Study on the Influence of Probe’S Position on the Flow Field in Hose-Drogue Refueling System

Abstract

In the docking process of hose-drogue aerial refueling system, the bow wave effect of an approaching receiver aircraft will produce a strong aerodynamic effect on the drogue which intensify the deviation of drogue and increase the difficulty of the docking. In order to reduce the influence of bow wave effect, different locations of probe are used to reduce the adverse effect. This paper presents a receiver aircraft's bow wave effect modeling method based on potential flow theory and considers the major shape characteristics of the receiver aircraft. This method is used in a probedrogue aerial refueling dynamic simulation system, which combined with the hose-drogue dynamic model and tanker wake dynamic model. The motion characteristics of the drogue when the probe in the different position and of the different length are calculated and analyzed.