Analysis on aerodynamic characteristics of morphing wing with flexible trailing edge

Abstract

The wing applying active variable camber trailing edge technology can improve aircraft's aerodynamic performance,and the study of aerodynamic characteristics is of great significance to the design of the morphing wing. Choosing the 2D variable camber wing with flexible trailing edge as the object of study,the compressible Navier-Stokes equation and Spalart-Allmaras( S-A) turbulence model were applied to investigate the aerodynamics of morphing wing numerically by using the software Fluent. Aerodynamic characteristics were studied from the perspective of pressure distribution,flow field structure and the deformation mode. The numerical results show that the morphing wing has almost the same slope of lift curve and maximum lift coefficient with the conventional wing with simple flap,but has lower stall angle of attack. It has higher lift coefficient,lift-to-drag ratio,and higher nose-down pitching moment coefficient than conventional wing before the occurrence of stall. When flexible trailing edge deflects downward to a special angle,trailing edge vortex is suppressed to expand forward. The lift coefficient slowly rises after the stall,which increases the range of effective angle of attack of morphing wing and leads to a good stall characteristic.