Model to Evaluate the Aerodynamic Energy Requirements of Active Materials in Morphing Wings

Abstract

A computational model is presented which predicts the force, stroke, and energy needed to overcome aerodynamic loads encountered by morphing wings during aircraft maneuvers. This low-cost model generates wing section shapes needed to follow a desired flight path, computes the resulting aerodynamic forces using a unique combination of conformal mapping and the vortex panel method, computes the longitudinal motion of the simulated aircraft, and closes the loop with a zero-error control law. The aerodynamic force prediction method has been verified against two more expensive codes. This overall model will be used to predict the performance of morphing wings and the requirements for the active material actuators in the wings.