Influence of aeroelastic flow induced oscillations on fatigue life of an airplane wing structure

In the field of aeroelasticity, the phenomenon of dynamic vibrations and its prevention is a primary challenge that is imposed on an airplane designer. The fully coupled/partly coupled fluid-structure interaction (FSI) analysis is one of the widely used techniques implemented by design industries to assess the characteristics of limit cycle oscillations (LCO). It requires detailed computational modelling capabilities including a high speed wind tunnel testing environment. Hence, the partly coupled (or) moderate loosely coupled (MLC) FSI techniques are preferred to approximate the real phenomenon better than the quasi-steady models. The turbulence characteristics of a viscous flow field are computed efficiently by a reduced-order modelling approach that offers tractable solutions. This novel approach is used to determine the consequences of LCO on the fatigue life of an airplane wing structure. Further, the numerical fatigue simulations are used to demonstrate the effectiveness of MLC algorithm against experimental techniques.