AIRFOIL OPTIMIZATION UTILIZING A REMOTELY CONTROLLED FLEXIBLE MODEL Phase Ⅰ. Low Speed Wind Tunnel Test

摘要

An interactive wind tunnel technique for optimizing airfoil shapes has been demonstrated. The tests were carried out at the General Dynamics Low Speed Tunnel and utilized a flexible airfoil whose shape could be varied with remotely controllable servo-hydraulic actuators located inside the airfoil.nThe test operation consisted of a sequence of incremental and simultaneous mode runs. Gradient data were generated during the incremental mode runs and were inputted into the computer. The computer supplied an optimal direction for changing the actuators and angle of attack to minimize (or maximize) the prescribed merit function, subject to equality and inequality constraints. The actuators and angle of attack were moved gradually in the optimal direction during a simultaneous mode run, and the airfoil shape which produced the minimum merit function was selected from which to begin a new incremental mode run.