See discussions, stats, and author profiles for this publication at: https://www.researchgate.

net/publication/336085304

Aerostructural Design Optimization Of High Speed Wings For Reusable

Launch Vehicles

Conference Paper · September 2019

CITATIONS READS

0 109

3 authors, including:

Andrew Cusick Melike Nikbay

University of Glasgow Istanbul Technical University
4 PUBLICATIONS   6 CITATIONS    91 PUBLICATIONS   644 CITATIONS   

SEE PROFILE SEE PROFILE

Some of the authors of this publication are also working on these related projects:

Computational Aeroelasticity Investigations For NATO-RTO-AVT-203 and Aeroelastic Prediction Workshop View project

Development of a Nonlinear Sonic Boom Prediction Software View project

All content following this page was uploaded by Melike Nikbay on 27 September 2019.

The user has requested enhancement of the downloaded file.

 AIAC-2019-195

Aerostructural Design Optimization of High Speed Wings for Reusable Launch

Vehicles

Andrew Cusick⇤ and Konstantinos Kontis† Melike Nikbay‡

ABSTRACT
This paper discusses the high speed vehicle optimization software under ongoing development
at the University of Glasgow. Implemented in MATLAB, surface inclination methods for high
speed aerodynamic computation, are coupled with a simple six degree-of-freedom finite element
beam model. The resulting aerostructural system is then utilized in a population based design
optimization framework. Discussions of these methodologies is provided, along with an overall
outline of their combination in a typical design optimization. A detailed description of the design
variables employed, along with an analysis of the management methods utilized for undesirable
characteristics and infeasible configurations. Finally, an aerostructural optimization is carried
out, with comparison to a previous reusable launch vehicle concept. This demonstrates the ca-
pability of the optimization framework, and highlights the future work necessary to progress the
research.

INTRODUCTION

⇤
PhD student in Aerospace Engineering, Email: a.cusick.1@research.gla.ac.uk
†
Prof. in Aerospace Engineering, Email: kostas.kontis@glasgow.ac.uk
‡
Prof. in Astronautical Engineering, Email: nikbay@itu.edu.tr
AIAC-2019-195 Cusick, Kontis & Nikbay

METHODOLOGY
Aerodynamic Modelling

Structural Modelling

Ankara International Aerospace Conference

AIAC-2019-195 Cusick, Kontis & Nikbay

Ku = f
K f
u

Interface

|| w|| < 10 6

Ankara International Aerospace Conference

AIAC-2019-195 Cusick, Kontis & Nikbay

Aerodynamic mesh
Wingbox spars
Beam nodes

Figure 1:

! = 0.5

Interpolation Methods

Ankara International Aerospace Conference

AIAC-2019-195 Cusick, Kontis & Nikbay

uA = uS + ✓S ⇥ r (1)

uS ✓S r
uA

Ankara International Aerospace Conference

AIAC-2019-195 Cusick, Kontis & Nikbay

N
X
s(x) = ↵j (||x xj ||) + p(x) (2)
j=1

s(x) x j
N

p(x)

↵j

s(xj ) = yj , 1  j  N (3)

y
(2)

N
X
↵j q(xj ) = 0 (4)
j=1

q p

Optimization Techniques

Ankara International Aerospace Conference

AIAC-2019-195 Cusick, Kontis & Nikbay

Cost Function

Initialize Constrain
Aerodynamics
Swarm Particles

Update
Particle Posi- Structures
tion/Velocity

Check
Select N Y Check
Convergence/
Global Best Violation
Failure

Update Evaluate
Pareto Front Cost

Figure 2:

COMPUTATIONAL FRAMEWORK
Overall Architecture

Description of Design Variables

Ankara International Aerospace Conference

AIAC-2019-195 Cusick, Kontis & Nikbay

c3 = 2 c2

b2
TE2

c2 = 1 c1

b1
TE1

c1

Figure 3:

Figure 4:

x y

Ankara International Aerospace Conference

AIAC-2019-195 Cusick, Kontis & Nikbay

ts,w
N

As1,2
As3

A = 2 · (ts · c + tw · h + As1 + As2 + N · As3 ) (5)

✓ ◆
c 2 c 3 · ts
I1 = 2 · (tw · h + As1 + As2 ) · + + As 3 · c s 3 (6)
4 12
✓ ◆
t w · h3 h2
I2 = 2 · + (ts · c + As1 + As2 + N · As3 ) · (7)
12 4
✓ 2 2 ◆
c · h · tw · ts
J =2· (8)
c · t w + h · ts

Ankara International Aerospace Conference

AIAC-2019-195 Cusick, Kontis & Nikbay

c h cs

(7)

RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

0 10 20

CL
CD

Table 1: Two partition wing design variable set used for optimization

Variable Minimum Maximum Quantity Comments

Dihedral, deg. 0 10 1 Constant across wingspan
Root chord, m 8 15 1
Taper ratio 0.1 1 2
Sweep, deg. -20 20 2 Wing trailing edge sweep
Semispan, m 0.5 4 2 Length of each partition
Spar positions [0.05 0.6] [0.3 0.9] 2 Non-dimensional chord location
Web/Skin thickness, m 0.001 0.1 2
Inner stringers 1 20 1
Stringer radii, m 0.01 0.05 3
Rib pitch, m 0.2 2 1
xc2 ,t2 0.7 0.9 6
xc3 ,t3 0.5 0.7 6
xc4 ,t4 0.3 0.5 6
xc5 ,t5 0.1 0.3 6 Non-dimensional Bézier curve
zc 1 -0.03 0.03 3 control points required for each
camber and thickness aerofoil
zc 2 -0.1 0.1 3
curve. Any points not shown
zc 3 5 -0.05 0.15 9
here are set at constant (0 or 1)
zc 6 0 0.01 3 to anchor curves
zt 1 0 0.03 3
zt 2 -0.05 0.1 3
zt 3 5 -0.05 0.15 9
zt 6 0.01 0.05 3
Total 77

Ankara International Aerospace Conference

AIAC-2019-195 Cusick, Kontis & Nikbay

Table 2: Constraints placed on designs

Constraint Comments
L Lbase Average lift force for given Mach number at least that of baseline
0.5 Abase  Awing  1.5 Abase Ensure wing design area remains within reason
tmax  tbase Constrain wing and trailing edge thickness
dt
db  0 Wing thickness cannot increase as span increases
b ⇡ bbase Wingspan within 2% of baseline
rLE rbase Ensure minimum leading edge for heating requirements
0  ⇤LE  80 Ensure leading edge sweep remains within reason
0.15  ctmax  0.5 Non-dimensional chord location of maximum aerofoil thickness
dt
dc t < tmax 0 Aerofoil thickness cannot decrease up to maximum thickness
dt
dc t > tmax  0 Aerofoil thickness cannot increase after maximum thickness
Failure  0 Failure criteria for all skin panels & spar webs for every flight state

CONCLUSIONS

Ankara International Aerospace Conference

AIAC-2019-195 Cusick, Kontis & Nikbay

Figure 5:

Table 3: Optimal design parameters

Parameters High mass design Trade-o↵ design Low mass design

Awing , m2 33.2 23.5 20.5
Dihedral, deg. 6.7 4.5 6.1
Spar positions 0.29, 0.61 0.3, 0.68 0.3, 0.7
Web/Skin thickness, m 0.09, 0.007 0.021, 0.002 0.017, 0.001
Inner stringers 8 1 1
Stringer radii, m 0.05, 0.04, 0.02 0.04, 0.03, 0.03 0.04, 0.03, 0.02
Rib pitch, m 1.93 1.87 1.94

Ankara International Aerospace Conference

AIAC-2019-195 Cusick, Kontis & Nikbay

(a) Baseline (b) High mass design

(c) Trade-o↵ design (d) Low mass design

Figure 6: Baseline and selected Pareto front configurations

Ankara International Aerospace Conference

AIAC-2019-195 Cusick, Kontis & Nikbay

References
Multivariate interpolation for fluid-structure-interaction
problems using radial basis functions

Multilevel Structural Optimization

for Preliminary Wing-Box Weight Estimation

X-34 Vehicle Aerodynamic Characteristics

Benchmark Aerostructural Models

for the Study of Transonic Aircraft Wings
Radial basis functions, multi-variable functional interpo-
lation and adaptive networks

Displacement extrapolations for CFD+CSM aeroelastic analysis

Wing-Body Aeroelasticity on Parallel Computers

Low-fidelity aerostructural optimization of aircraft

wings with a simplified wingbox model using OpenAeroStruct

Creation of Design and Analysis Tools for Large Design Space

Reusable Launch Vehicle Shape Optimization
A review of some
approximate methods used in aerodynamic heating analyses

Engineering relations for heat transfer and friction in high-velocity lami-

nar and turbulent boundary-layer flow over surfaces with constant pressure and temperature

The Generalized Shock-Expansion Method and Its Application to Bodies

Traveling at High Supersonic Air Speeds

Development and implementation of an ad-

vanced, design-sensitive method for wing weight estimation

Tool for preliminary structural sizing, weight estimation,

and aeroelastic optimization of lifting surfaces

Aerothermo-
dynamic Overview , X-34
A review of numerical fluids/structures interface methods for computa-
tions using high-fidelity equation

Ankara International Aerospace Conference

 AIAC-2019-195 Cusick, Kontis & Nikbay

A VERSION OF THE AITKEN ACCELERATOR FOR

COMPUTER ITERATION

Open-source coupled aerostructural

optimization using Python

Aerodynamic relationships inherent in Newtonian impact theory

Parallel Solution Methods for Aerostructural

Analysis and Design Optimization

Fixed-point fluid-structure interaction solvers with dynamic

relaxation

A Coupled-Adjoint Sensitivity Analysis

Method for High-Fidelity Aero-Structural Design

Military Handbook, Metallic Materials and Elements for Aerospace Vehicle Struc-
tures

Numerical inverse isoparametric mapping in remeshing and nodal

quantity contouring

Airframe Stress Analysis and Sizing

Unified fluid-structure interpolation and mesh motion

using radial basis functions

Discrete Data Transfer Technique for Fluid-Structure Interaction

Improving PSO-based Multi-Objective Optimization

using Crowding, Mutation and e-Dominance

Ankara International Aerospace Conference

View publication stats