Rotorcraft Research - The 1970s and a New Frontier in Structural Dynamics and Aeroelasticity

摘要

The paper describes research that Dewey Hodges and the author initiated in the early 1970s at the U.S. Army Aeronautical Research Laboratory at NASA Ames Research Center when rotorcraft research became something of a new frontier in aerospace. The paper includes an informal narrative of work on analytical methods for rotorcraft structural dynamics and aeroelasticity and describes the evolution and highlights of technologies that helped transform rotorcraft aeroelastic analysis from uncertainty into today's sophisticated methodology based on a rigorous theoretical foundation. Selected material on the development of nonlinear beam theory for rotor blades, applications to analytical investigations of aeroelastic stability, and experimental validation studies is included. This research helped to establish a sound basis for modern rotorcraft design methods. Many others at Army-Ames were involved in this work but Dewey Hodges was arguably one of the principal architects and the author was privileged to have been able to collaborate with him for over seventeen years.