Aeroelasticity quick analysis method of very propeller/flexible wing system

The propeller's revolving slipstream passing wing changes the drag/lift property of the wing. For the hyper long endurance unmanned flight vehicles design, the slipstream effect should be analyzed for the aeroelasticity of the very flexible wing. The Prandtl revised blade element-momentum theory was applied to calculate the aerodynamic parameters and in-plane loads (1P loads) of the slipstream. Then a Rankine vortex core was placed along the propeller's installation axis to simulate slipstream's induced effect on the wing. Further, the 3-D lifting-line method was utilized to calculate the steady aerodynamic loads of the curved bending wing. And the generalized surface splines and large deflection interpolation method were adopted to solve the geometrical characters of structure/aerodynamic coupling problem. Coupling with the nonlinear finite element method of the structure, the iterative approach was constructed for the solving of propeller's slipstream, 1P loads and the static aeroelasticity of very flexible wing. Finally, a validation study of a very flexible rectangular wing with one propeller was carried out using the method constructed. The numerical results show that the revolving slipstream changed the local incidence angle of a wing, thus changing the aerodynamic forces and deformation distribution. And in the small advance ratios situation, it has greater influences. The results demonstrate the applicability of this method in early stages of aircraft design.