Prediction of Aerodynamic Interactions of Helicopter Rotor on its Fuselage

Abstract

An iterative and full-coupled rotor/fuselage aerodynamic interaction analytical method is developed based upon the rotor free wake model and the 3-D fuselage panel model. A close vortex/surface interaction model using the Analytical/Numerical Matching (ANM) was adopted in the method in order to simulate effectively the unsteady close interaction between the rotor tip-vortex and fuselage surface. By the analytical method, the unsteady and steady pressure distribution on the fuselage surface, and the unsteady lift and pitching moment of the fuselage in a rotor interaction environment were calculated for different advance ratios. It is shown that the unsteady aerodynamic loads of the fuselage due to the rotor interaction have the same periodic characteristics as the rotor. The comparisons between the present close vortex/surface interaction model and a previous model, which simply excludes vortex filaments inside the fuselage, were also made and the advantages of the former over the latter were demonstrated in improving unsteady close interaction calculations.