A simulation investigation of helicopter ground resonance phenomenon

2019 ◽  
Vol 91 (3) ◽  
pp. 484-497
Author(s):  
Jaroslaw Stanislawski

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to present a simulation method applied for investigation of helicopter ground resonance phenomenon. Design/methodology/approach The considered physical model of helicopter standing on ground with rotating rotor consists of fuselage and main transmission gear treated as stiff bodies connected by elastic elements. The fuselage is supported on landing gear modeled by spring-damper units. The main rotor blades are treated as set of elastic axes with lumped masses distributed along blade radius. Due to Galerkin method, parameters of blades motion are assumed as a combination of bending and torsion eigen modes. A Runge–Kutta method is applied to solve equations of motions of rotor blades and helicopter fuselage. Findings The presented simulation method may be applied in preliminary stage of helicopter design to avoid ground resonance by proper selection of landing gear units and blade damper characteristics. Practical implications Ground resonance may occur in form of violently increasing mutual oscillations of helicopter fuselage and lead-lag motion of rotor blades. According to changes of stiffness and damping characteristics, simulations show stable behavior or arising oscillations of helicopter. The effects of different blade balance or defect of blade damper are predicted. Originality/value The simulation method may help to determine the envelope of safe operation of helicopter in phase of take-off or landing. The effects of additional disturbances as results of blades pitch control as swashplate deflection are introduced.

2019 ◽  
Vol 2019 (2) ◽  
pp. 59-75
Author(s):  
Jarosław Stanisławski

Summary The paper presents simulation method and results of calculations determining behavior of helicopter and landing site loads which are generated during phase of the helicopter take-off and landing. For helicopter with whirling rotor standing on ground or touching it, the loads of landing gear depend on the parameters of helicopter movement, occurrence of wind gusts and control of pitch angle of the rotor blades. The considered model of helicopter consists of the fuselage and main transmission treated as rigid bodies connected with elastic elements. The fuselage is supported by landing gear modeled by units of spring and damping elements. The rotor blades are modeled as elastic axes with sets of lumped masses of blade segments distributed along them. The Runge-Kutta method was used to solve the equations of motion of the helicopter model. According to the Galerkin method, it was assumed that the parameters of the elastic blade motion can be treated as a combination of its bending and torsion eigen modes. For calculations, data of a hypothetical light helicopter were applied. Simulation results were presented for the cases of landing helicopter touching ground with different vertical speed and for phase of take-off including influence of rotor speed changes, wind gust and control of blade pitch. The simulation method may help to define the limits of helicopter safe operation on the landing surfaces.


2018 ◽  
Vol 2 (2) ◽  
pp. 175-180
Author(s):  
Giuseppe Rocchetta ◽  
Geminiano Mancusi

Purpose Within the context of 2D square lattices, searching for the existence of band gaps assumes a great interest owing to many possible fields of application: from energy absorption devices to noise and vibration controllers, as well as advanced strategies for the seismic isolation. Design/methodology/approach The underlying microstructure may influence the mechanical response of 2D square lattices according to a complex interplay between different factors. A first one is related to the so-called “size-effect”. A second one relates, instead, to the mass density distribution. Findings It has been observed that lumped masses may induce additional band gaps to appear and may magnify their width. Finally, an additional factor deals with the inner damping characteristics of the constituent materials, which usually are polymer-based. Originality/value This study focuses on the first factor from a specific perspective: to investigate the influence of the size effect on the existence and properties of frequency band gaps.


Author(s):  
Arjun Krishnan ◽  
Ashwin Krishnan ◽  
Mark Costello

This article examines the fundamental aspects of controlling ground resonance in rotorcraft equipped with actively controlled landing gear. Ground resonance is a mechanical instability affecting rotorcraft on the ground. It occurs at certain rotor speeds, where the lead–lag motion of the rotor couples with the motion of fuselage creating a self-excited oscillation. Typically, passive or semi-active lag dampers are used to avoid instability; however, these are undesirable from a design and maintenance perspective. Innovations in active landing gear for rotorcraft, such as articulated robotic legs, have provided an alternate approach to avoid the instability, eliminating the need for lag dampers with respect to ground resonance. This article extends classic ground resonance to include movable landing gear and identifies key physical parameters affecting dynamic behavior. Applying LQ optimal control to this model, it is shown that ground resonance instability can be eliminated using active landing gear as the control mechanism, even when there is no lag damping present in the rotor. In addition, while superior performance is achieved when landing gear movement can occur both longitudinally and laterally, it is still possible to stabilize ground resonance with inputs in a single direction, albeit with reduced performance.


2017 ◽  
Vol 34 (5) ◽  
pp. 1551-1571 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ming Xia

Purpose The main purpose of this paper is to present a comprehensive upscale theory of the thermo-mechanical coupling particle simulation for three-dimensional (3D) large-scale non-isothermal problems, so that a small 3D length-scale particle model can exactly reproduce the same mechanical and thermal results with that of a large 3D length-scale one. Design/methodology/approach The objective is achieved by following the scaling methodology proposed by Feng and Owen (2014). Findings After four basic physical quantities and their similarity-ratios are chosen, the derived quantities and its similarity-ratios can be derived from its dimensions. As the proposed comprehensive 3D upscale theory contains five similarity criteria, it reveals the intrinsic relationship between the particle-simulation solution obtained from a small 3D length-scale (e.g. a laboratory length-scale) model and that obtained from a large 3D length-scale (e.g. a geological length-scale) one. The scale invariance of the 3D interaction law in the thermo-mechanical coupled particle model is examined. The proposed 3D upscale theory is tested through two typical examples. Finally, a practical application example of 3D transient heat flow in a solid with constant heat flux is given to illustrate the performance of the proposed 3D upscale theory in the thermo-mechanical coupling particle simulation of 3D large-scale non-isothermal problems. Both the benchmark tests and application example are provided to demonstrate the correctness and usefulness of the proposed 3D upscale theory for simulating 3D non-isothermal problems using the particle simulation method. Originality/value The paper provides some important theoretical guidance to modeling 3D large-scale non-isothermal problems at both the engineering length-scale (i.e. the meter-scale) and the geological length-scale (i.e. the kilometer-scale) using the particle simulation method directly.


2006 ◽  
Vol 129 (3) ◽  
pp. 850-857 ◽  
Author(s):  
Luis San Andrés ◽  
Dario Rubio ◽  
Tae Ho Kim

Gas foil bearings (GFBs) satisfy the requirements for oil-free turbomachinery, i.e., simple construction and ensuring low drag friction and reliable high speed operation. However, GFBs have a limited load capacity and minimal damping, as well as frequency and amplitude dependent stiffness and damping characteristics. This paper provides experimental results of the rotordynamic performance of a small rotor supported on two bump-type GFBs of length and diameter equal to 38.10mm. Coast down rotor responses from 25krpm to rest are recorded for various imbalance conditions and increasing air feed pressures. The peak amplitudes of rotor synchronous motion at the system critical speed are not proportional to the imbalance introduced. Furthermore, for the largest imbalance, the test system shows subsynchronous motions from 20.5krpm to 15krpm with a whirl frequency at ∼50% of shaft speed. Rotor imbalance exacerbates the severity of subsynchronous motions, thus denoting a forced nonlinearity in the GFBs. The rotor dynamic analysis with calculated GFB force coefficients predicts a critical speed at 8.5krpm, as in the experiments; and importantly enough, unstable operation in the same speed range as the test results for the largest imbalance. Predicted imbalance responses do not agree with the rotor measurements while crossing the critical speed, except for the lowest imbalance case. Gas pressurization through the bearings’ side ameliorates rotor subsynchronous motions and reduces the peak amplitudes at the critical speed. Posttest inspection reveal wear spots on the top foils and rotor surface.


Author(s):  
A. Narimani ◽  
M. F. Golnaraghi

In this paper using a modified averaging method the frequency response of a general nonlinear isolator is obtained. Stiffness and damping characteristics are considered cubic functions of displacement and velocity through the isolator. Analytical results are compared with those obtained by numerical integration in order to validate the closed form solution for strongly nonlinear isolator. While increasing the nonlinearity in the system improves the response of the isolator, stability and jump avoidance conditions set boundary limits for the parameters. The effects of nonlinear parameters to avoid jump phenomenon are discussed in detail. The set of parameters where the system behaves regularly are found and the nonlinear isolator is optimized based on RMS optimization method. Using this method the RMS function of absolute acceleration of the sprung mass is minimized versus the RMS function of relative displacement.


2018 ◽  
Vol 70 (1) ◽  
pp. 68-75 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jun-peng Shao ◽  
Guang-dong Liu ◽  
Xiao-dong Yu ◽  
Yan-qin Zhang ◽  
Xiu-li Meng ◽  
...  

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to describe a simulation and experimental research concerning the effect of recess depth on the lubrication performance of a hydrostatic thrust bearing by constant rate flow. Design/methodology/approach The computational fluid dynamics and finite volume method have been used to compute the lubrication characteristics of an annular recess hydrostatic thrust bearing with different recess depths. The performances are oil recess pressure, oil recess temperature and oil film velocity. The recess depth has been optimized. A test rig is established for testing the pressure field of the structure of hydrostatic thrust bearing after recess depth optimization, and experimental results show that experimental data are basically identical with the simulation results, which demonstrates the validity of the proposed numerical simulation method. Findings The results demonstrate that the oil film temperature decreases and the oil film pressure first increases and then decreases with an increase in the recess depth, but oil film velocity is constant. To sum up comprehensive lubrication performance, the recess depth of 3.5 mm is its optimal value for the annular recess hydrostatic thrust bearing. Originality/value The computed results indicate that to get an improved performance from a constant flow hydrostatic thrust bearing, a proper selection of the recess depth is essential.


2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Sinchai Chinvorarat ◽  
Pumyos Vallikul

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to present a novel retractable main landing gear for a light amphibious airplane, while the design, synthesis and analysis are given in details for constructing the main landing gear. Design/methodology/approach The constraint three-position synthesis has given the correct path of all linkages that suitably fit the landing gear into the compartment. The additional lock-link is introduced into the design to ensure the securement of the mechanism while landing. Having the telescopic gas-oil shock strut as a core element to absorb the impact load, it enhances the ability and efficiency to withstand higher impact than others type of light amphibious airplane. Findings By kinematics bifurcation analysis, the optimized value of the unlock spring stiffness at 90 N/m can be found to tremendously reduce the extended-retracted linear actuator force from 500 N to 150 N at the beginning of the retraction sequence. This could limit the size and weight of the landing gear actuator of the light amphibious airplane. Practical implications The drop test of the landing gear to comply with the ASTM f-2245 (Standard Specification for Design and Performance of a Light Sport Airplane) reveals that the novel landing gear can withstand the impact load at the drop height determined by the standard. The maximum impact loading 4.8 G occurs at the drop height of 300 mm, and there is no sign of any detrimental or failure of the landing gear or the structure of the light amphibious airplane. The impact settling time response reaches the 2% of steady-state value in approximately 1.2 s that ensure the safety and stability of the amphibious airplane if it subjects to an accidentally hard landing. Originality/value This paper presents unique applications of a retractable main landing gear of a light amphibious airplane. The proposed landing gear functions properly and complies with the drop test standard, ensuring the safety and reliability of the airplane and exploiting the airworthiness certification process.


2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Anan Zhang ◽  
Jie Yang ◽  
Chuihui Ma ◽  
Lin Cheng ◽  
Liangcai Hu

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to form a numerical simulation method for permeability coefficient that can consider the characteristics of gravel gradation and further explore the effects of indoor test factors and gradation characteristics on the permeability coefficient of gravel. Design/methodology/approach The random point method is used to establish the polyhedral gravel particle model, the discrete element method (DEM) is used to construct the gravel permeability test sample with gradation characteristics and the finite element method is used to calculate the permeability coefficient to form a DEM-computational fluid dynamics combined method to simulate the gravel seepage characteristics. Then, verified by the indoor test results. Based on this method, the influence of sample size, treatment method of oversize particles and the content of fine particles on the permeability coefficient of gravel is studied. Findings For the gravel containing large particles, the larger size permeameter should be used as far as possible. When the permeameter size is limited, the equal weight substitution method is recommended for the treatment method of oversized particles. Compared with the porosity, the pore connectivity has a higher correlation with the permeability coefficient of the sample. Research limitations/implications Insufficient consideration of the movement of gravel particles in the seepage process is also an issue for further study. Originality/value The simulation method described in this paper is helpful for qualitative analysis, quantitative expression of pore size and makes up for the defect that the seepage characteristics in pores cannot be observed in laboratory tests.


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