solution to the triple point equations exists, the alternative solutions are re-examined, taking non-homentropic effects into consideration. Some discussion of the possibility of infinite shock curvatures is also included. Qualitative flow patterns of the impinging flow are constructed, based on the triple point solutions and the known boundary conditions. The interesting cases where the tail shock flow is supersonic are given particular attention and two possible flow patterns are distinguished. Finally, some experimental evidence in the form of schlieren pictures is presented. Although not conclusive, this evidence supports the theory.

A method of estimating the fatigue properties of notched test pieces when cyclic loads are applied in the presence of mean stresses is described. The method takes into account the local yielding which occurs near the base of the notch when the nominal stresses are sufficiently high. The general form of the predicted R/M diagrams closely resembles those obtained experimentally in previously published work.

Reduction of aircraft manufacturing cost benefits aircraft direct operating cost (DOC). The degree of stringency in specifying aircraft smoothness influences cost, i.e. the tighter the tolerance, the higher is the manufacturing cost. Discrete surface roughness arising from manufacturing tolerance at the wetted surface may be seen as an ‘aerodynamic’ defect. Features such as steps, gaps, waviness and fastener flushness (termed excrescence), seen as defects, contribute to aircraft parasitic drag.

The study is conducted on an isolated nacelle which is considered to be representative of an entire aircraft. Eleven key manufacturing features at the wetted surface of a generic long duct nacelle are identified, each associated with surface roughness. The influence of tolerance allocation at each of the key features is investigated to establish a relationship between aircraft aerodynamics and associated costs. The initial results offer considerable insight to a relatively complex problem in a multi-disciplinary environment.

Excrescence drag arising out of these ‘aerodynamic’ defects is assessed by using CFD and semi-empirical methods. Cost versus tolerance relationships are established through in-house methods using industrial data.

The aircraft unit price typically contributes from two to four times more than the fuel burn to aircraft direct operating costs. A trade-off study between manufacturing cost and aircraft drag indicates that, in general, there is scope for some relaxation of present-day tolerance allocation, to reduce aircraft acquisition cost, which would in turn reduce direct operating costs.

A recent paper gave an elementary analysis of the effect of control procedures on the flow of air traffic. It was shown that the average delay experienced by aircraft landing at an airport increases rapidly as the arrival rate approaches the maximum handling capacity of the airport. It is the object of the present paper to give a more rigorous treatment of the problem and to derive the distribution of delays under different traffic conditions.

The maximum handling capacity of an airport is the greatest rate at which aircraft can enter the airport with absolute safety. It is determined by the safe minimum separation between successive landings. An aircraft arriving in the central zone with less than the safe minimum separation is withheld from landing until the minimum interval has elapsed.

In the following it is generally assumed that aircraft cross the boundaries of the control zone from random directions with random separations, the mean arrival rate being constant. Aircraft which follow their predecessors too closely are assumed to be delayed for a minimum period so that none lands with an interval less than the safe minimum. As a simplification it is assumed that no aircraft takes off from the airport.

A method for performing three-dimensional, multipoint, lift-constrained drag minimisation for complex aircraft configurations is presented. Parameters representing the aircraft geometry are the design variables used in the solution of an optimisation problem. The compressible Euler equations for the flow are discretised on automatically generated unstructured meshes, and the sensitivities of the objective function and the constraints with respect to the design parameters are efficiently calculated using the discrete adjoint method. In addition, the solution algorithm has been parallelised making the approach feasible for practical applications. Several constrained minimisation strategies are discussed and some numerical tests are carried out for a lift-constrained, two-dimensional problem. The strategy found to work best is demonstrated for the three-dimensional optimisation of a wing-body configuration operating in transonic and supersonic conditions. It is concluded that Euler-based optimisation can be useful as a first step in the design process but that most applications involving transonic flows do require viscous flow modelling to avoid unrealistic pressure distributions.

The results of an investigation into the effect of both the number of orifices and the geometry of these orifices on the fluid structures exiting from a synthetic jet actuator are presented. The experiments have used smoke and laser visualisation and single hotwire measurement techniques to establish the flow field exiting the various orifices and the fluid velocities in the exit plane of the orifice. The results indicate that the use of two small orifices can perhaps produce two coherent vortex rings with a total circulation greater than that found in the ring produced by a large, single orifice of equivalent area. However, they have also shown that there are three different types of interaction between two adjacent orifices, related to the spacing between them and the level of excitation applied to the diaphragm. In addition, these interactions may affect the overall level of circulation in different ways. Finally the results have shown that a rectangular orifice of a given exit plane area is more likely to produce a turbulent ring than the equivalent circular orifice due to a ‘smoothing’ process which endeavours to create an axisymmetric ring from a non-axisymmetric slug of fluid. This work has shown that when using synthetic jet actuators in flow control applications, care should be taken in selecting the spacing and geometry of the orifices used, as certain set-ups may be more suited to certain applications than others.

Passive imaging using mm-waves offers very significant advantages in scientific and military surveillance. However, the relatively long wavelengths mean that for the resolutions that are typically sought, the input aperture of the imager needs to be quite large; typically in excess of one metre. Deployment of conventional dish antennae of these dimensions on small aircraft is highly problematic. The use of snapshot synthetic aperture interferometric radiometry (SAIR) offers an attractive route to integrating a two-dimensional antenna array into the structure of an aircraft so that the transverse effective dimensions of the antenna can be almost as large as the aircraft. We report here a study into the feasibility of deployment of a SAIR on unmanned airborne vehicles and the achievable performance parameters. Critical considerations are the achievement of acceptable sensitivity and angular resolution from a SAIR that does not require excessive complexity. It is shown that traditional approaches based on fully sampling the spatial frequencies in the scene are unable to simultaneously meet all of these criteria, but that a SAIR based on thinned sampling of the spatial frequencies shows promise.

Following the original work of Munk, Jones, and Ward for steady flow, a solution is given for unsteady, supersonic flow over very slender bodies of revolution and wings. The results are subject to the restriction (M2- l)δ2 loge [(M2- 1)½ δ]«1 where δ is the slenderness ratio, M is the Mach number and, in addition, to the usual restrictions imposed by linearisation. As examples, the lifts and pitching moments on flat wings and bodies of revolution executing pitching motion and the damping moment on a rolling wing are calculated.

It is shown that the order of approximation is consistent with the limitations already imposed by linearisation, at least in supersonic flow, where no Kutta condition is required.

Contra-Rotating Open Rotor (CROR) propulsion systems have seen renewed interest as an economic and environmentally friendly powerplant for future transport aircraft. Installation effects, i.e. the mutual interactions between airframe components and the rotors, have a pronounced impact on the aerodynamic and aeroacoustic performance for this type of engine. In the past five years, DLR’s Institute of Aerodynamics and Flow Technology has performed a number of numerical studies investigating important aspects relating to engine-airframe integration of CROR engines. In this article an overview of coupled aerodynamic and aeroacoustic simulations investigating representative pusher-configuration CROR engines will be given, focusing on the impact on aerodynamic performance and aeroacoustics caused by the presence of a pylon, the potential for noise reduction by employing trailing-edge blowing at the pylon trailing edge as well as the performance and noise variations caused by different senses of rotation of the rotors. It is shown that the interaction with the pylon strongly impacts blade performance and front rotor noise emissions but that the use of active flow control in the form of pylon trailing-edge blowing can alleviate these adverse installation effects to a notable extent.

The German research Cluster of Excellence SE2A (Sustainable and Energy Efficient Aviation) is investigating different technologies to be implemented in the following decades, to achieve more efficient air transportation. This paper studies the Hybrid Laminar Flow Control (HLFC) using boundary layer suction for drag reduction, combined with other technologies for load and structural weight reduction and a novel full-electric propulsion system. A multidisciplinary design optimisation framework is presented, enabling physics-based analysis and optimisation of a fully electric aircraft wing equipped with HLFC technologies and load alleviation, and new structures and materials. The main focus is on simulation and optimisation of the boundary layer suction and its influence on wing design and optimisation. A quasi three-dimensional aerodynamic analysis is used for drag estimation of the wing. The tool executes the aerofoil analysis using XFOILSUC, which provides accurate drag estimation through boundary layer suction. The optimisation is based on a genetic algorithm for maximum take-off weight (MTOW) minimisation. The optimisation results show that the active flow control applied on the optimised geometry results in more than 45% reduction in aircraft drag coefficient, compared to the same geometry without HLFC technology. The power absorbed for the HLFC suction system implies a battery mass variation lower than 2%, considering the designed range as top-level requirement (TLR).

In a previous paper the author derived, by the Rayleigh-Ritz method, a determinantal equation for obtaining the critical magnitude of any uniform system of edge stress applied to a clamped oblique plate. In the present paper this equation is used to derive values for the buckling stresses of clamped oblique plates subjected to pure shear along and perpendicular to two edges of the plate.

As would be expected, it is found that reversal of the direction of the shear produces a change in the critical value. The lower value occurs when the shear is tending to increase the obliquity of the plate and critical values corresponding to this direction are calculated for 45° oblique plates with side ratios varying between 3/5 and 5/3. The critical values obtained for the reverse direction were obviously very inaccurate, due to the inadequacy of the series which was used to represent the buckling mode. As yet no satisfactory method has been found for overcoming this difficulty.

A formula is derived for the buckling in compression of an orthotropic sandwich panel, with all edges simply-supported. Two special types of symmetrical sandwiches, that of a sandwich having zero core flexural stiffnesses and of a corrugated core sandwich, are considered, and curves giving the critical buckling end load per inch are presented. An approximate theory is also given for the bending of sandwich panels under the action of an axial compressive load and a uniform lateral pressure. Curves are presented giving the maximum bending moments in a corrugated core sandwich panel.

The paper presents the design and experimental testing of the control system used in a new morphing wing application with a full-scaled portion of a real wing. The morphing actuation system uses four similar miniature brushless DC (BLDC) motors placed inside the wing, which execute a direct actuation of the flexible upper surface of the wing made from composite materials. The control system of each actuator uses three control loops (current, speed and position) characterised by five control gains. To tune the control gains, the Particle Swarm Optimisation (PSO) method is used. The application of the PSO method supposed the development of a MATLAB/Simulink® software model for the controlled actuator, which worked together with a software sub-routine implementing the PSO algorithm to find the best values for the five control gains that minimise the cost function. Once the best values of the control gains are established, the software model of the controlled actuator is numerically simulated in order to evaluate the quality of the obtained control system. Finally, the designed control system is experimentally validated in bench tests and wind-tunnel tests for all four miniature actuators integrated in the morphing wing experimental model. The wind-tunnel testing treats the system as a whole and includes, besides the evaluation of the controlled actuation system, the testing of the integrated morphing wing experimental model and the evaluation of the aerodynamic benefits brought by the morphing technology on this project. From this last perspective, the airflow on the morphing upper surface of the experimental model is monitored by using various techniques based on pressure data collection with Kulite pressure sensors or on infrared thermography camera visualisations.

In this paper two numerical procedures are presented: the first algorithm allows for the determination of the geometric characteristics of the maximum efficiency propeller for a given operative condition and profile distribution along the blade; the output of this numerical procedure is the chord distribution and twist angle of the blade, together with its efficiency and its torque and thrust coefficients for the prescribed operative condition. The aerodynamic characteristics of the optimum propeller when operating in a condition different from the design one are obtained by a second algorithm that allows for the evaluation of the efficiency, the thrust and torque coefficients of a propeller of known geometry, when the blade pitch and operative condition are varied.

In the paper the formulation used for deriving the geometry of the optimum propeller and determining its performances when operating off-design is described in detail. The results obtained from the proposed propeller model have been validated by comparison with experimental data.

The accurate prediction of ground effect aerodynamics is an important aspect of wing-in-ground effect vehicle (WIG) design. Computational fluid dynamics (CFD) solutions are useful alternatives to expensive (especially in the case of ground effect) wind-tunnel testing. However, the incorporation of the rigid surface effects often leads to confusion due to such a model being in a vehicle fixed reference frame (air moving, vehicle fixed) rather than the real-life situation of a ground fixed reference frame (air fixed, vehicle moving).

The paper describes the methodology and computational design strategies used to develop a series of fixed wing micro air vehicles (MAVs) at the Ghent University. The emphasis of the research is to find an optimal MAV-platform that is bound to geometrical constraints but superior in its performance. This requires a multidisciplinary design optimisation but the challenges are mainly of aerodynamic nature. Key areas are endurance, stability, controllability, manoeuvrability and component integration. The highly three-dimensional low Reynolds number flow, the lack of experimental databases and analytical or empirical models of MAV-aerodynamics required fundamental research of the phenomena. This includes the use of a vortex lattice method, three-dimensional CFD-computations and a numerical propeller optimisation method to derive the forces and their derivatives of the MAV and propeller for performance and stability-related optimisation studies. The design method leads to a simple, stable and robust flying wing MAV-platform that has the agility of a fighter airplane. A prototype, the UGMAV25, was constructed and flight tests were performed. The capabilities of the MAV were tested in a series of successful flight manoeuvres. The UGMAV15, a MAV with a span of 15cm, is also developed to test flight-qualities and endurance at this small scale. With the current battery technology, a flight-time of at least one hour is expected.

Solar powered aircraft are becoming more and more interesting for future long endurance missions at high altitudes, because they could provide Earth monitoring, telecommunications, etc. without any atmospheric pollution and, hopefully in the near future, with competitive costs compared with satellites. The research activities carried out till now have been mainly focused on flying wings or conventional aircraft configurations, with a great emphasis on the technological aspects. The present paper aims to define a mathematical model for solar powered aircraft preliminary design, valid independently of the aerodynamic configuration. A preliminary analysis is carried out in order to simulate Helios and the results are compared with those available from the flights of this aircraft. The proposed mathematical model is used also to compare four different aircraft configurations, namely: a flying wing, a conventional aircraft, a twin boom aircraft and a biplane aircraft. The results obtained are discussed in the paper and an optimum aircraft is analysed.

A method is presented for determining the swirling compressible flow through a nozzle, given conditions at a reference section. The principal assumption is that changes in the nozzle cross-sectional area are sufficiently gradual for the radial velocity component to be neglected at each section, i e, the usual assumption of one-dimensional compressible flow theory. This method is used to determine choked-flow conditions in the case where there is solid-body rotation at the throat for a range of swirl intensities with the ratio of the specific heats taking various values. Mass-flux coefficients and impulse functions are determined. Sonic surfaces, velocity profiles and other characteristics of interest are also presented. An approximate analysis valid for low swirl intensities is developed and analytical formulae are derived for most quantities of interest. The main conclusion of practical importance is that the introduction of swirl to compressible nozzle flows need not lead to a significant reduction in specific thrust. Further exploration of the possible effects of swirl on noise during the relatively short take-off and landing periods cannot therefore be ruled out on the grounds that swirl would lead to excessive thrust losses.

Donnell type equilibrium and stability equations are derived for stiffened thin conical shells. The stiffeners are considered closely spaced and are therefore assumed to be “distributed” over the whole surface of the shell. In the proposed theory the stiffeners and their spacing may vary in any prescribed manner, but here only equal and equally spaced stiffeners are dealt with. The force- and moment-strain relations of the combined stiffener-sheet cross section are determined by the assumption of identical normal strains at the contact surface of stiffener and sheet.

The stability equations are solved for general instability under hydrostatic pressure by the method of virtual displacements. The solution used earlier for unstiffened conical shells, which satisfies some of the boundary conditions of simple supports only approximately, is again applied here. The effect of this incomplete compliance with boundary conditions is shown to be negligible by consideration of “boundary work”. The solution proposed for stiffened conical shells involves the concepts of “correcting coefficients” and minimisation of corresponding “error loads”.

Typical examples are analysed and the effect of eccentricity of stiffeners is investigated. Simplified approximate formulae for the critical pressure of frame-stiffened conical shells are also proposed.

The ever-changing battlefield environment, as well as the emergence of global command and control architectures currently used by armed forces around the globe, requires the use of robust and adaptive technologies integrated into a reliable platform. Unmanned Combat Aerial Vehicles (UCAVs) aim to integrate such advanced technologies while also increasing the tactical capabilities of combat aircraft. This paper provides a summary of the technical and operational design challenges specific to UCAVs, focusing on high-performance, and stealth designs. After a brief historical overview, the main technology demonstrator programmes currently under development are presented. The key technologies affecting UCAV design are identified and discussed. Finally, this paper briefly presents the main issues related to airworthiness, navigation, and ethical concerns behind UAV/UCAV operations.