Numerical study of UAS-S4 Ehecatl aerodynamic performance improvement obtained with the use of a morphing wing approach

摘要

The paper presents aerodynamic results for the optimization of an Unmanned Aerial System wing using a morphing wing approach. The shape deformation is achieved by placing actuator lines at several positions along the spanwise direction. For each different flight condition, the optimal displacements are found using an algorithm based on a coupling between the new Artificial Bee Colony algorithm and a classical gradient-based search routine. The wing aerodynamic characteristics are calculated with an efficient nonlinear lifting line method coupled with a two-dimensional viscous flow solver. The optimizations are preformed at angles of attack below the maximum lift angle, with the aim of improving the UAS-S4 Ehecatl wing lift-to-drag ratio. Several configurations of the morphing wing are proposed, each with a different number of actuation lines, and the improvements obtained by these configurations are analysed and compared.