2007.Loosely Coupled Aeroelastic Simulations Using Multi-Disciplinary Computing Environment (MDICE).pdf

Symposium on Applied Aerodynamics and Design of Aerospace Vehicle (SAROD-2007) November 22-23, 2007, Thiruvananthapuram, India 1 Loosely Coupled Aeroelastic Simulations Using Multi-Disciplinary Computing Environment (MDICE) A.J. Meganathan?, S.J Zhang! ESI US RD, Huntsville, AL 35806, USA (abraham.meganathan@) ABSTRACT Computational aeroelastic analysis requires a multi-disciplinary approach to simulate the mutual interactions among inertial, elastic and aerodynamic forces. Coupling between the different disciplines of computational fluid dynamics (CFD) and computational structural dynamics (CSD) has been a challenge. This paper demonstrates a coupling methodology using Multi-Disciplinary Computing Environment (MDICE) implemented in the commercial CFD package FASTRAN. This methodology allows high-fidelity solvers from different disciplines to seamlessly communicate and interact with each other during a multi-physics simulation. Transonic wing flutter simulations of the well known benchmark case of AGARD 445.6 wing is used to demonstrate this methodology. The flutter boundary appears to correlate well with the experimental results in the subsonic regime. Results also indicate that the transonic dip phenomenon could be predicted using this methodology. These results indicate the potential for loosely coupled aeroelastic simulations to identify for flutter boundaries of new aerodynamic surface designs. Key Words: aeroelasticity, flutter FSI, MDICE, CFD-FASTRAN, loosely coupled simulations NOMENCLATURE E = Young’s modulus M = Mach number U∞ = Free stream velocity ω∝ = Natural circular frequency of the wing in the first uncoupled torsion ω / ω∝ = Flutter frequency ratio V* = Flutter speed ratio 1. INTRODUCTION Computational aeroelasticity is playing an increasingly important role in the development and flight certification of new and novel aircraft configurations. And, flutter characteristics of