PERFORMANCE CHARACTERISTICS OF A HYBRID WING FOR UAV

Aravind K.S., Naveena K P

Abstract: Unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV) have become important in the surveillance sector of various governments. Their adavatage of high end technology and minimal risk of human life has been the major boost with respect to the research associated with UAVs. Over the years, the designing and optimization of the aerodynamics of these vehicles has gained lot of importance owing to the increasing urge to develop UAVs with better stability and endurance at subsonic speeds. Since the aircraft should have various performance characteristics as per the desired aerodyanamic requirements, it has been a challenging task to incorporate these characteristics through the use of a single homogeneous airfoil for the wing. With regard to the above discussion, this work deals with the comparison of performance characteristics of a hybrid wing consiting of two airfoil sections combined into a single wing and those of wings with each of the two homogeneous airfoil sections. The optimal wing dimensions for the surveilence UAV was obtained through MATLAB. Three separate models consiting of the hybrid wing, S1223 and E420 were developed through Solid Edge and imported into Fluent. Later, the wing models were subjected to aerodynamic analysis through the implementation of parameters experienced by the wing during the actual flight. The results obtained were compared in order to draw a conclusion regarding the advantages of using a hybrid wing as against the usage of wings with homogeneous airfoil.

Keywords: UAV, Hybrid wing, Eppler 420, Seilig 1223 and Fluent.

DOI: https://doi.org/10.15623/ijret.2013.0210079