22nd Congress of International Council of the Aeronautical Sciences, Harrogate, UK, 28 August - 1st September, 2000
Paper ICAS 2000-4.8.1

COMPUTATIONAL AEROELASTICITY IN HIGH PERFORMANCE AIRCRAFT FLIGHT LOADS

M. Love, T. De La Garza, E. Charlton, D. Egle
Lockheed Martin Aeronautics Company, USA

Keywords: computational aeorelasticity, cfd, flight loads

A computational aeroelasticity method has been developed that combines a computational fluid dynamics (CFD) code based on a finite volume, Cartesian / prismatic grid scheme with automated unstructured grid creation and adaption with established structural finite element methods. This analysis is motivated by the need to develop an analysis capability for fighter-aircraft critical flight loads. Flight conditions for such often reside in transonic flow regimes and comprise nonlinear aerodynamics due to shocks, flow-separation onset, and complex geometry. The Multidisciplinary Computational Environment, MDICE [1], is providing for timely integration of Lockheed Martin’s CFD software, SPLITFLOW [2] in a maintenance friendly, loosely coupled nonlinear analysis method. Analysis correlation with static aeroelastic wind tunnel data demonstrates potential. Analysis set-up and results for a fighter aircraft with multiple control surfaces are demonstrated.

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