Abstract
Abstract This paper aims to solve two problems of the sandwich panel with aluminum honeycomb: material parameters solution and shape control. The accurate material parameters of the sandwich panels are the basis of shape control. Therefore, a mixed numerical-experimental method is proposed to inversely solve equivalent material parameters of the sandwich panel using genetic algorithm (GA) in the first place. Then a high efficiency FE model based on equivalent material parameters is established to study shape control of the sandwich panels. For shape control, the key issue aims to search optimum position and adjustment volume of control points where actuators are installed. Toward the end, the FE simulation method is deployed to optimize actuator position and adjustment volume one by one. Finally, an active control platform based on multi-point adjustment is developed to verify the practicability of the approach proposed in this paper. Through the experiment of shape control, the root mean square (RMS) of surface deviation of sandwich panel is decreased from 62.7μm to 15.5μm. The results show that the shape control can significantly improve the surface accuracy of the sandwich panels, and the validity of equivalent material parameters is also proved from the side.
Highlights
The sandwich panels with aluminum honeycomb, for their advantages of light weight, high rigidity, great intensity and good electrical property, have been widely used in fabrication of the reflectors for microwave communication equipment, such as compact antenna test range (CATR), radio telescope, millimeter-wave radar, etc
This paper aims to solve two problems of the sandwich panel with aluminum honeycomb: material parameters solution and shape control
The results show that the shape control can significantly improve the surface accuracy of the sandwich panels, and the validity of equivalent material parameters is proved from the side
Summary
The sandwich panels with aluminum honeycomb, for their advantages of light weight, high rigidity, great intensity and good electrical property, have been widely used in fabrication of the reflectors for microwave communication equipment, such as compact antenna test range (CATR), radio telescope, millimeter-wave radar, etc. The sandwich panels obtained by vacuum flexible forming proposed by professor ZHOU (Beihang University) have been successfully applied in fabrication of the reflectors for many CATRs [1–3]. These sandwich panels obtained from this forming process provides high-precision surface, it cannot satisfy high-precision requirements of the reflector panels when the working frequency is 110GHz or higher. A large number of investigations have focused on improving precision and controlling shape of the reflectors used in microwave communication equipment. Washington et al [6, 7] investigated the optimization method of mechanically reconfigurable aperture antennas. Ray M C. et al [9, 10] conducted investigations on the active control of geomet-
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