Design and Test Verification of Hybrid Airfoil Based on Multi-objective Genetic Algorithm

Abstract

Certification of modern aircraft requires the manufacturers to demonstrate flight safety within the flight envelope, including icing conditions. Icing wind tunnel test is an important way for flight safety and certification. However, the size of aircraft models that can be tested in icing wind tunnels is limited by the dimensions of the facilities. It is an effective method to replace the large model with a hybrid airfoil to carry out the experiment. If properly designed, these hybrid airfoil models can generate the full-scale ice accretion on the leading edge and reduce blockage. Based on the similarity of flow field in the leading edge, a multi-objective genetic optimization algorithm is proposed to design the hybrid airfoil under different conditions. The pressure tests are carried out and compared with the leading edge pressure coefficient of the corresponding full-scale airfoils. The design and experimental results show that the pressure coefficient deviation between the hybrid airfoils designed and the corresponding full-scale airfoil in the 15% chord length range of the leading edge is within 3%. Finally, icing wind tunnel test is used to inspect the ice shape of full-scale and hybrid airfoils, and the results shows that ice accretion process have good agreement of hybrid and full-scale airfoils.