Flutter of a Swept Aircraft Wing with a Powered Engine

Abstract

The flutter analysis of swept aircraft wings carrying a powered engine is presented. Because of the powered engine, both concentrated engine mass and the thrust force terms are combined in the governing equations which are obtained using Hamilton’s principle. Heaviside and Dirac delta functions are used to precisely consider the location and properties of the engine mass and the thrust force. The wing performs as a classical beam; and the structural model, which incorporates bending-torsion flexibility, is used. Also, Peter’s unsteady aerodynamic pressure loadings are considered and modified to take the sweep effects into account. The Galerkin method is subsequently applied to convert the partial differential equations into a set of ordinary differential equations. Moreover, the numerical results are compared with published results and excellent agreement is observed. Numerical simulations indicating the significant effects of the sweep angle, the thrust and the design parameters such as the mass ratio and the engine attached locations on the flutter boundaries are presented.