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Articles 1 - 17 of 17
Full-Text Articles in Aerospace Engineering
Numerical Analysis Of A Multi-Stage Elastohydrodynamic Seal For Aircraft Engines, Md Wasif Hasan
Numerical Analysis Of A Multi-Stage Elastohydrodynamic Seal For Aircraft Engines, Md Wasif Hasan
Electronic Theses and Dissertations
At present, both governmental and private aviation enterprises are trying to develop aircraft that are swifter, more lightweight, and more cost-effective in order to maintain competitiveness on both the domestic and global stage. Continuous innovation and sustainability efforts are necessary to achieve advancements in aviation systems, such as fans, compressors, combustors, and turbines, as well as sub-systems, like engine seals. Advanced engine seals exhibit considerable potential in enhancing the engine's pressure ratio and cycle temperatures, leading to reduced engine weight, increased thrust, and improved fuel economy. In this study, a novel multistage seal idea has been proposed for the supercritical …
3d Printed Aircraft, Matthew Nagy, Charles D'Amico, Alexis Salgado Medina
3d Printed Aircraft, Matthew Nagy, Charles D'Amico, Alexis Salgado Medina
Mechanical Engineering
This project is to design, build, and test a 3D-printable aircraft. The goal is to create a final design that will be able to fly for the longest duration possible, around 20 seconds. To determine the correct preliminary design and manufacturing process for a 3D printed RC aircraft, an analysis of multiple design options and manufacturing materials was performed. This allowed for a variety of choices for aircraft type, airfoil design, structure, among other topics to be narrowed down to the most promising option. It has been found that the aircraft will follow a design similar to industry motor-gliders, with …
Enabling Premixed Hydrogen-Air Combustion For Aeroengines Via Laboratory Experiment Modeling, Christopher James Caulfield
Enabling Premixed Hydrogen-Air Combustion For Aeroengines Via Laboratory Experiment Modeling, Christopher James Caulfield
Masters Theses
All combustion systems from large scale power plants to the engines of cars to gas turbines in aircraft are looking for new fuel sources. Recently, clean energy for aviation has come into the foreground as an important issue due to the environment impacts of current combustion methods and fuels used. The aircraft industry is looking towards hydrogen as a new, powerful, and clean fuel of the future. However there are several engineering and scientific challenges to overcome before hydrogen can be deployed into the industry. These issues
range from storing the hydrogen in a viable cryogenic form for an aircraft …
An Alternate Dimensionless Form Of The Linearized Rigid-Body Aircraft Equations Of Motion With Emphasis On Dynamic Parameters, Douglas F. Hunsaker, Benjamin C. Moulton
An Alternate Dimensionless Form Of The Linearized Rigid-Body Aircraft Equations Of Motion With Emphasis On Dynamic Parameters, Douglas F. Hunsaker, Benjamin C. Moulton
Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Student Publications and Presentations
The equations of motion for an aircraft can be linearized about a reference condition within the assumptions of small disturbances and linear aerodynamics. The resulting system of equations is typically solved to obtain the eigenvalues and eigenvectors that describe the small disturbance motion of the aircraft. Results from such an analysis are often used to predict the rigid-body dynamic modes of the aircraft and associated handling qualities. This process is typically carried out in dimensional form in most text books, or in nondimensional form using dimensionless parameters rooted in aerodynamic theory. Here we apply Buckingham’s Pi theorem to obtain nondimensional …
Simplified Mass And Inertial Estimates For Aircraft With Components Of Constant Density, Benjamin C. Moulton, Douglas F. Hunsaker
Simplified Mass And Inertial Estimates For Aircraft With Components Of Constant Density, Benjamin C. Moulton, Douglas F. Hunsaker
Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Student Publications and Presentations
Aircraft mass and inertial properties are required for predicting the dynamics and handling qualities of aircraft. However, such properties can be difficult to estimate since these depend on the external shape and internal structure, systems, and mass distributions within the airframe. Mass and inertial properties of aircraft are often predicted using computer-aided design software, or measured using various experimental techniques. The present paper presents a method for quickly predicting the mass and inertial properties of complete aircraft consisting of components of constant density. Although the assumption of constant density may appear limiting, the method presented in this paper can be …
Landing Gear Sealing Solution, Andrew Milligan
Landing Gear Sealing Solution, Andrew Milligan
Williams Honors College, Honors Research Projects
XYZ Landing Gear Solutions has been tasked with redesigning two internal components of the landing gears for the ABC-123 aircraft program. The customer, ABC Aeronautics, informed XYZ Landing Gear Solutions that a particular system of the landing gear does not meet the necessary performance requirements of the program. As a result, the entire system will have to be removed, facilitating the need for a redesign of the two components that the system interfaced with. The focus of this project will be completing the redesign process for both of these components. “Redesign” and “design” will be used interchangeably in this report. …
Formation Control With Collision Avoidance For Fixed-Wing Unmanned Air Vehicles With Speed Constraints, Christopher Heintz
Formation Control With Collision Avoidance For Fixed-Wing Unmanned Air Vehicles With Speed Constraints, Christopher Heintz
Theses and Dissertations--Mechanical Engineering
Advances in the miniaturization of powerful electronic components and motors, the democratization of global navigation satellite systems (GNSS), and improvements in the performance, safety, and cost in lithium batteries has led to the proliferation of small and relatively inexpensive unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs). Many of these UAVs are of the multi-rotor design, however, fixed-wing designs are often more efficient than rotary-wing aircraft, leading to a reduction in the power required for a UAV of a given mass to stay airborne. Autonomous cooperation between multiple UAVs would enable them to complete objectives that would be difficult or impossible for a single …
Urban Cargo Transport Uav Final Design Review, Niko Giannakakos, Rafael Barreto Gutierrez, Tejas Bhavsar
Urban Cargo Transport Uav Final Design Review, Niko Giannakakos, Rafael Barreto Gutierrez, Tejas Bhavsar
Senior Design Project For Engineers
Delivery of goods to homes and offices over the last decades has seen a significant increase as more people and businesses need or want items sent directly to them. With the increase in demand, technology has also experienced a rapid growth, specifically in the field of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs). Many major companies are currently researching UAVs as the future of their delivery operations. With this ever-growing demand, NASA has issued a design competition of a UAV developed for urban deliveries. This unmanned aircraft system (UAS) would need to be able to deliver small packages, in a timely manner, within …
Design Of Banner Tow Mechanism For Bush Plane, Kyle Ciarrone, Ivan Martin, Rishabh Gadi, Tyler Brandt
Design Of Banner Tow Mechanism For Bush Plane, Kyle Ciarrone, Ivan Martin, Rishabh Gadi, Tyler Brandt
Williams Honors College, Honors Research Projects
The 2019-2020 AIAA DBF objective was to design, build, and test a banner-towing bush plane that carries wooden passengers and luggage. Senior members on the team undertook the creation of the banner tow mechanism subsystem as their senior design project on behalf of the design team due to the challenge of its mechanical design and the aerodynamic considerations regarding its placement and enclosure aboard the aircraft. The competition as well as access to campus resources were canceled due to COVID-19, so full testing and integration of the mechanism was not achieved. However, the engineering design process was experienced from the …
Aircraft Hydraulic Systems - Fundamentals, Nihad E. Daidzic
Aircraft Hydraulic Systems - Fundamentals, Nihad E. Daidzic
Aviation Department Publications
Aircraft hydraulic systems are essential non-propulsive power systems. Hydraulic power systems are used to power major functional aircraft systems, such as flight controls (primary and secondary), friction braking, nose gear steering, thrust-reversers, operating heavy cargo doors, etc.
Subscale Mars Colonization Mission, Cameron J. Lamack, James Lumsden, Sean Nevin, Donner Schoeffler, Riley Evers, Alexandra Poulakos, Skyler Tan, Anthony Keba, Siraj Zaman, Ali Altamimi, Anthony Modica
Subscale Mars Colonization Mission, Cameron J. Lamack, James Lumsden, Sean Nevin, Donner Schoeffler, Riley Evers, Alexandra Poulakos, Skyler Tan, Anthony Keba, Siraj Zaman, Ali Altamimi, Anthony Modica
Honors Thesis
The team will compete in the SAE (Society of Automotive Engineers) Aero Design West Advanced Class competition, held 5-7th April 2019 in Van Nuys, California. The team will work to develop, through research, design, optimizational trade studies, and manufacturing, a system for the deployment of parasitic aircraft, as well as payload. The system will consist of a primary fixed-wing aircraft, parasitic autonomous gliders, a real-time altitude data acquisition system, as well as both static and releasable payload. The deployable gliders must navigate autonomously to a targeting area on the ground without any on-board propulsion. The releasable payload, which will consist …
Model Predictive Power Management Of A Hybrid Electric Propulsion System For Aircraft, Tyler J. Wall
Model Predictive Power Management Of A Hybrid Electric Propulsion System For Aircraft, Tyler J. Wall
Masters Theses
This work presents the switched optimal power flow control for an aircraft with a hybrid electric propulsion system. The propulsion system is a switched system that operates in either of two modes: (i) battery discharging and electric motor propelling and (ii) battery charging and electric motor generating. The aircraft model and components that form the hybrid propulsion system are modeled as either an algebraic power source/sink or as a dynamic model with appropriate power and state interconnections. With the system model defined, a model predictive control power management strategy is set fourth which minimizes a performance index that includes altitude …
A Genetic Algorithm Incorporating Design Choice For The Preliminary Design Of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles, Kenneth Michael Mull
A Genetic Algorithm Incorporating Design Choice For The Preliminary Design Of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles, Kenneth Michael Mull
Masters Theses
Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs) are currently at the forefront of aerospace technologies. The design of these aircraft is complex and often performance characteristics are coupled to multiple design attributes. At the early design phase both discrete and continuous design choices are present limiting the feasibility of traditional derivative based optimization techniques. In place of these methods, the design space can be explored using a genetic algorithm that mimics the process of natural selection, providing a capable and reliable base airframe constructed from the required performance metrics. By incorporating a genetic multidisciplinary optimization algorithm early in the conceptual design phase, aircraft …
Software-And Hardware-In-The-Loop Verification Of Flight Dynamics Model And Flight Control Simulation Of A Fixed-Wing Unmanned Aerial Vehicle, Calvin Coopmans, Michal Podhradsk, Nathan V. Hoffer
Software-And Hardware-In-The-Loop Verification Of Flight Dynamics Model And Flight Control Simulation Of A Fixed-Wing Unmanned Aerial Vehicle, Calvin Coopmans, Michal Podhradsk, Nathan V. Hoffer
Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Faculty Publications
Unmanned aerial system (UAS) use is ever-increasing. In this paper, it is shown that even with low-cost hardware and open-source software, simple numerical testing practices (software- and hardware-in-the-loop) can prove the accuracy and usefulness of an aeronautical flight model, as well as provide valuable pre-flight testing of many situations typically only encountered in flight: high winds, hardware failure, etc. Software and hardware simulation results are compared with actual flight testing results to show that these modeling and testing techniques are accurate and provide a useful testing platform for a small unmanned aerial vehicle. Source code used in simulation is open …
Adaptive Quaternion Control Of A Miniature Tailsitter Uav, Nathan B. Knoebel, Timothy W. Mclain
Adaptive Quaternion Control Of A Miniature Tailsitter Uav, Nathan B. Knoebel, Timothy W. Mclain
Faculty Publications
The miniature tailsitter is a unique aircraft with inherent advantages over typical unmanned aerial vehicles. With the capabilities of both hover and level flight, these small, portable systems can produce efficient maneuvers for enhanced surveillance and autonomy with little threat to surroundings and the system itself. Such vehicles create control challenges due to the two different flight regimes. These challenges are addressed with a computationally efficient adaptive quaternion control algorithm. A backstepping method for model cancellation and consistent tracking of reference model attitude dynamics is derived. This is used in conjunction with a regularized data-weighting recursive least-squares algorithm for the …
Solid State Aircraft Concept Overview, M. Shahinpoor, P. Jenkins, C. Smith, Kakkattukuzhy M. Isaac, T. Dalbello, Anthony Colozza
Solid State Aircraft Concept Overview, M. Shahinpoor, P. Jenkins, C. Smith, Kakkattukuzhy M. Isaac, T. Dalbello, Anthony Colozza
Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works
Due to recent advances in polymers, photovoltaics, and batteries a unique type of aircraft may be feasible. This is a "solid-state" aircraft, with no conventional mechanical moving parts. Airfoil, propulsion, energy production, energy storage and control are combined in an integrated structure. The key material of this concept is an ionic polymeric-metal composite (IPMC) that provides source of control and propulsion. This material has the unique capability of deforming in an electric field and returning to its original shape when the field is removed. Combining the IPMC with thin-film batteries and thin-film photovoltaics provides both energy source and storage in …
Adaptive Critic Based Neurocontroller For Autolanding Of Aircraft With Varying Glideslopes, Gaurav Saini, S. N. Balakrishnan
Adaptive Critic Based Neurocontroller For Autolanding Of Aircraft With Varying Glideslopes, Gaurav Saini, S. N. Balakrishnan
Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works
In this paper, adaptive critic based neural networks have been used to design a controller for a benchmark problem in aircraft autolanding. The adaptive critic control methodology comprises successive adaptations of two neural networks, namely `action' and `critic' networks until closed loop optimal control is achieved. The autolanding problem deals with longitudinal dynamics of an aircraft which is to be landed in a specified touchdown region in the presence of wind disturbances and gusts using elevator deflection as the control for glideslope and flare modes. The performance of the neurocontroller is compared to that of a conventional PID controller. Neurocontroller's …