Supersonic Transport Aircraft Research Articles

Attenuation of boundary-layer instabilities for natural laminar flow design on supersonic highly swept wings

To meet the challenge of drag reduction for next-generation supersonic transport aircraft, increasing attention has been focused on Natural Laminar Flow (NLF) technology. However, the highly swept wings and high-Reynolds-number conditions of such aircraft dramatically amplify Crossflow (CF) instabilities inside boundary layers, making it difficult to maintain a large laminar flow region. To explore novel NLF designs on supersonic wings, this article investigates the mechanisms underlying the attenuation of Tollmien–Schlichting (TS) and CF instabilities by modifying pressure distributions. The evolution of TS and CF instabilities are evaluated under typical pressure distributions with different leading-edge flow acceleration region lengths, pressure coefficient slopes and pressure coefficient deviations. The results show that shortening the leading-edge flow acceleration region and using a flat pressure distribution are favorable for suppressing CF instabilities, and keeping a balance of disturbance growth between positive and negative wave angles is favorable for attenuating TS instabilities. Based on the uncovered mechanisms, a strategy of supersonic NLF design is proposed. Examination of the proposed strategy at a 60°sweep angle and Ma=2 presents potential to exceed the conventional NLF limit and achieve a transition Reynolds number of 17.6 million, which can provide guidance for NLF design on supersonic highly swept wings.

Predicting Take-Off Noise, Sonic Boom, and Landing Noise of Supersonic Transport Aircraft Concepts

In 2023, the German Aerospace Center (DLR) has launched the STORMIE (Supersonic Transport Open Research Models and Impact on Environment) project. Focus of the project is the prediction and minimization of environmental and human impacts of civil supersonic transport. Data generated in the project will be used to inform national and European authorities in order to discuss certification standards for supersonic aircraft within the International Civil Aviation Organization's Committee on Aviation Environmental Protection (CAEP). In order to assess the environmental impacts, representative civil supersonic business-jet and airliner concepts will be designed. This paper will present an overview of past and ongoing activities conducted at DLR to assess and minimize landing and take-off noise as well as the sonic boom of supersonic aircraft. Numerical methods at different levels of fidelity are applied and will be complemented by listening tests of auralized simulation data in a later project stage. First noise-related activities within the STORMIE project are summarized.

Characteristics of Vortices around Forward Swept Wing at Low Speeds/High Angles of Attack

The forward-swept wing (FSW), one of the wing planforms used in aircraft, is known for its high performance in reducing wave drag. Additionally, a study has shown that this wing planform can mitigate sonic booms, which pose a significant challenge to achieving supersonic transport (SST). Therefore, FSW is expected to find applications in future SST aircraft owing to aerodynamic advantages at high speeds. However, there is a lack of sufficient knowledge and systematization to improve aerodynamic performance at low speeds and high angles of attack during takeoff and landing. These are crucial for practical implementation. Although the aerodynamic benefits of an FSW in high-speed flight can be harnessed using advanced structural and control technologies, the realization of SST using an FSW is challenging without enhanced research on low-speed aerodynamics. This study explores the practical aerodynamic knowledge of FSWs. We utilized a numerical simulation based on the Navier–Stokes equation and focused on investigating wake vortex phenomena. Our simulation included various wing planforms, including backward-swept wings (BSWs). The results revealed the presence of vortices with lateral axes emanating from the FSW, while longitudinal vortices were observed in the BSW. Based on these results, we developed a theoretical hypothesis for the vortex structure around an FSW.

A Rapid Surrogate Model for Estimating Aviation Noise Impact across Various Departure Profiles and Operating Conditions

Aviation noise remains a key barrier to the sustainable growth of commercial aviation. The advent of emerging technologies, such as urban air mobility, and the renewed interest in commercial supersonic transport aircraft, has only further raised concerns over the resultant community noise exposure. The foundation of any noise mitigation effort is the ability to accurately model noise metrics over a wide range of scenarios. Aviation noise is influenced by a wide variety of factors, including aircraft type, payload weight, thrust settings, airport elevation, ambient weather, and flight trajectory. Traditional noise modeling paradigms rely on physics-based and empirical calculations, which are computationally expensive. Attempts at speeding up the computations with alternate models could deliver on speed or accuracy, but not both. Recent research has indicated that model order reduction techniques hold promise for transforming and greatly reducing the number of quantities that need to be modeled. Paired with surrogate modeling techniques, a rapid and accurate noise model can be generated. The research presented in this manuscript expands on the model order reduction method and develops a rapid noise surrogate model, which can account for the piloting actions, the ambient temperature, and airport elevation. The presented results indicate that the method works well with minimal error for most modeling scenarios. The results also outline avenues for improvement, such as using a different class of surrogate models or modeling additional training cases. The model developed in this research has numerous applications for multi-query applications, such as parametric trade-off analyses and optimization studies. With the inclusion of airport and aircraft parameters, the model enables the development of frameworks that optimize piloting actions for noise mitigation on the ground.

Review of vortex lattice method for supersonic aircraft design

AbstractThere has been a renewed interest in developing environmentally friendly, economically viable, and technologically feasible supersonic transport aircraft and reduced order modeling methods can play an important contribution in accelerating the design process of these future aircraft. This paper reviews the use of the vortex lattice method (VLM) in modeling the general aerodynamics of subsonic and supersonic aircraft. The historical overview of the vortex lattice method is reviewed which indicates the use of this method for over a century for development and advancements in the aerodynamic analysis of subsonic and supersonic aircraft. The preference of VLM over other potential flow-solvers is because of its low order highly efficient computational analysis which is quick and efficient. Developments in VLM covering steady, unsteady state, linear and non-linear aerodynamic characteristics for different wing planform for the purpose of several different types of design optimisation is reviewed. For over a decade classical vortex lattice method has been used for multi-objective optimisation studies for commercial aircraft and unmanned aerial vehicle’s aerodynamic performance optimisation. VLM was one of the major potential flow solvers for studying the aerodynamic and aeroelastic characteristics of many wings and aircraft for NASA’s supersonic transport mission (SST). VLM is a preferred means for solving large numbers of computational design parameters in less time, more efficiently, and cheaper when compared to conventional CFD analysis which lends itself more to detailed study and solving the more challenging configuration and aerodynamic features of civil supersonic transport.

Potential Impacts on Ozone and Climate From a Proposed Fleet of Supersonic Aircraft

AbstractThere has been renewed interest in developing commercial supersonic transport aircraft due to the increased overall demands by the public for air travel, the aspiration for more intercontinental travel, and the desire for shorter flight times. Various companies and academic institutions have been actively considering the designs of such supersonic aircraft. As these new designs are developed, the environmental impact on ozone and climate of these fleets need to be explored. This study examines one such proposed commercial supersonic fleet of 55‐seater that is projected to fly at Mach 2.2, corresponding to cruise altitudes of 17–20 km, and which would burn 122.32 Tg of fuel and emit 1.78 Tg of NOx each year. Our analyses indicate this proposed fleet would cause a 0.74% reduction in global column ozone (∼2 Dobson Units), which is mainly attributed to the large amounts of nitrogen oxides released in the atmosphere from the supersonic aircraft. The maximum ozone loss occurs at the tropics in the fall season, with a reduction of −1.4% in the total column ozone regionally. The stratospheric‐adjusted radiative forcing on climate from this fleet was derived based on changes in atmospheric concentrations of ozone (59.5 mW/m2), water vapor (10.1 mW/m2), black carbon (−3.9 mW/m2) and sulfate aerosols (−20.3 mW/m2), resulting in a net non‐CO2, non‐contrail forcing of 45.4 mW/m2, indicating an overall warming effect.

Effect of longitudinal lift distribution on sonic boom of a canard-wing-stabilator-body configuration

After the last flight of the Concorde in 2003, sonic boom has been one of the obstacles to the return of a supersonic transport aircraft to service. To reduce the sonic boom intensity to an acceptable level, it is of great significance to study the effect of lift distribution on far-field sonic boom, since lift is one of the most important contributors to an intense sonic boom. Existing studies on the longitudinal lift distribution used low-fidelity methods, such as Whitham theory, and in turn, only preliminary conclusions were obtained, such as that extending the lift distribution can reduce sonic boom. This paper uses a newly developed high-fidelity prediction method to quantitatively study the effect of longitudinal lift distribution on the sonic boom of a Canard-Wing-Stabilator-Body (CWSB) configuration. This high-fidelity prediction method combines near-field CFD simulation with far-field propagation by solving the augmented Burgers equation. A multipole analysis method is employed for the extraction of near-field waveform in order to reduce computational cost. Seven configurations with the same total lift but different distributions are studied, and the quantitative relationship between the longitudinal lift distribution and far-field sonic boom intensity is investigated. It is observed that a small lift generated by the stabilator can prevent aft-stabilator and aft-fuselage shocks from merging, while the balanced lift generated by the canard and wing can effectively keep the corresponding shocks further apart, which is beneficial for reducing both the on-track and off-track sonic boom. In turn, the acoustic level perceived at the ground can be reduced by 5.9 PLdB on-track and 5.4 PLdB off-track, on average.

Fatigue strength estimates for composite wing panels of prospective supersonic transport aircraft

Fatigue strength estimates for composite wing panels of prospective supersonic transport aircraft

Numerical study of fatigue damage accumulation in composite wing panels of prospective supersonic transport aircraft

Numerical study of fatigue damage accumulation in composite wing panels of prospective supersonic transport aircraft

Impact of Design Constraints on Noise and Emissions of Derivative Supersonic Engines

The propulsion systems used in commercial supersonic transport (SST) aircraft, such as the Concorde, have used repurposed engines or derivative engines based on cores from existing donor engines rather than purpose-designed clean-sheet engines. A similar approach is currently being adopted in the development of new SSTs. Turbomachinery components and cooling mass flow rates in derivative engines are sized by the design cycle of the donor engine and constrain the design of the derivative engine cycle. Here, we identify the constraints imposed by the donor engines and quantify their impact on the specific fuel consumption (SFC), certification noise, and (oxides of nitrogen) emissions index [EI()] relative to purpose-designed clean-sheet engines. We design and optimize a clean-sheet and derivative engine for a notional 55 metric ton SST proposed by NASA. A clean-sheet engine optimized for SFC results in an approximately 4.5% reduction in SFC, an approximately 2.5-fold increase in EI(), and a 1.2 EPNdB increase in certification noise relative to the derivative engine. Applying a constraint on EI() to the clean-sheet engine results in an approximately 0.5% reduction in SFC relative to the derivative engine. The work provides a quantitative comparison of clean-sheet purpose-built engines and derivative engines from an environmental perspective that can inform policy makers as they develop updated environmental standards for civil supersonic aircraft.

Synthesis of a Controller Built on the Principle of Inverse Dynamics and Identification of a Nonlinear Model of Longitudinal Motion in Offline Mode

This report is dedicated to the design of a controller based on the principle of inverse dynamics and the offline identification of the coefficients of a supersonic transport (SST) aircraft’s linear longitudinal dynamics model based on the results of measuring the nonlinear mathematical model’s responses. A landing task under the influence of atmospheric disturbances is considered.

Adaptive flight control system for flight safety improvement in reentry and other high-velocity vehicles

An adaptive controller and a nonlinear rate limiter are presented in order to improve the flight safety of manually controlled reentry vehicles and supersonic transport (SST) aircraft. The adaptive controller is based on the principle of dynamic inversion. The calculation of the controller parameters corresponding to the aerodynamic coefficients of the vehicle was carried out by a proposed online identification procedure. The effectiveness of the adaptive controller was tested through a set of experiments performed using a ground-based simulator. The obtained results were used to estimate the probability of an accident due to pilot error for the basic Space Shuttle flight control system and for its improved version with the adaptive controller. It was found that using the adaptive controller causes high required rates of elevon deflection. Because of the actuator's rate limiting, this is a source of pilot-induced oscillations. To counteract these oscillations in the pilot-vehicle closed loop system, an adaptive nonlinear rate limiter is introduced. The effectiveness of using the adaptive prefilter for improving the flight safety and flying qualities of the Space Shuttle reentry vehicle and an SST was demonstrated in experiments involving a ground-based simulator.

Towards a Supersonic Transport: Minimization of Sonic Boom

An aircraft exceeding the speed of sound can cover large distances in short amount of time and has several important applications. Thus, there has always been an interest in producing a Supersonic Transport (SST) Aircraft for commercial usage in recent decades. However, the problem of sonic boom restricts operations over inhabited/ land areas. This major obstacle to overland supersonic flight has been subject of governmental and private research for a long time. The research has two parts: minimum acceptable parameters of ground boom signatures for supersonic flight and reduction of Sonic Boom. The methods developed to reduce the boom are generally classified into Aircraft operations, Design, and Exotic methods. This paper reviews the significant methods proposed under each of these categories with special emphasis on design. Due to the range and complexity of methods proposed, there is no consensus amongst the scientific community about the design for an SST. The requirements of low boom design conflict with the requirements of carriage of an effective payload and basic aerodynamics. With the development of high- fidelity CFD and wave propagation programmes like PCBoom, analysing new designs has become easier and understanding of the contribution of various configurations on ground signatures has improved. This has led to promising developments like the X-59 research aircraft, making this field of study one of the most exciting in the aviation industry today.

Aerodynamic Analysis of a Supersonic Transport Aircraft at Low and High Speed Flow Conditions

The recent improvement of technology readiness level in aeronautics and the renewed demand for faster transportation are driving the rebirth of supersonic flight for commercial aviation. However, the design of a future supersonic aircraft is still very challenging due to the complexity of several problems, such as static stability performance during the acceleration phase from subsonic speeds to supersonic speeds. Additionally, the interest of scientific community in open source numerical platform as a valid tool for a reliable and affordable aerodynamic design is considerably growing. In this framework, the present work addresses the aerodynamic performance of a Concorde-like aeroshape developed within the preliminary design of a high-speed civil transportation aircraft. Several flight conditions, ranging from subsonic to supersonic speeds, were investigated in detail by using Computational Fluid Dynamics. The aerodynamic force and moment coefficients are computed with fully three-dimensional and steady state Reynolds Average Navier-Stokes simulations, carried out in turbulent flow conditions. The effect of the Mach number variation on the shift of the aircraft aerodynamic center is detailed, by focusing on the aircraft pitching static stability. Flowfield numerical simulations are performed with both commercial (Ansys-Fluent) tool and open-source (SU2) code, which is also used extensively in multidisciplinary design procedures, for further comparisons. Particular attention is focused on the shift of the aeroshape aerodynamic center to verify that the provided wing design allows the aircraft static margin to be within 5% of the reference length, both at low-speed and high-speed flight conditions. The computed positions of the aerodynamic center are in agreement with the aeroshape surface pressure distributions and confirmed the literature results available for the Concorde aircraft. Therefore, in the view of future simulation campaigns for supersonic transportation aircraft, the present work aims to bridge the gap between previous aerodynamic design experiences, for instance matured on Concorde, and those carried out with modern CFD tools on full-scale aircraft, and on time-scales compatible with conceptual design practice. Finally, as the difference between the computed aerodynamic coefficients reflected mainly on drag computation performed with SU2, a special focus on numerical diffusion effect of the solver is also given and compared with a commercial certified CFD tool. This adds a unique further contribution to the SU2 community for aeronautics application.

Predicting the High-Angle-of-Attack Characteristics of a Delta Wing at Low Speed

Ensuring the safe operation of new supersonic transport aircraft requires understanding their stability during takeoff and landing. These phases involve flying at subsonic speeds and high angles of attack, where the aerodynamics are characterized by unsteady vortical flow. This work assesses the accuracy of Reynolds-averaged Navier–Stokes (RANS) and delayed detached eddy simulations (DDES) at predicting the vortex-dominated flow over a delta wing for angles of attack up to and past stall. The delta wing has an aspect ratio of 2 and is a simplified representation of a supersonic transport wing. The predicted aerodynamic coefficients are compared with experimental data, focusing on the shape of the pitching moment curve. In addition, a steadiness metric is formulated to distinguish between steady and unsteady angles of attack. It is found that RANS accurately predicts vortex effects in the steady regime but is inaccurate at high angles of attack where the flow is unsteady. DDES is more reliable in the unsteady regime, but the computational cost is at least 100 times that of RANS. Predicting the pitching moment at the highest angles of attack is difficult even with DDES on a 69-million-cell mesh. These results provide guidelines for choosing the appropriate fidelity depending on the flow characteristics, the required accuracy, and the computational budget.

Conceptual design of sonic boom stealth supersonic transports

This paper introduces a supersonic transport aircraft design model developed in the GENUS aircraft conceptual design environment. A conceptual design model appropriate to supersonic transports with low-to-medium-fidelity methods are developed in GENUS. With this model, the authors reveal the relationship between the sonic boom signature and the lift and volume distributions and the possibility to optimise the lift distribution and volume distribution together so that they can cancel each other at some region. A new inspiring design concept—sonic boom stealth is proposed by the authors. The sonic boom stealth concept is expected to inspire the supersonic aircraft designers to design low-boom concepts through aircraft shaping and to achieve low ground impacts. A family of different classes of supersonic aircraft, including a single-seat supersonic demonstrator (0.47 psf), a 10-passenger supersonic business jet (0.90 psf) and a 50-seat supersonic airliner (1.02 psf), are designed to demonstrate the sonic boom stealth design principles. Although, there are challenges to balance the volume with packaging and control requirements, these concepts prove the feasibility of low-boom low-drag design for supersonic transports from a multidisciplinary perspective.

Simulation of Landing and Take-Off Noise for Supersonic Transport Aircraft at a Conceptual Design Fidelity Level

The German Aerospace Center has launched an internal project to assess the noise impact associated with supersonic transport aircraft during approach and departure. A dedicated simulation process is established to cover all relevant disciplines, i.e., aircraft and engine design, engine installation effects, flight simulation, and system noise prediction. The core of the simulation process is comprised of methods at the complexity and fidelity level of conceptual aircraft design, i.e., typical overall aircraft design methods and a semi-empirical approach for the noise modeling. Dedicated interfaces allow to process data from high fidelity simulation that will support or even replace initial low fidelity results in the long run. All of the results shown and discussed in this study are limited to the fidelity level of conceptual design. The application of the simulation process to the NASA 55t Supersonic Technology Concept Aeroplane, i.e., based on non-proprietary data for this vehicle, yields similar noise level predictions when compared to the published NASA results. This is used as an initial feasibility check of the new process and confirms the underlying methods and models. Such an initial verification of the process is understood as an essential step due to the lack of available noise data for supersonic transport aircraft in general. The advantageous effect of engine noise shielding on the resulting system noise is demonstrated based on predicted level time histories and certification noise levels. After this initial verification, the process is applied to evaluate a conceptual supersonic transport design based on a PhD thesis with two engines mounted under the wing, which is referred to as aircraft TWO. Full access to this vehicle’s design and performance data allows to investigate the influence of flight procedures on the resulting noise impact along approach and departure. These noise results are then assembled according to proposed Federal Aviation Agency regulations in their Notice of Proposed Rulemaking, e.g., speed limitations, for Supersonic transport noise certification and the regulations from Noise Chapters of the Annex 16 from the International Civil Aviation Organization in order to evaluate the resulting levels as a function of the flight procedure.

Aerodynamic Analysis of a Supersonic Transport Aircraft at Landing Speed Conditions

Supersonic flight for commercial aviation is gaining a renewed interest, especially for business aviation, which demands the reduction of flight times for transcontinental routes. So far, the promise of civil supersonic flight has only been afforded by the Concorde and Tupolev T-144 aircraft. However, little or nothing can be found about the aerodynamics of these aeroshapes, the knowledge of which is extremely interesting to obtain before the development of the next-generation high-speed aircraft. Therefore, the present research effort aimed at filling in the lack of data on a Concorde-like aeroshape by focusing on evaluating the aerodynamics of a complete aircraft configuration under low-speed conditions, close to those of the approach and landing phase. In this framework, the present paper focuses on the CFD study of the longitudinal aerodynamics of a Concorde-like, tailless, delta-ogee wing seamlessly integrated onto a Sears–Haack body fuselage, suitable for civil transportation. The drag polar at a Mach number equal to 0.24 at a 30 m altitude was computed for a wide range of angles of attack (0∘,60∘), with a steady RANS simulation to provide the feedback of the aerodynamic behaviour post breakdown, useful for a preliminary design. The vortex-lift contribution to the aerodynamic coefficients was accounted for in the longitudinal flight condition. The results were in agreement with the analytical theory of the delta-wing. Flowfield sensitivity to the angle of attack at near-stall and post-stall flight attitudes confirmed the literature results. Furthermore, the longitudinal static stability was addressed. The CFD simulation also evidenced a static instability condition arising for 15∘≤α≤20∘ due to vortex breakdown, which was accounted for.

Stratospheric Ozone and Climate Forcing Sensitivity to Cruise Altitudes for Fleets of Potential Supersonic Transport Aircraft

AbstractThe possibility of commercial and business supersonic aircraft that fly in the lower stratosphere is being discussed and specific designs are under consideration. Emissions from supersonic transports have raised crucial environmental concerns regarding ozone and climate. The atmospheric response is sensitive to a range of factors regarding aircraft types, designs, and deployment parameters. This study conducts a series of sensitivity experiments of possible future cruise altitudes to evaluate the potential atmospheric response for a fleet of supersonic aircraft assumed to be fully operational in 2050. Cruise emissions in the sensitivity studies were varied in 2 km bands over the 13–23 km altitude range. We show that the supersonic aircraft can induce both ozone increase and decrease depending on altitude primarily as a result of emissions of nitrogen oxides, and the changes in total column ozone depend on the cruise altitude. The total column ozone change is shown to have a small increase flying from 13 to 17 km, with the ozone impact not very dependent on cruise altitude. As cruise altitude transitions from 17 to 23 km, the ozone impact transitions from production to depletion and the column ozone depletion strongly depends on cruise altitude. We also explore the seasonal ozone loss, changes in ozone, and climate radiative forcing per unit of fuel burn as a function of cruise altitude. The climate impact of water vapor emissions shows a larger effect associated with higher cruise altitude, with more than 1 mW m−2 Tg−1 yr for cruise altitudes above 19 km.

Conceptual design and integration of a propulsion system for a supersonic transport aircraft

Despite 50 years of technological advancement since the inception of Concorde, research on supersonic passenger aircraft has only recently resulted in design and flight test of several small 12 to 55-passenger business jets with supersonic cruises between Mach 1.2 and 2.2. Analytical research designs of larger 300-passenger aircraft have been conducted only to speeds of Mach 2.0 and 2.2, mainly avoiding moving beyond turbojet propulsion. This research extends on an earlier multifactor regression sizing study to determine in greater design detail whether the configuration of a 200-passenger Mach 3.0 aircraft is feasible using extant technology. This research article is the second part of two and covers a suitable and cost-effective propulsion system for the executive supersonic passenger aircraft. Through this high-speed design, the research examines modern propulsion technology and the performance advancements it affords through higher efficiencies, higher metallurgical thermal limits, variable cycle engines and variable stator technology. The analysis was conducted on several potential propulsion systems using GasTurb software to obtain engine performance data. The performance results led to a combined cycle turbofan–ramjet engine as being the engine that could yield the most extensive range for the aircraft. Further investigation is needed on aircraft noise, engine emissions, the accuracy of the thrust-critical lift-to-drag ratios and the aeroelastic effects that can be closely coupled to noise and performance.