Optimal Rolling Maneuvers with Very Flexible Wings

Abstract

The single-shooting method is used to identify optimal manoeuvres in the lateral dynamics of partially-supported flexible wings. Efficient actuation strategies are sought when large wing deflections substantially modify the geometry of the vehicle during the manoeuvre. For that purpose, geometrical nonlinear models are first built using composite beams and an unsteady vortex lattice, and the optimal control problem is then solved via a gradient-based algorithm. A flight-dynamics model based on elastified stability derivatives is shown to capture the relevant dynamics either under slow actuation or for stiff wings and it is used as a reference. Embedding the full aeroelastic description into the optimisation framework expands the space of achievable manoeuvres, such as quick wing response with low structural vibrations or large lateral forces with minimal lift losses.

Simulation and Optimization of Takeoff Maneuvers of Very Flexible Aircraft

“…To date, most of the computational effort in the open literature has focused on building nonlinear aeroelastic simulation strategies to capture those effects and, more recently, on designing suitable feedback control strategies [14][15][16][17][18][19]. An additional challenge is brought about by the need to identify nominal operation procedures, as recently explored by Maraniello and Palacios [20] for lateral maneuvers with very flexible wings. A parameterization of the maneuver definition defines an optimization problem on a suitable metric of the dynamic response of the vehicle.…”