Experimental surrogate-based design optimization of wing geometry and structure for flapping wing micro air vehicles

Abstract

We present the experimental design optimization of a flapping wing and the development of a non-circular gear based flapping mechanism to enhance the propulsive efficiency of a flapping wing micro air vehicle (FWMAV). The proposed flapping mechanism consists of a very simple structure, which excludes any linkages but utilizes non-circular gears to achieve a desired flapping amplitude and angular velocity. An optimal wing was obtained via a surrogate-based global optimization reflecting the noise generated from the experiments. Compared to the baseline wing, the optimal wing was improved more than three times in terms of propulsive efficiency. The analysis showed that one of wing geometric parameters, the non-dimensional radius of second moment of area rˆ2, plays an essential role in designing an optimal wing. To achieve high efficiency, rˆ2 should decrease as the wing area increases. Simultaneously, rˆ2 determined other optimal values of geometry parameters such as aspect ratio and camber angle. Furthermore, rˆ2 was also closely related to an optimal vein position which not only generated a moderate wing angle of attack but also reduced the adverse effect of angle of attack fluctuation. Through the optimal wing and the proposed flapping mechanism, we could be able to achieve better efficiency and robust manufacturing compared with the previously reported tailless-FWMAVs.