Dynamic Characteristics Analysis and Flight Control Design for Oblique Wing Air- Craft
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Accepted Manuscript Dynamic characteristics analysis and flight control design for oblique wing air- craft Wang Lixin, Xu Zijian, Yue Ting PII: S1000-9361(16)30182-0 DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.cja.2016.10.010 Reference: CJA 711 To appear in: Chinese Journal of Aeronautics Received Date: 15 December 2015 Revised Date: 15 June 2016 Accepted Date: 17 August 2016 Please cite this article as: W. Lixin, X. Zijian, Y. Ting, Dynamic characteristics analysis and flight control design for oblique wing aircraft, Chinese Journal of Aeronautics (2016), doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.cja.2016.10.010 This is a PDF file of an unedited manuscript that has been accepted for publication. As a service to our customers we are providing this early version of the manuscript. The manuscript will undergo copyediting, typesetting, and review of the resulting proof before it is published in its final form. Please note that during the production process errors may be discovered which could affect the content, and all legal disclaimers that apply to the journal pertain. Chinese Journal of Aeronautics 28 (2015) xx-xx Contents lists available at ScienceDirect Chinese Journal of Aeronautics journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/cja d Dynamic characteristics analysis and flight control design for oblique wing aircraft Wang Lixin, Xu Zijian, Yue Ting* School of Aeronautics Science and Engineering, Beihang University, Beijing 100083, China Received 15 December 2015; revised 15 June 2016; accepted 17 August 2016 Abstract The movement characteristics and control response of oblique wing aircraft (OWA) are highly coupled between the longitudinal and lateral-directional axes and present obvious nonlinearity. Only with the implementation of flight control systems can flying qualities be satisfied. This article investigates the dynamic modeling of an OWA and analyzes its dynamic characteristics. Furthermore, a flight control law based on model-reference dynamic in- version is designed and verified. Calculations and simulations show that OWA can be trimmed by rolling a bank angle and deflecting the triaxial control surfaces in a coordinated way. The oblique wing greatly affects longitudi- nal motion. The short-period mode is highly coupled between longitudinal and lateral motion, and the bank angle also occurs in phugoid mode. However, the effects of an oblique wing on lateral mode shape are relatively small. For inherent control characteristics, symmetric deflection of the horizontal tail will generate not only longitudinal motion but also a large rolling rate. Rolling moment and pitching moment caused by aileron deflection will rein- force motion coupling, but rudder deflection has relatively little effect on longitudinal motion. Closed-loop simula- tions demonstrate that the flight control law can achieve decoupling control for OWA and guarantee a satisfactory dynamic performance. Keywords: Oblique wing aircraft; Dynamic characteristics; Decoupling; Control allocation; Model-reference dynamic inver- sion ciency than traditional fixed-wing designs.3 1. Introduction1 Compared to variable-sweep wing aircraft, the neutral point of OWA shifts in a small range with Oblique wing aircraft (OWA) can vary wing sweep configuration change, reducing trim drag and load for optimal configuration at various flight speeds and on the fuselage and empennage. The wave drag of extension of their flight envelope.1-2 Compared to OWA is also smaller in transonic and supersonic conventional fixed-wing aircraft, an OWA maintains flight. The lift dependent wave drag and the volume excellent low-speed, takeoff and landing performance dependent wave drag of OWA are 1/4 and 1/16 less at no sweep while being capable of large lift to drag than those of variable sweep aircraft, respectively.4 ratio via high skew angle in supersonic flight. Cruise Furthermore, oblique wing designs are simple and and maneuvering performance can also be enhanced reliable in structure, thus reducing the complexity of when the wings are at a moderate oblique angle. As a fuselage structure and related aerodynamic drag.5 result, OWA have the ability to adapt to mul- However, the asymmetry of OWA introduces special ti-mission flight and possess higher operational effi- flight dynamics problems and challenges for flight 6-8 control. The asymmetric configuration will pro- *Corresponding author. Tel.: +86 10 82338821 duce side force, rolling moment and yawing moment E-mail address: [email protected] in level flight, which do not exist in conventional ·2 · Chinese Journal of Aeronautics aircraft, leading to severe coupling and nonlinearity The asymmetry of an OWA significantly affects its of the aircraft. Moreover, aileron deflection induces aerodynamic characteristics. The pressure distribu- not only rolling moment but also pitching moment, tion along the chord direction changes due to the and rolling effectiveness is insufficient at high skew spanwise flow of air. The aerodynamic load of the angle. Only with flight control systems can the lon- right forward-swept wing is concentrated on the gitudinal and lateral motions of OWA be decoupled wing root; thus the leading-edge suction of the right to meet operational requirements of pilots and wing tip and the lift coefficient decrease. The left achieve good flight quality. backswept wing is the opposite: aerodynamic load is Currently, the flight controllers for OWA are concentrated on the wing tip, and the leading-edge mostly designed by linear control methods based on suction and lift coefficient increase, which can be linear equations.9-15 For example, Alag et al.13 and seen in Fig. 2(a). Since leading-edge suction makes a Pahle14 used linear quadratic optimal control theory greater contribution to lift, the left wing has a lift based on model-following technology to design con- increment. As seen in Fig. 2(b), the lift increment of 15 trol laws. Clark and Letron proposed a command left wing ∆LL is greater than the lift increment of and stability augmentation system where right wing ∆L , which produces nose-down pitch- eigenstructure assignment techniques are combined R ing moment ∆M and rolling moment ∆L that with an optimization procedure to determine the make the right wing move downward. feedback matrix for approximating the desired The asymmetric wings of an OWA generate side eigenstructure. Evaluation of these controllers on force that symmetric wings do not have. In Fig. 2 (c), nonlinear equations of motion seems to be less de- the velocity of airflow V can be divided into veloc- sirable with certain time delays and great oscilla- 0 16 tions. With regard to the research on applying ity normal to the leading edge Vn and velocity par- modern control technologies, such as intelligent con- allel to the leading edge Vt . Regardless of viscosity, trol theory, to OWA with high cross-coupling and V has no effect on the pressure distribution of the nonlinearity, Pang16 designed an attitude controller t D V with a sliding mode control method for near-space wing surface. The drag n corresponding to n vehicles with an oblique wing. However, the over- can be divided into Dx and Dy in the wind coor- shoot of this closed-loop system was relatively high, dinate system. In symmetric swept back wings, the and no reports are available about OWA in the con- two side-components DyL and DyR offset each ventional flight envelope. This paper investigates the nonlinear dynamic other. But, for the oblique wing, the lack of symmetry model of OWA, and dynamic response is numerically introduces a side component that increases as the simulated and analyzed. According to the highly skew angle becomes larger. The side force is large cross-coupled and nonlinear properties of OWA, enough that it cannot be ignored when contrasted model-reference dynamic inversion is used for flight with the magnitude of drag. control law design. Differential horizontal tail and The leading edge suction of the left backswept ailerons are allocated for roll control. This approach wing is larger than that of the right forward-swept can successfully maintain multivariate decoupling wing at subsonic speed, and the lift vector of the left control for OWA. wing inclines forward (see Fig. 2(b)), which results in smaller drag of the left wing. At supersonic speed, 2. Layout and aerodynamic characteristics the wave drag of the right wing is larger. Conse- quently, the drag of the left wing is larger than that The OWA investigated in this paper is presented in of the right wing at subsonic and supersonic speed, Fig. 1. The oblique wing is designed to pivot from 0° i.e. DDnL< nR . Fig. 2(c) shows that the asymmetric to 60° with the right wing forward. drag produces a yawing moment ∆N > 0 N m that tends to reduce the skew angle. Fig. 1 Oblique wing aircraft. Chinese Journal of Aeronautics · 3 · Fig. 3 Decrease of aileron moment arm caused by oblique wing. 3. Modeling and dynamic characteristics analys es 3.1. Flight dynamic modeling The aerodynamic forces and moments of OWA be- come highly nonlinear and cross-coupled as the skew angle becomes larger. In addition, the inertia is also cross-coupled between an aircraft’s 1ongitudinal and 1ateral-directional axes. So the flight motion of OWA should be modeled by six-degree-of-freedom nonlin- ear equations and cannot be divided into longitudinal and lateral equations. Compared with conventional fixed-wing aircraft, OWA’s asymmetry leads to great changes in moments of inertia and cross products of inertia; the cross products of inertia I xy and I yz are no longer zero. Therefore, the moment equations cannot be simplified like with conventional fixed-wing aircraft, and they are expressed in Eq. (1).5 2 2 L= Ix p&& − I yz()() q − r − I zx r + pq Fig. 2 Influence of oblique wing on aerodynamic force −Ixy()() q& − rp − I y − I z qr and moment.