CFD calculations on the unsteady aerodynamic characteristics of a tilt-rotor in a conversion mode

In order to calculate the unsteady aerodynamic characteristics of a tilt-rotor in a conversion mode, a virtual blade model(VBM) and an real blade model(RBM) are established respectively. A new multi-layer moving-embedded grid technique is proposed to reduce the numerical dissipation of the tilt-rotor wake in a conversion mode. In this method, a grid system generated abound the rotor accounts for rigid blade motions, and a new searching scheme named adaptive inverse map(AIM) is established to search corresponding donor elements in the present movingembedded grid system to translate information among the different computational zones. A dual-time method is employed to fulfill unsteady calculations on the flowfield of the tilt-rotor,and a second-order centered difference scheme considering artificial viscosity is used to calculate the flux. In order to improve the computing efficiency, the single program multiple data(SPMD)model parallel acceleration technology is adopted, according to the characteristic of the current grid system. The lift and drag coefficients of an NACA0012 airfoil, the dynamic pressure distributions below a typical rotor plane, and the sectional pressure distributions on a three-bladed Branum–Tung tilt-rotor in hover flight are calculated respectively, and the present VBM and RBM are validated by comparing the calculated results with available experimental data. Then, unsteady aerodynamic forces and flowfields of an XV-15 tilt-rotor in different modes, such as a fixed conversion mode at different tilt angles(15°, 30°, 60°) and a whole conversion mode which converses from 0° to90°, are numerically simulated by the VBM and RBM respectively. By analyses and comparisons on the simulated results of unsteady aerodynamic forces of the tilt-rotor in different modes, some meaningful conclusions about distorted blade-tip vortex distribution and unsteady aerodynamic force variation in a conversion mode are obtained, and these investigation results could provide a good foundation for tilt-rotor aircraft design in the future.     

Numerical study on flow fields and aerodynamics of tilt rotor aircraft in conversion mode based on embedded grid and actuator model

A method combining rotor actuator disk model and embedded grid technique is presented in this paper, aimed at predicting the flow fields and aerodynamic characteristics of tilt rotor aircraft in conversion mode more efficiently and effectively. In this method, rotor's influence is considered in terms of the momentum it impacts to the fluid around it; transformation matrixes among different coordinate systems are deduced to extend actuator method's utility to conversion mode flow fields' calculation. Meanwhile, an embedded grid system is designed, in which grids generated around fuselage and actuator disk are regarded as background grid and minor grid respectively, and a new method is presented for ‘donor searching' and ‘hole cutting' during grid assembling. Based on the above methods, flow fields of tilt rotor aircraft in conversion mode are simulated, with threedimensional Navier–Stokes equations discretized by a second-order upwind finite-volume scheme and an implicit lower–upper symmetric Gauss–Seidel(LU-SGS) time-stepping scheme. Numerical results demonstrate that the proposed CFD method is very effective in simulating the conversion mode flow fields of tilt rotor aircraft.     

Numerical simulation of aerodynamic interaction for a tilt rotor aircraft in helicopter mode

A rotor CFD solver is developed for simulating the aerodynamic interaction phenomenon among rotor, wing and fuselage of a tilt rotor aircraft in its helicopter mode. The unsteady Navier–Stokes equations are discretized in inertial frame and embedded grid system is adopted for describing the relative motion among blades and nacelle/wing/fuselage. A combination of multi-layer embedded grid and ‘‘extended hole fringe" technique is complemented in original grid system to tackle grid assembly difficulties arising from the narrow space among different aerodynamic components, and to improve the interpolation precision by decreasing the cell volume discrepancy among different grid blocks. An overall donor cell searching and automatic hole cutting technique is used for grid assembly, and the solution processes are speeded up by introduction of Open MP parallel method. Based on this solver, flow fields and aerodynamics of a tilt rotor aircraft in hover are simulated with several rotor collective angles, and the corresponding states of an isolated rotor and rotor/wing/fuselage model are also computed to obtain reference solution.Aerodynamic interference influences among the rotor and wing/fuselage/nacelle are analyzed,and some meaningful conclusions are drawn.     

Aerodynamic shape optimization for alleviating dynamic stall characteristics of helicopter rotor airfoil

In order to alleviate the dynamic stall effects in helicopter rotor, the sequential quadratic programming(SQP) method is employed to optimize the characteristics of airfoil under dynamic stall conditions based on the SC1095 airfoil. The geometry of airfoil is parameterized by the class-shape-transformation(CST) method, and the C-topology body-fitted mesh is then automatically generated around the airfoil by solving the Poisson equations. Based on the grid generation technology, the unsteady Reynolds-averaged Navier-Stokes(RANS) equations are chosen as the governing equations for predicting airfoil flow field and the highly-efficient implicit scheme of lower–upper symmetric Gauss–Seidel(LU-SGS) is adopted for temporal discretization. To capture the dynamic stall phenomenon of the rotor more accurately, the Spalart–Allmaras turbulence model is employed to close the RANS equations. The optimized airfoil with a larger leading edge radius and camber is obtained. The leading edge vortex and trailing edge separation of the optimized airfoil under unsteady conditions are obviously weakened, and the dynamic stall characteristics of optimized airfoil at different Mach numbers, reduced frequencies and angles of attack are also obviously improved compared with the baseline SC1095 airfoil. It is demonstrated that the optimized method is effective and the optimized airfoil is suitable as the helicopter rotor airfoil.     

Panel/full-span free-wake coupled method for unsteady aerodynamics of helicopter rotor blade

A full-span free-wake method is coupled with an unsteady panel method to accurately predict the unsteady aerodynamics of helicopter rotor blades in hover and forward flight. The unsteady potential-based panel method is used to consider aerodynamics of finite thickness multi-bladed rotors, and the full-span free-wake method is applied to simulating dynamics of rotor wake. These methods are tightly coupled through trailing-edge Kutta condition and by converting doublet-wake panels to full-span vortex filaments. A velocity-field integration technique is also adopted to overcome singularity problem during the interaction between the rotor wake and blades. Helicopter rotors including Caradonna-Tung, UH-60A, and AH-1G rotors, are simulated in hover and forward flight to validate the accuracy of this approach. The predicted aerodynamic loads of rotor blades agree well with available measured data and computational fluid dynamics (CFD) results, and the unsteady dynamics of rotor wake is also well simulated. Compared to CFD, the present method obtains accurate results more efficiently and is suitable to rotorcraft aeroelastic analysis.     

Numerical Simulation of Rotor-aerodynamic Surface Interaction in Hover Using Moving Chimera Grid

Three-dimensional unsteady Navier-Stokes equations are numerically solved to simulate the aerodynamic interaction of rotor, canard and horizontal tail in hover based on moving chimera grid. The variations of unsteady aerodynamic forces and moments of the canard and horizontal tail with respect to the rotor azimuth are analyzed with the deflection angle set at 0° and 50°, respectively. The pressure map of aerodynamic surfaces and velocity vector distribution of flow field are investigated to get better understanding of the unsteady aerodynamic interaction. The result shows that the canard and horizontal tail present different characteristics under the downwash of the rotor. The canard produces much vertical force loss with low amplitude fluctuation. Contrarily, the horizontal tail, which is within the flow field induced by the down wash of the rotor, produces only less vertical force loss, but the amplitudes of the lift and pitching moment are larger, implying that a potential deflection angle scheme in hover is 50° for the canard and 0° for the horizontal tail.     

A coupling VWM/CFD/CSD method for rotor airload prediction

A coupling fluid-structure method with a combination of viscous wake model(VWM),computational fluid dynamics(CFD) and comprehensive structural dynamics(CSD) modules is developed in this paper for rotor unsteady airload prediction. The hybrid VWM/CFD solver is employed to model the nonlinear aerodynamic phenomena and complicated rotor wake dynamics;the moderate deflection beam theory is implemented to predict the blade structural deformation; the loose coupling strategy based on the ‘delt method' is used to couple the fluid and structure solvers.Several cases of Helishape 7A rotor are performed first to investigate the effect of elastic deformation on airloads. Then, two challenging forward flight conditions of UH-60 A helicopter rotor are investigated, and the simulated results of wake geometry, chordwise pressure distribution and sectional normal force show excellent agreement with available test data; a comparison with traditional CFD/CSD method is also presented to illustrate the efficiency of the developed method.     

Numerical Simulation of Rotor Flow Field Based on Overset Grids and Several Spatial and Temporal Discretization Schemes

A numerical method based on solutions of Euler/Navier-Stokes (N-S) equations is developed for calculating the flow field over a rotor in hover. Jameson central scheme, van Leer flux-vector splitting scheme, advection upwind splitting method (AUSM) scheme, upwind AUSM/van Leer scheme, AUSM+ scheme and AUSMDV scheme are implemented for spatial discretization, and van Albada limiter is also applied. For temporal discretization, both explicit Runge-Kutta method and implicit lower-upper symmetric Gauss-Seidel (LU-SGS) method are attempted. Simultaneously, overset grid technique is adopted. In detail, hole-map method is utilized to identify intergrid boundary points (IGBPs). Furthermore, aimed at identification issue of donor elements, inverse-map method is implemented. Eventually, blade surface pressure distributions derived from numerical simulation are validated compared with experimental data, showing that all the schemes mentioned above have the capability to predict the rotor flow field accurately. At the same time, vorticity contours are illustrated for analysis, and other characteristics are also analyzed.     

Numerical analysis on noise of rotor with unconventional blade tips based on CFD/Kirchhoff method

A solver is developed aiming at efficiently predicting rotor noise in hover and forward flight. In this solver, the nonlinear near-field solutions are calculated by a hybrid approach which includes the Navier-Stokes and Euler equations based on a moving-embedded grid system and adaptive grid methodology. A combination of the third-order upwind scheme and flux-difference splitting scheme, instead of the second-order center-difference scheme which may cause larger wake dissipation, has been employed in the present computational fluid dynamics (CFD) method. The sound pressure data in the near field can be calculated directly by solving the Navier-Stokes equations, and the sound propagation can be predicted by the Kirchhoff method. A harmonic expansion approach is presented for rotor far-field noise prediction, which gives an analytical expression for the integral function in the Kirchhoff formula. As a result, the interpolation process is simplified and the efficiency and accuracy of the interpolation are improved. Then, the high-speed impulsive (HIS) noise of a helicopter rotor at different tip Mach numbers and on different observers is calculated and analyzed in hover and forward flight, which shows a highly directional characteristic of the rotor HIS noise with a maximum value in the rotor plane, and the HSI noise weakens rapidly with the increasing of the directivity angle. In order to investigate the effects of the rotor blade-tip shape on its aeroacoustic characteristics, four kinds of blade tips are designed and their noise characteristics have been simulated. At last, a new unconventional CLOR-II blade tip has been designed, and the noise characteristics of the presented CLOR-II model rotor have been simulated and measured compared to the reference rotors with a rectangular or swept-back platform blade tip. The results demonstrate that the unconventional CLOR-II blade tip can significantly reduce the HSI noise of a rotor.     

Integrated optimization analyses of aerodynamic/stealth characteristics of helicopter rotor based on surrogate model

Based on computational fluid dynamics(CFD)method,electromagnetic high-frequency method and surrogate model optimization techniques,an integration design method about aerodynamic/stealth has been established for helicopter rotor.The developed integration design method is composed of three modules:integrated grids generation(the moving-embedded grids for CFD solver and the blade grids for radar cross section(RCS)solver are generated by solving Poisson equations and folding approach),aerodynamic/stealth solver(the aerodynamic characteristics are simulated by CFD method based upon Navier–Stokes equations and Spalart–Allmaras(S–A)turbulence model),and the stealth characteristics are calculated by using a panel edge method combining the method of physical optics(PO),equivalent currents(MEC)and quasi-stationary(MQS),and integrated optimization analysis(based upon the surrogate model optimization technique with full factorial design(FFD)and radial basis function(RBF)),an integrated optimization analyses on aerodynamic/stealth characteristics of rotor are conducted.Firstly,the scattering characteristics of the rotor with different blade-tip swept and twist angles have been carried out,then time–frequency domain grayscale with strong scattering regions of rotor have been given.Meanwhile,the effects of swept-tip and twist angles on the aerodynamic characteristic of rotor have been performed.Furthermore,by choosing suitable object function and constraint condition,the compromised design about swept and twist combinations of rotor with high aerodynamic performances and low scattering characteristics has been given at last.     

基于高阶WENO格式的旋翼非定常涡流场数值模拟

为提高直升机旋翼黏性涡流场计算流体力学（CFD）的计算精度及降低数值耗散,发展了一套基于五阶加权本质无振荡（WENO）格式的旋翼非定常涡流场数值计算方法。采用运动嵌套网格方法生成围绕前飞状态旋翼的网格系统,以Navier-Stokes方程作为主控方程,湍流模型采用一方程Spalart-Allmaras模型。为了提高旋翼流场中对涡的形成、演化等发展过程的模拟精度,采用高间断分辨率的Roe-WENO格式计算对流通量。对状态变量的插值,选取适当的加权因子,通过多个重构模板的凸组合来构造五阶WENO格式,在交界面附近获得具有五阶精度的状态变量。为了提高计算效率,采用高效的隐式LU-SGS（Lower-Upper Symmetric Gauss-Seidel）推进方法和并行计算策略。最后,运用该方法分别对悬停状态下C-T（Caradonna-Tung）旋翼和UH-60A旋翼以及前飞状态下C-T旋翼和SA349/2旋翼的涡流场及气动特性进行了数值模拟,并将数值结果与传统二阶精度格式的计算值进行了对比。结果表明：在计算时间增长10%～20%的前提下,五阶WENO格式能够捕捉到更精确的涡流场特性,反映了五阶WENO格式在计算旋翼非定常涡流场时具有更高的计算精度与更低的数值耗散特性。     

旋翼非定常气动特性CFD模拟的通用运动嵌套网格方法

针对直升机旋翼非定常气动特性CFD模拟中的网格生成难题,提出了一套高效、通用的运动嵌套网格生成方法.首先,基于Poisson方程求解和翻折法生成旋翼桨叶的正交贴体网格.其次,针对旋翼桨叶的扭转分布及变距、挥舞等复杂运动,建立了一套通用的洞单元识别的扰动衍射法;为保证洞包络面的封闭性,完善了挖洞过程中网格加密策略;在洞边界确立基础上,提出了一种高效、鲁棒的最小距离法贡献单元搜索的改进方法.在此基础上,建立了基于RANS(Reynolds-averaged Navier-Stokes)方程的旋翼非定常流场CFD模拟方法.最后,采用所建立的方法分别对悬停和前飞状态下的C-T(Caradonna-Tung)旋翼和7A(Helishape 7A)旋翼的气动特性、桨尖涡的位置进行了计算,计算结果与试验值误差小于5%,验证了该运动嵌套网格生成方法在旋翼非定常气动特性CFD模拟中的有效性.      

基于目标压力分布的旋翼先进气动外形反设计分析方法

基于雷诺平均Navier-Stokes（RANS）方程、运动嵌套网格、目标压力分布及余量修正方法,构建了一套直升机旋翼桨叶先进气动外形反设计方法。为避免由桨叶气动外形变化导致的网格畸变,发展了一套基于Poisson方程求解的旋翼桨叶结构化贴体正交网格的快速、自动化生成方法,为提高运动嵌套网格的生成质量和通用性,采用剖面间网格插值与桨尖翻折相结合的方法,同时建立了基于“Top Map”和“Inverse Map”相结合的洞边界划定和贡献单元搜寻的新方法。基于Navier-Stokes方程和双时间法建立了旋翼非定常流场模拟方法,通量求解采用Roe-MUSCL格式,并使用低速预处理法来克服前飞旋翼流场收敛中遇到的刚性问题。在计算流体力学（CFD）方法基础上,基于旋翼翼型压力系数余量联立各方位角处的反设计MGM（Modified Garabedia-McFadden）超定方程组,并依据激波分离、失速等约束设置了各方位角处的反设计权重系数,创建了基于MGM超定方程组最小二乘解的旋翼气动外形（翼型）设计方法。应用所建立的方法,分别针对多目标、多状态和前飞时的旋翼（翼型）气动外形进行反设计分析,验证了本文方法的有效性。最后,将该方法拓展应用到旋翼桨尖气动外形设计中,设计得到与UH-60A直升机旋翼气动特性相似的矩形桨叶外形。     

基于CFD/CSD耦合方法的旋翼气动弹性载荷计算分析

为提高直升机前飞状态下旋翼非定常气动弹性载荷的预估精度,在旋翼气动弹性综合分析方法中引入旋翼CFD模块,建立了一套基于CFD/CSD松耦合分析的计算方法和程序。为高效解决流固耦合方法中由于桨叶挥舞、扭转等弹性变形带来的旋翼贴体网格变形问题,采用基于代数变换方法的网格变形技术,桨叶运动变形量和旋翼气动力信息通过流固交接面传递。旋翼流场分析方法中,主控方程采用耦合S-A湍流模型的Navier-Stokes方程,围绕旋翼流场的网格采用结构嵌套网格方法生成,无黏通量计算采用Roe格式,时间推进采用双时间法。旋翼结构分析中,考虑旋翼配平,基于Hamilton变分原理和20自由度Timoshenko梁模型求解弹性旋翼非线性运动方程。分别对CSD和CFD方法进行验证,在此基础上,计算了SA349/2旋翼桨叶在前飞状态下的非定常气动力、挥舞弯矩、摆振弯矩和扭转力矩,并与飞行测试数据进行了对比。计算表明:CFD/CSD耦合方法可以显著提高旋翼非定常气动弹性载荷的分析精度,精确捕捉桨叶表面压强峰值、激波位置等,表明本文发展的旋翼CFD/CSD耦合方法可以有效地运用到旋翼气动弹性载荷的预测分析中。     

悬停状态倾转旋翼机非定常气动干扰研究

悬停状态旋翼/机翼机身干扰流场的高精度数值模拟对准确预估倾转旋翼飞行器气动性能具有十分重要的意义，开展该干扰流场的高精度数值模拟一直是直升机空气动力学领域的研究热点和难点之一。本文基于运动嵌套网格技术，建立一套适用于倾转旋翼非定常流场的CFD方法。采用雷诺平均Navier-Stokes(RANS)方程作为主控方程，湍流模型选用Spalart-Allmaras模型，时间推进上采用高效的隐式LU-SGS格式。在此基础上，首先开展某新型倾转旋翼无人机的旋翼/机翼机身非定常干扰流场数值模拟研究，得到了与文献相符的“喷泉效应”现象，计算结果显示干扰作用使总拉力损失16.6%。然后着重研究了不同襟副翼预置角对降低悬停状态下旋翼/机翼机身气动干扰作用的影响，研究结果显示45°襟副翼预置角效果最佳，使全机总拉力损失从原来的16.6%降到13.8%。     

悬停状态倾转旋翼/机翼干扰流场及气动力的CFD计算

基于一套高效通用的多层运动嵌套网格技术,建立了适合悬停状态倾转旋翼机旋翼/机翼气动干扰特性分析的高效混合计算流体力学（CFD）方法。在倾转旋翼/机翼贴体网格区采用可压雷诺平均Navier-Stokes（RANS）方程作为主控方程,过渡/背景网格区选用Euler方程,湍流模型选用Spalart-Allmaras模型。时间推进上采用双时间推进格式进行非定常求解,并在方法中运用了SPMD（Single Program Multiple Data）模式的并行加速技术。在此基础上,首先分别采用UH-60A直升机旋翼及XV-15倾转旋翼机旋翼作为数值算例,验证了CFD方法的有效性。然后着重对倾转旋翼/机翼的非定常干扰流场及气动力分布特征进行了数值研究,模拟得到与实际情况相符的“喷泉效应”干扰现象。计算结果表明,干扰作用使得倾转旋翼相对于孤立旋翼拉力数值减小了3%,但总的拉力系数损失达到了17%,证明悬停状态下气动干扰对飞行器气动性能有重要影响。     

一种适合于旋翼前飞非定常流场计算的新型运动嵌套网格方法

针对旋翼流场计算中关键的运动嵌套网格技术,提出了一个新的网格单元关系快速判断方法。该方法通过计算特殊网格点在背景网格上的位置来建立桨叶网格在背景网格中所占据范围的关系,并用于嵌套网格洞单元的识别,又进一步将该方法推广用于Inverse Map的建立,在此基础上,建立了一套用于前飞流场计算的运动嵌套方法。通过多种前飞旋翼测试算例,分别评估了背景网格、桨叶网格尺寸改变对计算时间的影响,同时验证了该方法的可靠性,结果表明构建网格嵌套关系所用时间随桨叶网格和背景网格尺寸的变化幅度较小,且具有良好的鲁棒性,能够满足旋翼前飞状态计算的需要。最后,在基于前飞非定常N-S/Euler流场求解器中,采用该方法模拟了UH-60A和7A旋翼悬停/前飞状态的气动特性,通过计算时间的对比体现出该方法的高效性,并且流场计算结果与试验数据对比表明该方法可以有效地用于旋翼前飞非定常流场的计算。     

后缘小翼对旋翼气动特性的控制机理及参数分析

针对后缘小翼（TEF）的典型运动参数对旋翼气动特性的控制进行了分析研究。为克服变形网格方法可能导致网格畸变的不足,发展了一套适用于前飞状态带后缘小翼旋翼的运动嵌套网格方法。基于非定常雷诺平均Navier-Stokes（URANS）方程、k-ω剪切应力输运（SST）湍流模型和Roe-MUSCL插值格式,采用含LU-SGS隐式推进的双时间方法及并行技术,建立了一套适用于带有后缘小翼控制的旋翼前飞非定常流动特性模拟的高效CFD方法。以带后缘小翼的SMART旋翼为算例,对比了桨叶剖面等效法向力的计算结果,验证了CFD方法的有效性。着重开展了前飞状态旋翼后缘小翼的控制分析,在操纵量不变的情况下,分别研究了后缘小翼偏转幅值、偏转频率、安装位置及宽度等参数对旋翼气动力的影响特性,获得了典型参数对旋翼气动特性的控制规律。进一步研究了配平状态下后缘小翼对旋翼气动特性的参数影响。结果表明：后缘小翼可以充分发挥旋翼在前行侧的升力潜能,同时降低后行侧动态失速过程中旋翼的阻力和扭矩;在相同的旋翼拉力情况下,通过安装后缘小翼可以将旋翼阻力系数和扭矩系数分别降低17%和29%,升阻比提高14%。     

倾转旋翼典型飞行状态气动特性的CFD分析

针对倾转旋翼特有的悬停、巡航、过渡3种飞行模式,基于CFD方法分别对倾转旋翼的上述3种典型飞行状态进行了数值模拟.首先,基于运动嵌套网格思想建立了适合倾转旋翼运动模拟的多层运动嵌套网格系统.然后,基于RANS(Reynolds averaged Navier-Stokes)方程建立了适用于非定常流场分析的CFD模拟方法.为了提高整个流场的计算效率,时间推进采用高效的隐式LU-SGS(lower upper symmetric Gauss Seidel)方法,并运用SPMD(single program multiple data)并行计算模式.最后,采用所建立的网格生成方法和流场求解器,进行了不同飞行状态下的倾转旋翼气动特性数值分析,验证了建立CFD方法的有效性并得出了多种飞行状态下的气动特性.结果表明:悬停状态下倾转旋翼相对于直升机旋翼有更加明显的下洗流影响区域.巡航状态两旋翼中心间距为2.5R时,倾转旋翼之间存在明显的气动干扰.过渡状态下,倾转旋翼提供的拉力在倾转角为45°前下降较快,且在倾转角较小时,倾转旋翼桨叶表面拉力分布仍能表现出直升机旋翼的特性.      

应用多块对接结构网格方法的直升机涵道尾桨气动特性分析

基于湍流Navier-Stokes方程,建立了一套直升机涵道尾桨流场及气动特性的CFD分析方法.在该方法中,针对直升机涵道尾桨流场的特点以及动量源方法对网格系统的要求,提出了一种多块对接网格生成方法,分块贴体网格采用求解Poisson方程的方法生成.通过结合涵道尾桨的运动方式、几何特征及气动特征,建立一个包含动量源项的N-S方程的涵道尾桨流场计算方法和迭代流程;为较好地捕捉涵道壁附近存在的旋涡及分离现象,采用了一方程S-A湍流模型.通过对ONERA M6机翼的绕流特性的计算分析,以及对涵道尾桨在悬停状态下的拉力、诱导速度、载荷分布等的计算分析,验证了该CFD方法的有效性.在此基础上,采用该方法进行直升机悬停、侧飞和前飞状态下涵道尾桨流场与气动特性的数值分析,得到了关于涵道尾桨流场和气动特性的一些有意义的结论.