Aerodynamic Design and Characterization of a Quad Tilt-Wing UAV via Wind Tunnel Tests
Publication: Journal of Aerospace Engineering
Volume 25, Issue 4
Abstract
This paper presents aerodynamic design and characterization of a new quad tilt-wing unmanned aerial vehicle [Sabancı University unmanned aerial vehicle (SUAVI)] through wind tunnel tests and provides experimental data for the design of similar aerial platforms. SUAVI is capable of vertical takeoff and landing (VTOL) and horizontal flight, and it can perform both indoor and outdoor surveillance. Aerodynamic design of the vehicle directly affects its operational performance, including flight stability and flight duration in vertical, transition, and horizontal flight modes. Selection of the propulsion system and determination of the shape of the fuselage and the wings are done in an optimal manner by taking several aerodynamic criteria into account. Flow simulations reveal that the rear wings are affected by the downwash of the front wings. To solve this problem, the rear wings are placed at a higher incidence angle than the front wings. Wind tunnel tests are performed to measure the lift and drag forces and pitching moments for level flight in the entire speed range. Furthermore, the rear and front motor throttle settings and the wing incidence angle combinations for the nominal flight are measured and tabulated. To eliminate undesired spanwise air flows at the wing tips, several winglets with different shapes and sizes are introduced, and the optimum winglet is developed by several simulations and experiments. Some of the results presented in this paper are novel contributions to the literature and can be used in the design of new hybrid unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs).
Get full access to this article
View all available purchase options and get full access to this article.
Acknowledgments
The authors would like to acknowledge the support provided by TUBITAK (Scientific and Technological Research Council of Turkey) under Grant No. 107M179.
References
Abbott, I. H., and Doenhoff, A. E. (1959). Theory of wing sections, Dover, Mineola, NY.
Anderson, J. D. (2001). Fundamentals of aerodynamics, McGraw Hill, Boston.
Barnard, R. H., and Philpott, D. R. (2004). Aircraft flight: A description of the physical principles of aircraft flight, Prentice Hall, Upper Saddle River, NJ.
Coifman, B. M., Mishalani, M., and Redmill, K. (2004). “Surface transportation surveillance from unmanned aerial vehicles.” Proc., 83rd Annual Meeting, Transportation Research Board, Washington DC.
Cruck, E., and Lygeros, J. (2007). “Sense and avoid system for a MALE UAV.” Proc., AIAA Guidance, Navigation and Control Conf. and Exhibit, American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Hilton Head, SC.
Dickeson, J. J., Miles, D., Cifdaloz, O., Wells, V. L., and Rodriguez, A. A.(2007). “Robust LPV H gain-scheduled hover-to-cruise conversion for a tilt-wing rotorcraft in the presence of CG variations.” Proc., American Control Conf, IEEE, New York.
Dingle, L., and Tooley, M. (2005). Aircraft engineering principles, Elsevier Butterworth-Heinemann, Oxford, U.K.
Dreier, M. E. (2007). Introduction to helicopter and tiltrotor flight simulation, American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Reston, VA.
Erbil, M. A., Prior, S. D., Karamanoglu, M., Odedra, S., Barlow, C., and Lewis, D. (2009). “Reconfigurable unmanned aerial vehicles.” Proc., Int. Conf. on Manufacturing and Engineering Systems, National Formosa Univ., Yunlin County, Taiwan.
Franklin, J. A. (2002). Dynamics, control, and flying qualities of V/STOL aircraft, American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Reston, VA.
Grigson, P., and Gray, A.(1998). “UAV utility in the intelligence, surveillance, target acquisition and reconnaissance role.” Proc., 13th Bristol Int.l RPV/UAV Systems Conf., Univ. of Bristol, Bristol, U.K.
Gupta, V. (2005). “Quad tilt rotor simulations in helicopter model using computational fluid dynamics.” Ph.D. thesis, Univ. of Maryland, College Park, MD.
Gupta, V., and Baeder, J.(2002). “Investigations of quad tiltrotor aerodynamics in forward flight using CFD.” Proc., 20th Applied Aerodynamics Conf., American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics, St. Louis.
Kendoul, F., Fantoni, I., and Lozano, R. (2005). “Modeling and control of a small autonomous aircraft having two tilting rotors.” Proc., 44th IEEE Conf. on Decision and Control, and the European Control Conf., IEEE, Seville, Spain.
Latchman, H., and Wong, T. (2002). “Statement of work for airborne traffic surveillance systems—Proof of concept study for Florida Department of Transportation.” Univ. of Florida, Project No: 354-86, Final Report. 〈http://www.list.ufl.edu/publications〉 (Nov. 11, 2010).
Lee, J., Min, B., and Kim, E. (2007). “Autopilot design of tilt-rotor UAV using particle swarm optimization method.” Proc., Int. Conf. on Control, Automation and Systems, IEEE, Seoul.
McCormick, B. W. (1995). Aerodynamics, aeronautics, and flight mechanics, Wiley, New York.
McGuinness, B., and Ebbage, L. (2002). “Assessing human factors in command and control: Workload and situational awareness metrics.” Proc., Command and Control Research and Technology Symp, The Defense Technical Information Center, Monterey, CA.
Muraoka, K., Okada, N., and Kubo, D. (2009). “Quad tilt wing VTOL UAV: Aerodynamic characteristics and prototype flight test.” Proc., AIAA Unmanned…Unlimited Conf., American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Seattle.
Murphy, D. W. (1994). “The air mobile ground security and surveillance system AMGSSS.” Proc., 10th Annual ADPA Security Technology Symp, American Defense Preparedness Association, Arlington, VA.
Nonami, K. (2007). “Prospect and recent research and development for civil use autonomous unmanned aircraft as UAV and MAV.” J. Syst. Des. Dyn., 1(2), 120–128.
Polak, D. R., Rehm, W., and George, A. R. (2000). “Effects of an image plane on the tiltrotor fountain flow.” J. Am. Helicopter Soc., 45(2), 90–96.
Puri, A. (2008). “A survey of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) for traffic surveillance.” Dept. of Computer Science and Engineering, Univ. of South Florida, 〈http://www.csee.usf.edu/apuri/techreport.pdf〉 (Nov. 11, 2010).
Radhakrishnan, A., and Schmitz, F. (2004). “An experimental investigation of a quad tilt rotor in low speed forward flight.” Proc., AHS 4th Decennial Specialist’s Conf. on Aeromechanics, American Helicopter Society, San Francisco.
Salazar, S., Lozano, R., and Escareno, J. (2009). “Stabilization and nonlinear control for a novel trirotor mini-aircraft.” Control Eng. Pract., 17(8), 886–894.
Sheldahl, R. E., and Klimas, P. C. (1981). “Aerodynamic characteristics of seven symmetrical airfoil sections through 180-degree angle of attack for use in aerodynamic analysis of vertical axis wind turbines.” SAND-80-2114, Sandia National Laboratories, Albuquerque, NM.
Snyder, D. (2000). “The quad tiltrotor: Its beginning and evolution.” Proc., 56th Annual Forum, American Helicopter Society, Virginia Beach, VA.
Travers, D. (2000). “Brigade ISTAR operations.” Army Doctrine Train. Bull., 3(4), 43–49.
Information & Authors
Information
Published In
Journal of Aerospace Engineering
Volume 25 • Issue 4 • October 2012
Pages: 574 - 587
Copyright
© 2012 American Society of Civil Engineers.
History
Received: Nov 30, 2010
Accepted: Sep 8, 2011
Published online: Sep 14, 2012
Published in print: Oct 1, 2012
Authors
Metrics & Citations
Metrics
Citations
Download citation
If you have the appropriate software installed, you can download article citation data to the citation manager of your choice. Simply select your manager software from the list below and click Download.