• Proceedings of the Korean Society for Noise and Vibration Engineering Conference
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• 2011.10a
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• pp.236-241
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• 2011

An active trailing-edge flap blade named as Seoul National University Flap (SNUF) blade is designed for reducing helicopter vibratory loads and the relevant aeroacoustic noise. Unlike the conventional rotor control, which is restricted to 1/rev frequency, an active control device like the present trailing-edge flap is capable of actuating each individual blade at higher harmonic frequencies i.e., higher harmonic control (HHC) of rotor. The proposed blade is a small scale blade and rotates at higher RPM. The flap actuation components are located inside the blade and additional structures are included for reinforcement. Initially, the blade cross-section design is determined. The aerodynamic loads are predicted using a comprehensive rotorcraft analysis code. The structural integrity of the active blade is verified using a stress-strain recovery analysis.

• International Journal of Aeronautical and Space Sciences
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• v.9 no.2
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• pp.18-33
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• 2008

This paper presents design optimization of a new Active Twist Rotor (ATR) blade and conducts its aeroelastic analysis in forward flight condition. In order to improve a twist actuation performance, the present ATR blade utilizes a single crystal piezoelectric fiber composite actuator and the blade cross-sectional layout is designed through an optimization procedure. The single crystal piezoelectric fiber composite actuator has excellent piezoelectric strain performance when compared with the previous piezoelectric fiber composites such as Active Fiber Composites (AFC) and Macro Fiber Composites (MFC). Further design optimization gives a cross-sectional layout that maximizes the static twist actuation while satisfying various blade design requirements. After the design optimization is completed successfully, an aeroelastic analysis of the present ATR blade in forward flight is conducted to confirm the efficiency in reducing the vibratory loads at both fixed- and rotating-systems. Numerical simulation shows that the present ATR blade utilizing single crystal piezoelectric fiber composites may reduce the vibratory loads significantly even with much lower input-voltage when compared with that used in the previous ATR blade. However, for an application of the present single crystal piezoelectric actuator to a full scaled rotor blade, several issues exist. Difficulty of manufacturing in a large size and severe brittleness in its material characteristics will need to be examined.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Aeronautical & Space Sciences
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• v.40 no.6
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• pp.499-505
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• 2012

Vibratory loads imposed by the rotating blade upon the fuselage has been one of major obstacles in rotorcrafts. A new concept of rotor blade is currently developed to adopt an Active Trailing-edge Flap (ATF) to alleviate such obstacles. The flap is mounted at 65~85% spanwise location from the rotor hub. The nominal rotational speed of the blade is as high as 1,528 RPM, to match the required tip Mach number. Structural integrity is one of the important design aspects to be maintained and monitored in this special type of rotor. This is due to that many detailed components, which drive the flap, are inserted inside the rotating blade. To conduct its structural design and analysis, CAMRAD-II and the one-dimensional beam analysis are used. At the same time, three-dimensional finite element analysis are also used, such as MSC. PATRAN/NASTRAN, in order to analyze the details of the present active blade. As a result, comparable characteristics for the present rotor are predicted by both approaches.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society for Noise and Vibration Engineering Conference
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• 2007.05a
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• pp.85-92
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• 2007

This paper presents a design optimization of a new Advanced Active Blade Twist (AATR-II) blade incorporating single crystal Macro Fiber Composites (MFC) and conducts vibratory loads reduction analysis using an obtained optimal blade configuration. Due to the high actuation performance of the single crystal MFC, the AATR blade may reduce the helicopter vibration more efficiently even with a lower input-voltage as compared with the previous ATR blades. The design optimization provides the optimal cross-sectional configuration to maximize the tip twist actuation when a certain input-voltage is given. In order to maintain the properties of the original ATR blade, various constraints and bounds are considered for the design variables selected. After the design optimization is completed successfully, vibratory load reduction analysis of the optimized AATR-II blade in forward flight condition is conducted. The numerical result shows that the hub vibratory loads are reduced significantly although 20% input-voltage of the original ATR blade is used.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society for Noise and Vibration Engineering Conference
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• 2013.04a
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• pp.347-352
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• 2013

Seoul National University Flap (SNUF) blade is a small-scaled rotor blade incorporating a small trailing-edge flap control surface driven by piezoelectric actuators at higher harmonics for vibration attenuation. Initially, the blade was designed using two-dimensional cross-section analysis and a geometrically exact one-dimensional beam analysis, and material configuration was finalized. Flap deflection angle of ${\pm}45^{\circ}$ was established as the criterion for better vibration reduction performance based on an earlier simulation. Flap linkage mechanism design is carried out and static bench tests are conducted to verify the flap actuation mechanism performance. Different versions of test beds are developed and tested with the flap and chosen APA 200M piezoelectric actuators. Through significant improvements, a maximum deflection of ${\pm}3.7^{\circ}$ was achieved. High frequency experiments are conducted to evaluate the performance and transfer function of the test bed is determined experimentally. As the static tests are almost completed, rotor power required for testing the blade in whirl tower (centrifugal environment) is calculated and further preparations are under way.

• International Journal of Control, Automation, and Systems
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• v.5 no.1
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• pp.24-34
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• 2007

Closed-loop active twist control of integral helicopter rotor blades is investigated in this paper for reducing hub vibration induced in forward flight. A four-bladed fully articulated integral twist-actuated rotor system has been designed and tested successfully in wind tunnel in open-loop actuation. The integral twist deformation of the blades is generated using active fiber composite actuators embedded in the composite blade construction. An analytical framework is developed to examine integrally twisted helicopter blades and their aeroelastic behavior during different flight conditions. This aeroelastic model stems from a three-dimensional electroelastic beam formulation with geometrical-exactness, and is coupled with finite-state dynamic inflow aerodynamics. A system identification methodology that assumes a linear periodic system is adopted to estimate the harmonic transfer function of the rotor system. A vibration minimizing controller is designed based on this result, which implements a classical disturbance rejection algorithm with some modifications. Using the established analytical framework, the closed-loop controller is numerically simulated and the hub vibratory load reduction capability is demonstrated.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Aeronautical & Space Sciences
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• v.46 no.7
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• pp.542-550
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• 2018

This paper presents design of a bearingless main rotor of SNUF (Seoul National University Flap) blade equipped with active trailing-edge flap to reduce the hub vibratory loads during helicopter forward flight. For that purpose, sectional design of the flexbeam is carried out using the thin-walled composite material rotating beam vibration analysis program (CORBA77_MEMB) in EDISON. Using the multi-body dynamics analysis program, DYMORE, blade dynamic characteristics and those of the loads control are examined using the active trailing-edge flap in terms of the flexbeam sectional design.

• International Journal of Aeronautical and Space Sciences
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• v.8 no.2
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• pp.11-16
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• 2007

This paper describes the cycloidal wind turbine, which is a straight blade vertical axis wind turbine using the cycloidal blade system. Cycloidal blade system consists of several blades rotating about an axis in parallel direction. Each blade changes its pitch angle periodically. Cycloidal wind turbine is different from the previous turbines. The wind turbine operates with optimum rotating forces through active control of the blade to change pitch angle and phase angle according to the changes of wind direction and wind speed. Various numerical experiments were conducted to develop a small vertical axis wind turbine of 1 kW class. For this numerical analysis, the rotor system equips four blades consisting of a symmetric airfoil NACA0018 of 1.0m in span, 0.22m in chord and 1.0m in radius. A general purpose commercial CFD program, STAR-CD, was used for numerical analysis. PCL of MSC/PATRAN was used for efficient parametric auto mesh generation. Variables of wind speed, pitch angle, phase angle and rotating speed were set in the numerical experiments. The generated power was obtained according to the various combinations of these variables. Optimal pitch angle and phase angle of cycloidal blade system were obtained according to the change of the wind direction and the wind speed. Based on data obtained from the above analysis, control device was designed. The wind direction and the wind speed were sensed by a wind indicator and an anemometer. Each blades were actuated to optimal performance values by servo motors.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Aeronautical & Space Sciences
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• v.41 no.11
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• pp.855-864
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• 2013

Active tab is one of the promising technology for the BVI (blade-vortex interaction) noise reduction, and analysis of noise reduction performance is very important phase of the technology development. For the purpose of analysing the performance of noise reduction using active tab, CAMRAD II model for a model-scale rotor system was constructed utilizing structural design result and airfoil aerodynamic data generated by CFD (computational fluid dynamics) calculation. HHC strategy was applied to descent flight condition and air-load was calculated by CAMRAD II then variations of BVI noise was calculated by in-house program. Calculation result with respect to tab length and control phase changes showed BVI noise could be reduced by -3.3dB.

• Transactions of the Korean Society for Noise and Vibration Engineering
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• v.23 no.7
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• pp.645-653
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• 2013

Seoul National University flap(SNUF) blade is a small-scale rotor blade incorporating a small trailing-edge flap control surface driven by piezoelectric actuators at higher harmonics for vibration attenuation. Initially, the blade was designed using two-dimensional cross-section analysis and geometrically exact one-dimensional beam analysis, and its material configuration was finalized. A flap-deflection angle of ${\pm}4^{\circ}$ was established as the criterion for enhanced vibration reduction based on an earlier simulation. The flap-linkage mechanism was designed and static bench tests were conducted for verifying the performance of the flap-actuation mechanism. Different versions of test beds were developed and tested with the designed flap and the selected APA 200M piezoelectric actuators. Through significant improvements, a maximum deflection of ${\pm}3.7^{\circ}$ was achieved. High-frequency experiments were conducted for evaluating the performance, and the transfer function of the test bed was determined experimentally. With the static tests almost complete, the rotor power required for testing the blade in a whirl tower (centrifugal environment) was calculated, and further preparations are underway.