Abstract
This article aims to indicate the differences between rigid and flexible wing aircraft flying (FQ) and handling (HQ) qualities. The Simulation Framework for Flexible Aircraft was used to provide a generic cockpit environment and a piloted mathematical model of a bare airframe generic high aspect ratio wing aircraft (GA) model. Three highly qualified test pilots participated in the piloted simulation trials campaign and flew the GA model with both rigid and flexible wing configurations. The results showed a negligible difference for the longitudinal HQs between rigid and flexible wing aircraft. However, significant changes were indicated for the lateral/directional HQs of the flexible wing aircraft. A wing ratcheting phenomenon manifested itself during the roll mode tests, the spiral mode exhibited neutral stability and the Dutch roll mode shape changed from a horizontal to a vertical ellipse. The slalom task flight tests, performed to assess the FQs of the aircraft, revealed the degradation of both the longitudinal and lateral/directional FQs.
Highlights
Over the last few decades society has witnessed significant achievements in aviation
The short period pitching oscillation (SPPO) mode tests are indicated as SP in the following tables, the phugoid mode – PH, the roll mode – RM, the spiral mode – SM, the Dutch roll mode – DR and the slalom task – SL
Two sets of tests inducing the short period pitching oscillation and the phugoid modes were carried out to identify the differences between the longitudinal HQs of rigid and flexible wing aircraft
Summary
Over the last few decades society has witnessed significant achievements in aviation. Economic and social benefits that the aviation industry induces globally are greatly appreciated and understood (Anonymous, 2017; ATAG, 2016). They come at a cost of a negative environmental impact, for which the aviation sector is highly criticised. High AR unswept wings are usually seen in sailplane designs to provide very high lift-to-drag ratios, but could not be used for large transport aircraft in the past because of arising structural issues due to the Previous approaches to assess HQs of flexible aircraft were mainly based on the longitudinal dynamics (Andrews, 2011; Damveld, 2009; Field & Rossitto, 1999; Waszak & Schmidt, 1988). Based on this research Damveld (2009) developed a new method to investigate and quantify the longitudinal HQs – experimental behaviour measurement method. Andrews (2011), on the other hand, investigated the impact of both the fuselage and the wing flexibility on HQs of a large commercial
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