Uninhabited Combat Air Vehicle Research Articles

Serpentine Inlet Performance Enhancement Using Vortex Generator Based Flow Control

In order to provide the line of-sight blockage of the engine face for an advanced Uninhabited Combat Air Vehicle(UCAV), a highly curved serpentine inlet is proposed and experimentally studied. Based on the static pressure distribut ion measurement along the wall, the flow separation is found at the top wall of the second S duct for the baseline inlet design, which yields a high flow distortion at the exit plane. To improve the flow uniformity, a single array of vortex generators (VGs) is employed within the inlet. In this experimental study, the effects of mass flow ratio, free stream Mach number, angle of attack and yaw on the performance of a serpentine inlet instrumented with VGs are obtained. Results indicate: (1) Compared with the baseline serpentine design without flow control the application of the VGs promotes the mixing of core flow and the low momentum flow in the boundary layer and thus prevents the flow separation. Under the design condition, the exit flow distortion (▪) decreases from 11. 7% to 2.3% by using the VGs. (2) With the descent of the free stream Mach number the total pressure loss decreases. How ever, the circular total pressure distortion increases. When the angle of attack rises from - 4° to 8°, the total pressure recovery and the circular total pressure distortion both go down. In addition, with the increase of yaw the total pressure recovery is fairly constant, while the circular total pressure distortion ascends gradually. (3) When Ma0=0.6-0.8, α= −4°-8° and β= 0°-6°, the total pressure recovery varies between 0.936 and 0.961, the circular total pressure distortion coefficient varies between 1.4% and 5.4% and the synthesis distortion coefficient has a ranges from 3.8% to 7.0%. The experimental results confirm the excellent performance of the newly designed serpentine inlet incorporating VGs.

Computation of Actuation Power Requirements for Smart Wings with Morphing Airfoils

New generations of highly maneuverable aircraft, uninhabited combat air vehicles or micro air vehicles, are likely to feature very flexible lifting surfaces. To enhance the performance and control characteristics of these vehicles, the replacement of hinged control surfaces by smart wings with morphing airfoils is investigated. This requires a fundamental understanding of the interaction between aerodynamics, structures, and control systems. The modeling of a smart wing with morphing airfoils is described. Trailing-edge flaps for maneuvering are replaced by airfoil morphing via distributed structural actuation. The goal is to build a model consistent with distributed control and to exercise this model to determine the progress possible in terms of flight control (lift, drag, and maneuver performance) with an adaptive wing. The model is used to study the roll performance and actuation power requirements of a smart wing with morphing airfoils. For selected flight conditions, actuation power requirements of a smart wing with morphing airfoils are compared to those of a conventional wing with trailing-edge flaps.

Design, Fabrication, and Testing of a Scaled Wind Tunnel Model for the Smart Wing Project

Building on the research performed during the DARPA/AFRL/NASA Smart Wing Phase 1 program (Kudva, J.N. et al. (July 1999). Overview of the DARPA/AFRL/NASA Smart Wing Program, SPIE Symposium on Smart Structures and Materials, Newport Beach, CA, Vol. 3674, pp. 230 6; Martin, C.A. et al. (1999). Smart Materials and Structures Smart Wing Phase 1 Final Report, AFRL-ML-WP-TR-1999-4162, Air Vehicles Directorate, Air Force Research Laboratory, Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, OH.) sought to improve vehicle aerodynamic efficiency using control surfaces actuated by smart materials, the goal of the Phase 2 effort was to develop larger scale, smart hingeless control surfaces capable of high-rate actuation and quantify their performance benefits at test conditions representative of operational flight environments. To achieve this goal, a 30-percent geometric scale, full-span wind tunnel model of a proposed Northrop Grumman Corporation (NGC) Uninhabited Combat Air Vehicle (UCAV) was designed and tested. The model incorporated conventional, hinged control surfaces on the left side and smart, hingeless control surfaces on the right to allow incremental aerodynamic performance comparisons; including lift increment due to unit control surface deflection (CL), and roll moment due to unit control surface deflection (Cld). This paper describes the design, fabrication, system integration, and ground test results of the Smart Wing Phase 2 model. Topics that are covered include: (1) wind tunnel model selection; (2) analysis and design procedure; (3) smart control surface integration; (4) model instrumentation; and (5) static load and Ground Vibration Test (GVT) results and correlation.

Development of High-rate, Adaptive Trailing Edge Control Surface for the Smart Wing Phase 2 Wind Tunnel Model

The DARPA/AFRL/NASA Smart Wing program, led by Northrop Grumman Corporation (NGC) under the DARPA Smart Materials and Structures initiative, addressed the development of smart technologies and demonstration of relevant concepts to improve the aerodynamic performance of military aircraft. In Phase 2, Test 2 of the program, the main objective was to demonstrate high-rate actuation of hingeless, spanwise, and chordwise deformable control surfaces using smart materials-based actuators on a 30% scale, full span wind tunnel model of a proposed NGC uninhabited combat air vehicle (UCAV). A minimum actuation rate of 25° flap deflection in 0.33 s, producing a slew rate of 75°/s, was desired. This slew rate is representative of many operational military aircrafts with hinged control surfaces. Numerous trade studies were performed on a variety of smart materials and flexible structure configurations before arriving at the final trailing edge structure design that consisted of a flexcore center and elastomeric outer skin actuated by high-power ultrasonic motors using an eccentric motion. The trailing edge control surface fitted onto the wind tunnel model comprised 10 eccentric-driven segments connected together by a continuous outer skin and a flexible hinge pin at the trailing edge tip. This pinned configuration allowed the segments partial freedom to rotate about each other, but constrained any lateral motion thus giving a smooth trailing edge shape for nonuniform spanwise deflections. To control the 10 segments of the trailing edge, a VME-based control system with high speed, simultaneously sampled A/D and D/A boards and a dedicated DSP board was developed. This paper describes the analysis and design of the flex structure, ultrasonic motor selection and performance, element and coupon tests to verify analysis, control system development, model integration, and results from the wind tunnel test.

Overview of the DARPA Smart Wing Project

The recently completed DARPA/AFRL/NASA Smart Wing program, performed by a team led by Northrop Grumman Corporation (NGC), addressed the development and demonstration of smart materials based concepts to improve the aerodynamic and aeroelastic performance of military aircraft. This paper presents an overview of the program. The program was divided into two phases. Under Phase 1 (January 1995 to February 1999), the NGC-led team developed adaptive wing structures with integrated actuation mechanisms to replace standard hinged control surfaces and provide variable, optimal aerodynamic shapes for a variety of flight regimes. An important limitation of the Phase 1 effort, the low bandwidth achievable in Shape Memory Alloy (SMA)-based actuation, was addressed in Phase 2 (January 1997 to November 2001). Under Phase 2, a 30-percent scale full span wind tunnel model of an NGC Uninhabited Combat Air Vehicle (UCAV) design was developed. For the Phase 2 first wind tunnel test, completed in March 2000, SMA-actuated, hingeless, smoothly contoured, flexible leading and trailing edge control surfaces were incorporated on one wing of the model and conventional trailing edge control surfaces actuated using electric motors on the other. This test provided baseline steady-state data at Mach numbers ranging from 0.3 to 0.8. The test also demonstrated the benefits of the smart leading edge control surface to compensate for loss of aileron effectiveness with increasing dynamic pressure. The second test, performed in May 2001, demonstrated a hingeless, smoothly contoured, structurally compliant, trailing edge control surface actuated using piezoelectric motors. Spanwise and chordwise shape control was demonstrated for the smart trailing edge control surface at deflection rates of up to 80°/s. Performance improvements in terms of increased rolling and pitching moments and lower control surface deflections were quantified. The work performed under this program has demonstrated the feasibility of developing smart control surface designs to provide optimal aerodynamic performance at a wide range of flight conditions.

Flow Separation Within the Engine Inlet of an Uninhabited Combat Air Vehicle (UCAV)

This paper discusses the structure of the flow within the engine inlet of an uninhabited combat air vehicle (UCAV). The UCAV features a top-mounted, serpentine inlet leading to an engine buried within the fuselage. The performance of the inlet is found to depend strongly on a flow separation that occurs within the inlet. Both the time-averaged and the unsteady structure of this separation is studied, and an argument relating the inlet performance to the behavior of this separation is suggested. The results presented in this paper also suggest that there are considerable aerodynamic limitations to further shortening or narrowing of the inlet. Since there are substantial, system level benefits from using a smaller inlet, the case for separated flow control therefore appears clear.

Unmanned vehicles go to war

A two‐day conference in May 1998 on unmanned vehicles gave a remarkable picture of the range of uses ‐ and particularly for military purposes ‐ to which robot vehicles are being put. Reconnaissance aircraft were by far the most strongly represented, although there was a US Navy paper looking at the future of “uninhabited combat air vehicles” (keeping a man in the control loop). There were also presentations on underwater vehicles, target vehicles and sensors. This report summarizes two aerial and two underwater applications.