Flexible-wing MAVs

Dr. Peter Ifju, Bret Stanford Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering University of Florida

Special Thanks
Students:
Bret Stanford Roberto Albertani Kyu-Ho Lee Sewoong Jung Scott Ettinger Mujahid Abdulrahim Don McArthur Dan Claxton Frank Boria Mike Sytsma Jos Coquyt Dragos Viieru Baron Johnson Mike Morton James Clifton Scott Bowman James Davis Yongsheng Lian Thomas Rambo Albert Lin Sponsors: Brandon Evers

UF Faculty:
Rick Lind Warren Dixon Paul Hubner Wei Shyy Rafi Haftka David Jenkins Andy Kurdila Carl Crane Warren Dixon Franklin Percival Mike Nechyba

Air Force Office of Scientific Research AFRL at Eglin Air Force Base US Special Operations Command NASA Langley Research Center US Geological Survey US Dept of Fisheries and Wildlife

Design Concept: Flexible, Thin, Undercambered Wing

Undercambered wing provides better aerodynamic characteristics at Reynolds No. below 100,000. Flexibility can be tuned for smoother flight in gusty wind conditions adaptive washout. We have built wings with improved longitudinal stability. Delayed/gentle stall has been documented Flexible wing can be morphed efficiently. Flexible wings can be folded for storage and deployed without assembly. Wing configuration can be engineered to be lightweight as well as durable

Benefits of the UF Designs

Durability Durability

Gust Alleviation Gust Alleviation

Storage Storage

Morphing Morphing

Stability, high lift Stability, high lift

Outline:
Introduction Fabrication methodologies Flight testing Experimental program In-situ deformation measurements Structural model Fluid structure interaction models Model validation via deformation measurements Optimization Conclusions and future work

Custom MAV Design Software

MAVLab: rapid wing generation
Span Chord Twist Sweep Airfoil geometry Virtually any planform shape

CAD Model, Tool Path and Milling

Finished Tooling and Composite Construction

Finished tool with layout pattern

Prepreg unidirectional, woven carbon fiber and Kevlar composite construction

Composite Construction Continued

Vacuum bagging

Fuselage layup

Component installation Assembly

Finished MAV in Less Than One Day

Latex rubber membrane material is applied Fins are attached Off to be flight tested

International Micro Air Vehicle Surveillance Competition History

Maximum Dimension, cm
50 MLB MLB UF 25 15 UF 10 UF UF BYU UF KKU UF UF 4.5 in. (11.4 cm) record

Smallest MAV to identify target at 600m

2000

2001

2002

2003

2004

1998

1997

1999

Year

2005

2006

30 cm US European MAV Competition

Three Wings were then Studied

[453] [452]

[02]

Latex Skin

Rigid

Batten-Reinforced BR

Perimeter-Reinforced PR

Composite wings constructed from carbon fiber composites, and latex rubber skin All three wings have the same nominal shape:
AR = 1.25, root chord = 130 mm, wing span = 150 mm

Rigid wing: nominal aerodynamics Batten-reinforced wing: adaptive washout Perimeter-reinforced: adaptive inflation

Coefficient of Lift vs. Angle of Attack

The low aspect ratio accounts for high stall angles After stall, the lift of the perimeter reinforced wing is greater than The other wings before stall The perimeter reinforced wing has higher CLmax

Moment Coefficient vs Coefficient of Lift

The perimeter reinforced wing has a higher negative slope The rigid wing has the lowest Static longitudinal stability of the perimeter reinforced wing is substantially higher than the rigid case with the batten reinforced wing intermediate

Wing Deformation Measurements Using Visual Image Correlation

The stereo-triangulation is achieved through twin synchronized cameras (35 mm lens, 1.3 mega pixels, 5-10 ms exposure times) each looking at a different angle After a random speckling pattern is applied to the surface of the 3-D geometry in question, the VIC system digitally acquires the pattern, and tracks the deformation of each speckle

Synchronized cameras

Wind tunnel 250 Watt lamp Model

Wind Tunnel VIC Tests Procedure

VIC Results: BR Wing Out-Of-Plane Displacements

Deformation patterns here imply that the wind load subjects the leading edge to torsion Primary region of deformation: battens are forced to bend upwards due to wind loading

Wing fixed here: Non-zero displacement implies a small rigid body rotation of entire model

12 AOA, Wind Speed = 13 m/s

VIC Results: PR Wing Out-Of-Plane Displacements

The carbon fiber perimeter exhibits substantial bending

The primary region of deformation occurs as the membrane billows upwards due to the aerodynamic forces

Wing fixed here: Non-zero displacement implies a small rigid body rotation of entire model

12 AOA, Wind Speed = 13 m/s

MAV Structural Modeling

Accurate finite element wing modeling can provide insight into the complicated fluid-structure interaction over a flexible MAV In keeping with the composite nature of the wing, three different elements are used: shells to model the carbon fiber weave (red), beams to model the battens (green), and membranes to model the latex skin (blue)

Static MAV Model Validation

Visual image correlation is an ideal tool for finite element validation Static model validation was conducted by hanging small weights from the wing, and comparing numerical and experimental displacement fields

Experimental (VIC)

Numerical (FEA)

Out-of-plane displacements caused by a 7 g load at the tip of the outer left batten (MAV clamped at trailing edge)

Fluid Structure Interaction Model

High fidelity finite element analysis (FEA) structural model With nonlinear membrane properties Define rigid wing geometry Conduct CFD on rigid wing Apply aero loads from CFD to FEA Navier Stokes based computational fluid dynamics (CFD) model with master/slave perturbation techniques for remeshing Deformed shape analyzed by CFD Apply new aero loads to FEA Stop when wing geometry converges

Fluid Structure Interaction Model Convergence

Comparing BR Model and Experiment

Out-of-plane displacement

Chord-wise strain

Comparing BR Model and Experiment

Span-wise strain

Shear strain

Comparing PR Model and Experiment

Out-of-plane displacement

Chord-wise strain

Comparing PR Model and Experiment

Span-wise strain

Shear strain

Pressure, Streamlines and Deformation

Rigid Batten Perimeter

0AOA, top Rigid Batten Perimeter

0AOA, bottom

Pressure, Streamlines and Deformation

Rigid Batten Perimeter

15AOA, top Rigid Batten Perimeter

15AOA, bottom

Comparing BR Model and Experiment

Pressure, Streamlines and Deformation

PR Membrane Pretension vs. Deformation

BR Membrane Pretension vs. Deformation

PR Pretension vs. Performance

BR Membrane Pretension vs. Deformation

Conclusions and Future Work

The design space can be greatly increased by employing flexibility Flight tests and wind tunnel tests have shown appreciable gains in some flight parameters with both the batten reinforced and perimeter reinforced membrane wing Advanced structural deformation measurement techniques provide high fidelity information that can give insight into the mechanisms that lead to enhanced flight performance Fluid structure interaction models can give insight into how to improve specific flight characteristics However no flexible wing design is the best at everything Topological optimization is currently being used for determining better ways to reinforce the wing for specific objective functions Future work to validate the fluid structure interaction model by experimentally characterizing the flow field is desired.