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At least 1,441 records · Page 80

Estimation of dynamic stability parameters from drop model flight tests

A recent NASA application of a remotely-piloted drop model to studies of the high angle-of-attack and spinning characteristics of a fighter configuration has provided an opportunity to evaluate and develop parameter estimation methods for the complex aerodynamic environment associated with high angles of attack. The paper discusses the overall drop model operation including descriptions of the model, instrumentation, launch and recovery operations, piloting concept, and parameter identification methods used. Static and dynamic stability derivatives were obtained for an angle-of-attack range from -20 deg to 53 deg. The results of the study indicated that the variations of the estimates with angle of attack were consistent for most of the static derivatives, and the effects of configuration modifications to the model (such as nose strakes) were apparent in the static derivative estimates. The dynamic derivatives exhibited greater uncertainty levels than the static derivatives, possibly due to nonlinear aerodynamics, model response characteristics, or additional derivatives.

Chambers, J. R.↗

Low-speed wind-tunnel investigation of a porous forebody and nose strakes for yaw control of a multirole fighter aircraft

Low-speed wind-tunnel tests were conducted in the Langley 12-Foot Low-Speed Tunnel on a model of the Boeing Multirole Fighter (BMRF) aircraft. This single-seat, single-engine configuration was intended to be an F-16 replacement that would incorporate many of the design goals and advanced technologies of the F-22. Its mission requirements included supersonic cruise without afterburner, reduced observability, and the ability to attack both air-to-air and air-to-ground targets. So that it would be effective in all phases of air combat, the ability to maneuver at angles of attack up to and beyond maximum lift was also desired. Traditional aerodynamic yaw controls, such as rudders, are typically ineffective at these higher angles of attack because they are usually located in the wake from the wings and fuselage. For this reason, this study focused on investigating forebody-mounted controls that produces yawing moments by modifying the strong vortex flowfield being shed from the forebody at high angles of attack. Two forebody strakes were tested that varied in planform and chordwise location. Various patterns of porosity in the forebody skin were also tested that differed in their radial coverage and chordwise location. The tests were performed at a dynamic pressure of 4 lb/ft(exp 2) over an angle-of-attack range of -4 deg to 72 deg and a sideslip range of -10 deg to 10 deg. Static force data, static pressures on the surface of the forebody, and videotapes of flow-visualization using laser-illuminated smoke were obtained.

Fears, Scott P.↗

Wind-Tunnel Investigation at Mach Numbers from 0.40 to 1.14 of the Static Aerodynamic Characteristics of a Nonlifting Vehicle Suitable for Reentry

An investigation was conducted in the Langley 8-foot transonic pressure tunnel to investigate the static pitching-moment, normal-force, and axial-force characteristics on a model of a nonlifting vehicle suit- able for reentry. The vehicle was designed to use a heat sink and blunt shape to alleviate the effects of the heating encountered during reentry of the earth's atmosphere. The effects of modifying the intersection of the face of the model with the afterbody from a sharp corner to a rounded edge were also investigated. Tests were conducted at Mach numbers from 0.40 to 1.14 and at angles of attack from approximately -3 deg to 20 deg. The Reynolds number varied from about 2.0 x 10(exp 6) to 3.6 x 10(exp 6). The results show that the model had a low positive static-stability level, low normal-force coefficients, and large axial-force coefficients. The model trimmed, for the angle-of-attack range investigated, at angles of attack near zero. The effects on the stability as a result of rounding the corner were negligible.

Pearson, Albin O.↗

Forced Oscillation Wind Tunnel Testing for FASER Flight Research Aircraft

As unmanned air vehicles (UAVs) continue to expand their flight envelopes into areas of high angular rate and high angle of attack, modeling the complex unsteady aerodynamics for simulation in these regimes has become more difficult using traditional methods. The goal of this experiment was to improve the current six degree-of-freedom aerodynamic model of a small UAV by replacing the analytically derived damping derivatives with experimentally derived values. The UAV is named the Free-flying Aircraft for Sub-scale Experimental Research, FASER, and was tested in the NASA Langley Research Center 12- Foot Low-Speed Tunnel. The forced oscillation wind tunnel test technique was used to measure damping in the roll and yaw axes. By imparting a variety of sinusoidal motions, the effects of non-dimensional angular rate and reduced frequency were examined over a large range of angle of attack and side-slip combinations. Tests were performed at angles of attack from -5 to 40 degrees, sideslip angles of -30 to 30 degrees, oscillation amplitudes from 5 to 30 degrees, and reduced frequencies from 0.010 to 0.133. Additionally, the effect of aileron or elevator deflection on the damping coefficients was examined. Comparisons are made of two different data reduction methods used to obtain the damping derivatives. The results show that the damping derivatives are mainly a function of angle of attack and have dependence on the non-dimensional rate and reduced frequency only in the stall/post-stall regime

Hoe, Garrison↗

Wind tunnel investigations of forebody strakes for yaw control on F/A-18 model at subsonic and transonic speeds

Wind tunnel investigations have been conducted of forebody strakes for yaw control on 0.06-scale models of the F/A-18 aircraft at free-stream Mach numbers of 0.20 to 0.90. The testing was conducted in the 7- by 10-Foot Transonic Tunnel at the David Taylor Research Center and the Langley 7- by 10-Foot High-Speed Tunnel. The principal objectives of the testing were to determine the effects of the Mach number and the strake plan form on the strake yaw control effectiveness and the corresponding strake vortex induced flow field. The wind tunnel model configurations simulated an actuated conformal strake deployed for maximum yaw control at high angles of attack. The test data included six-component forces and moments on the complete model, surface static pressure distributions on the forebody and wing leading-edge extensions, and on-surface and off-surface flow visualizations. The results from these studies show that the strake produces large yaw control increments at high angles of attack that exceed the effect of conventional rudders at low angles of attack. The strake yaw control increments diminish with increasing Mach number but continue to exceed the effect of rudder deflection at angles of attack greater than 30 degrees. The character of the strake vortex induced flow field is similar at subsonic and transonic speeds. Cropping the strake planform to account for geometric and structural constraints on the F-18 aircraft has a small effect on the yaw control increments at subsonic speeds and no effect at transonic speeds.

Erickson, Gary E.↗

Effect of Reynolds number variation on aerodynamics of a hydrogen-fueled transport concept at Mach 6

Two separate tests have been made on the same blended wing-body hydrogen-fueled transport model at a Mach number of about 6 and a range of Reynolds number (based on theoretical body length) of 1.577 to 55.36 X 10 to the 6th power. The results of these tests, made in a conventional hypersonic blowdown tunnel and a hypersonic shock tunnel, are presented through a range of angle of attack from -1 to 8 deg, with an extended study at a constant angle of attack of 3 deg. The model boundary layer flow appeared to be predominately turbulent except for the low Reynolds number shock tunnel tests. Model wall temperatures varied considerably; the blowdown tunnel varied from about 255 F to 340 F, whereas the shock tunnel had a constant 70 F model wall temperature. The experimental normal-force coefficients were essentially independent of Reynolds number. A current theoretical computer program was used to study the effect of Reynolds number. Theoretical predictions of normal-force coefficients were good, particularly at anticipated cruise angles of attack, that is 2 to 5 deg. Axial-force coefficients were generally underestimated for the turbulent skin friction conditions, and pitching-moment coefficients could not be predicted reliably.

Penland, Jim A.↗

Comparison of Force and Moment Coefficients for the Same Test Article in Multiple Wind Tunnels

This paper compares the results of force and moment measurements made on the same test article and with the same balance in three transonic wind tunnels. Comparisons are made for the same combination of Reynolds number, Mach number, sideslip angle, control surface configuration, and angle of attack range. Between-tunnel force and moment differences are quantified. An analysis of variance was performed at four unique sites in the design space to assess the statistical significance of between-tunnel variation and any interaction with angle of attack. Tunnel to tunnel differences too large to attribute to random error were detected were observed for all forces and moments. In some cases these differences were independent of angle of attack and in other cases they changed with angle of attack.

Deloach, Richard↗

Compressible studies on dynamic stall

The purpose of this work is to investigate the effects of compressibility on the dynamic stall phenomenon by numerical simulation of the unsteady flow. The full two-dimensional unsteady compressible Navier-Stokes equations are solved for flows over oscillating airfoils and airfoils pitching rapidly to high angles of attack. The free-stream speeds vary from low subsonic with mild compressibility effects, to moderate subsonic where strong compressibility effects appear close to the leading edge at high angles of attack. An Alternating Direction Implicit scheme is implemented for the numerical solution with the viscous terms retained in both directions. The numerical results are compared with available experimental data for a Sikorsky airfoil for compressible high Reynolds number flows. There is good agreement between the computed and measured unsteady lift and pitching moment coefficient time histories. The computed high-speed subsonic unsteady results give a good picture of the entire flow field, and the dynamic stall progression in the compressible flow regime. It was observed that compressibility effects are more severe close to the leading edge at moderate angles of attack, and that the dynamic stall vortex appears at lower angles of attack as the free-stream speed increases.

Ekaterinaris, J. A.↗

Exploratory Investigation at Mach Number of 2.01 of the Longitudinal Stability and Control Characteristics of a Winged Reentry Configuration

An investigation has been conducted to determine the longitudinal stability and control characteristics of a reentry configuration at a Mach number of 2.01. The configuration consisted of clipped delta wing with hinged wing-tip panels. The results indicate that deflecting the wing-tip panels from a position normal to the wing chord plane to a position coincident with the wing chord plane resulted in a stabilizing change in the pitching-moment characteristics but did not significantly affect the nonlinearity of the pitching-moment variation with angle of attack. The trailing-edge controls were effective in producing pitching moment throughout the angle-of-attack range for control deflections up to at least 600. The control deflection required for trim, however, varied nonlinearly with angle of attack. It would appear that this nonlinearity as well as the maximum deflection required for trim could be greatly decreased by utilizing a leading-edge control in conjunction with a trailing-edge control.

Foster, Gerald V.↗

Control of Interacting Vortex Flows at Subsonic and Transonic Speeds Using Passive Porosity

A wind tunnel experiment was conducted in the NASA Langley Research Center (LaRC) 8-foot Transonic Pressure Tunnel (TPT) to determine the effects of passive surface porosity on vortex flow interactions about a general research fighter configuration at subsonic and transonic speeds. Flow- through porosity was applied to a wind leading-edge extension (LEX) mounted to a 65 deg cropped delta wind model to promote large nose-down pitching moment increments at high angles of attack. Porosity decreased the vorticity shed from the LEX, which weakened the LEX vortex and altered the global interactions of the LEX and wing vortices at high angles of attack. Six-component forces and moments and wing upper surface static pressure distributions were obtained at free- stream Mach numbers of 0.50, 0.85, and 1.20, Reynolds number of 2.5(10(exp-6) per foot, angles of attack up to 30 deg and angles of sideslip to plus or minus 8 deg. The off-surface flow field was visualized in selected cross-planes using a laser vapor screen flow visualization technique. Test data were obtained with a centerline vertical tail and with alternate twin, wing-mounted vertical fins having 0 deg and 30 deg cant angles. In addition, the porosity of the LEX was compartmentalized to determine the sensitivity of the vortex- dominated aerodynamics to the location and level of porosity applied to the LEX.

NATO FURNISHED↗

Vortex flap flow reattachment line and subsonic longitudinal aerodynamic data on 50 deg to 74 deg Delta wings on common fuselage

Positions of the primary vortex flow reattachment line and longitudinal aerodynamic data were obtained at Mach number 0.3 for a systematic series of vortex flaps on delta wing body configurations with leading edge sweeps of 50, 58, 66, and 74 deg. The investigation was performed to study the parametric effects of wing sweep, vortex flap geometry and deflection, canards, and trailing edge flaps on the location of the primary vortex reattachment line relative to the flap hinge line. The vortex reattachment line was located via surface oil flow photographs taken at selected angles of attack. Force and moment measurements were taken over an angle of attack range of -1 deg to 22 deg at zero sideslip angle for many configurations to further establish the data base and to assess the aforementioned parametric effects on longitudinal aerodynamics. Both the flow reattachment and aerodynamic data are presented.

Frink, N. T.↗

Small-Signal Angle Stability-Oriented False Data Injection Cyber-Attacks on Power Systems

The small-signal angle stability (SSAS) of a power system is determined by the property of operation points. The widely applied false data injection (FDI) cyber-attack, however, is able to stealthily mislead the optimal power flow (OPF) and thus compromise operation points, leading to damages to the SSAS margin. Here, to provide insights for cyber defenders, this paper proposes and investigates a stealthy SSAS-oriented FDI cyber-attack focusing on two attacking purposes, i.e., the SSAS margin and operation cost, with higher priority on the former one. First, this paper establishes a novel bi-level model with an implicit SSAS constraint based on a structure preserving model to compromise operation points. Then, for the SSAS interarea mode in a typical two-area system, this paper formulates closed-form expressions of how the SSAS margin and operation cost behave with respect to stealthy injections. By comparison, for the SSAS local mode in general power systems, this paper proposes a moving target cyber-attack-based hierarchical solution algorithm. Simulation results on a two-area system, a Kundur 11 bus system, and a modified IEEE 14 bus system demonstrate the significant damaging effects of the proposed SSAS-oriented FDI cyber-attack and the conflict between the two attacking purposes.

Benders decomposition↗

Development of a Flush Airdata Sensing System on a Sharp-Nosed Vehicle for Flight at Mach 3 to 8

NASA Dryden Flight Research Center has developed a flush airdata sensing (FADS) system on a sharp-nosed, wedge-shaped vehicle. This paper details the design and calibration of a real-time angle-of-attack estimation scheme developed to meet the onboard airdata measurement requirements for a research vehicle equipped with a supersonic-combustion ramjet engine. The FADS system has been designed to perform in flights at Mach 3-8 and at -6 deg - 12 deg angle of attack. The description of the FADS architecture includes port layout, pneumatic design, and hardware integration. Predictive models of static and dynamic performance are compared with wind-tunnel results across the Mach and angle-of-attack range. Results indicate that static angle-of-attack accuracy and pneumatic lag can be adequately characterized and incorporated into a real-time algorithm.

Davis, Mark C.↗

Pilot interface with fly by wire control systems

Aircraft designers are rapidly moving toward full fly by wire control systems for transport aircraft. Aside from pilot interface considerations such as location of the control input device and its basic design such as side stick, there appears to be a desire to change the fundamental way in which a pilot applies manual control. A typical design would have the lowest order of manual control be a control wheel steering mode in which the pilot is controlling an autopilot. This deprives the pilot of the tactile sense of angle of attack which is inherent in present aircraft by virtue of certification requirements for static longitudinal stability whereby a pilot must either force the aircraft away from its trim angle of attack or trim to a new angle of attack. Whether or not an aircraft actually has positive stability, it can be made to feel to a pilot as though it does by artificial feel. Artificial feel systems which interpret pilot input as pitch rate or G rate with automatic trim have proven useful in certain military combat maneuvers, but their transposition to other more normal types of manual control may not be justified.

Melvin, W. W.↗

An aerothermodynamic study of slender conical vehicles

A numerical study was performed to assess the applicability of some current techniques which can be used for aerothermal predictions over slender spherically blunted cones. Predictions using a viscous-shock-layer method and several engineering approaches were compared with experimental results from flight and ground-based tests, with each other, and with other detailed results. Good agreement was obtained in comparisons with laminar and turbulent heating data from the Reentry F flight vehicle and with the wind-tunnel data. In particular, the viscous-shock-layer method was shown to yield excellent comparisons and should be useful in providing detailed flowfield and surface values for slender blunted cones. Additional predictions were obtained with these methods for two 5-deg half-angle cones with different nose radii to illustrate the effects of nose bluntness and angle of attack on drag and heat transfer. These results demonstrate the benefit of nose blunting with respect to heating and drag for laminar and transitional flow at zero-lift conditions and the benefit of heating reduction at angle of attack. Detailed comparison of the engineering code predictions with the viscous-shock-layer results for these additional cases generally showed good agreement except for the laminar prodictions at angle of attack on the forward cone surface. Nonequilibrium calculations at 0-deg angle of attack showed that substantial benefits of low surface catalysis existed only in the nose-dominated region.

Thompson, R. A.↗

Aerodynamic characteristics of missile control fins in nonlinear flow fields

Recent experimental results show that the control effectiveness of a missile fin in supersonic flow at moderate-to-high angles of attack is a strong nonlinear function of free-stream Mach number, body incidence angle, fin bank angle and fin deflection angle. Analysis of the experimental results using an Euler finite-difference computer code with flow separation together with the equivalent angle-of-attack concept indicates that the observed nonlinearities are due to the variation of local dynamic pressure and local Mach number around the missile body alone. The nonlinearities are shown to be a strong source of control cross-coupling for high Mach number, high angle-of-attack combinations. The analysis suggests a relatively simple yet comprehensive approach for accurately accounting for these nonlinear effects.

Hemsch, M. J.↗

Development of a Flush Airdata Sensing System on a Sharp-Nosed Vehicle for Flight at Mach 3 to 8

NASA Dryden Flight Research Center has developed a flush airdata sensing (FADS) system on a sharp-nosed, wedge-shaped vehicle. This paper details the design and calibration of a real-time angle-of-attack estimation scheme developed to meet the onboard airdata measurement requirements for a research vehicle equipped with a supersonic-combustion ramjet engine. The FADS system has been designed to perform in flights at speeds between Mach 3 and Mach 8 and at angles of attack between -6 deg. and 12 deg. The description of the FADS architecture includes port layout, pneumatic design, and hardware integration. Predictive models of static and dynamic performance are compared with wind-tunnel results across the Mach and angle-of-attack range. Results indicate that static angle-of-attack accuracy and pneumatic lag can be adequately characterized and incorporated into a real-time algorithm.

Davis, Mark C.↗

Transonic Wind-Tunnel Investigation of the Fin Loads on a 1/8-Scale Model Simulating the First Stage of the Scout Research Vehicle

An investigation to determine the fin loads on a 1/8-scale model simulating the first stage of the Scout research vehicle was made in the Langley 8-foot transonic tunnel at Mach numbers from 0.40 to 1.20. Tests were conducted over an angle-of-attack range from about -10 to 10 deg and at a Reynolds number per foot of approximately 3.5 x 10(exp 6). Results of the tests indicate that for a given angle of attack, negative tip-control deflections caused decreases in normal-force and fin-bending-moment coefficients and increases in pitching-moment coefficient, as would be expected. The effects were slight at a model angle of attack of -10 deg where tip-control stall had probably occurred but increased with an increase in angle of attack.

Kelly, Thomas C.↗