Aerodynamic Analysis of Flexible Flapping Wing Micro Aerial Vehicle Using Quasi-Steady Approach

Abstract

In recent times flexible flapping-wing aerodynamics has generated a great deal of interest and is the topic of contemporary research because of its potential application in micro aerial vehicles (MAVs). The prominent features of MAVs include low Reynolds Number, changing the camber of flapping wings, development of related mechanisms, study of the suitability airfoil shape selection and other parameters. Generally, low Reynolds Number is similar to that of an insect or a bird (103–105). The primary goal of this project work is to perform CFD analysis on flexible flapping wing MAVs in order to estimate the lift and drag by using engineering methods such as quasi-steady approach. From the wind tunnel data, 3-D deformation is obtained. For CFD analysis, two types of quasi-steady methods are considered. The first method is to slice the wing section chord-wise and span wise at multiple regions, frame by frame, and obtain the 2-D corrugated camber section for each frame. This 2-D corrugated camber is analysed using CFD techniques and all the individual 2-D corrugated camber results are summed up frame by frame, to obtain the total lift and drag for one wing beat. The second method is to consider the 3D wing in entirety and perform the CFD analysis to obtain the lift and drag for five wing beat.