DOC375008 s1

Conservatoire National des Arts et M
etiers
Th
`
ese
Specialite: Mecanique
presente par
Biel Ortun
pour obtenir le grade de Docteur
CSM/CFD Coupling for the Dynamic
Analysis of Helicopter Rotors
Numerical Simulations of Fluid-Structure Interaction

by coupling a Navier-Stokes Finite Volume code and
a Non Linear Structure Finite Element code
Soutenue le 18 decembre 2008,
devant le jury compose de:
Marc Berthillier Universite Franche-Comte Rapporteur
Christophe Pierre Universite McGill Rapporteur
Philippe Devinant Universite Orleans President du jury
Rogelio Ferrer Eurocopter Examinateur
Jean-Pierre Grisval ONERA Examinateur
Didier Petot ONERA Co-encadrant de thèse
Roger Ohayon CNAM Paris Directeur de thèse

Remerciements
La periode decembre 2005 - decembre 2008 restera pour moi un excellent souvenir. Ces
trois ans de thèse passes ` a lONERA et au Laboratoire de Mecanique des Structures et
des Systèmes Couples du Conservatoire National des Arts et Metiers ont ete une source
de grande satisfaction, en grande partie gr ace aux equipes avec lesquelles jai travaille.
Je tiens ` a remercier M. Jean-Pierre Grisval, directeur du Departement dAeroelasticite
et Dynamique des Structures et M. Nicolas Piet, chef de lunite Modelisation et Simula-
tion, de mavoir accueilli au sein de leur equipe.
Jai eu lappui incontestable de M. Roger Ohayon, mon directeur de thèse et professeur
titulaire de chaire de Mecanique du CNAM ainsi que de M. Didier Petot, mon encadrant
` a lONERA. Jai apprecie leur accessibilite et rapidite à repondre soigneusement à toutes
mes questions. Jai beaucoup appris grace à eux.
Jexprime ma gratitude à M. Christophe Pierre, doyen de la faculte dingenierie de
lUniversite de McGill et au professeur Marc Berthillier, de lUniversite de Franche-Comte,
davoir accepte detre les rapporteurs de ce travail.
Je remercie egalement M. Rogelio Ferrer, representant dEurocopter, et M. Philippe
Devinant, professeur ` a lUniversite dOrleans, davoir consacre leur temps et interet ` a la
participation de mon jury de soutenance le 18 decembre 2008.
Le bon deroulement de ma thèse naurait pas ete possible sans la collaboration de
Khiem-Van Truong. Je souhaite aussi remercier Alain Dugeai, Christophe Blondeau et
Yves Gorge pour leur appui informatique. ` a Marc Rapin pour la participation au congrès
de Reno en 2007. Et plus generalement, à lensemble de mes collègues à DADS, qui ont
rendu lambiance de travail aussi accueillante.
Mes remerciements vont aussi ` a dautres departements de lONERA : le DSNA, o` u jai
eu la chance de travailler avec Marc Poinot, Christophe Benoit, Stephanie Peron, Jacques
Sidès et dautres. Et le DAAP, avec Michel Costes, Philippe Beaumier, Benoit Rodriguez
et Thomas Renaud. Je ne cite pas tous les noms par souci de brièvete.
ii
Au del` a de lONERA je souhaite remercier lequipe du Laboratoire de Mecanique des
Structures et des Systèmes Couples du CNAM pour les echanges toujours enrichissants
sous forme de seminaires. Et les ingenieurs dEurocopter France, Eurocopter Deutschland
et le DLR que jai eu le plaisir de rencontrer regulièrement au cours des reunions du projet
SHANEL.
Merci ` a Marion, qui a ecoute mes innombrables repetitions, pour son soutien et ses
suggestions.
Enn, merci au Centre Aeronautique de Beynes, o` u jai decouvert le vol à voile et la
serenite de caresser les nuages.
iii
Contents
Introduction 1
1 Introduction to the Physics of a Helicopter Rotor 6
1.1 Rotor aerodynamics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
1.1.1 Introduction to Rotorcraft Nonlinear and Unsteady Aerodynamics . 6
1.2 Structural dynamics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
1.2.1 Introduction to rotor dynamics. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
2 The Numerical Analyses 18
2.1 Advanced nite element analysis for rotor dynamics . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18
2.2 The nite element solver MSC.Marc . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
2.2.1 Adapting nite element analysis to rotor modeling . . . . . . . . . . 21
2.2.2 About the MSC.Marc simulations in an inertial frame . . . . . . . . 26
2.2.3 Time integration . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27
2.3 The CFD code elsA . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
2.4 The rotorcraft comprehensive analysis code HOST . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32
2.4.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32
2.4.2 The basic HOST algorithm . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33
2.4.3 Aerodynamics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34
2.4.4 Structural dynamics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35
2.4.5 Review of the start point: the HOST/CFD coupling . . . . . . . . . 36
2.4.6 Concurrent comprehensive/CFD couplings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40
3 Development of a Framework for Code Coupling 43
3.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43
3.2 Coupling specication . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44
3.3 Adopted solutions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44
3.3.1 Programming model . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44
3.3.2 Data model . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45
3.3.3 Programming language for the framework . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
3.4 Architecture of the framework . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
3.4.1 Network distributed computing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48
3.4.2 Properties of the new coupling framework . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48
iv
CONTENTS
3.5 An interface for MSC.Marc . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49
3.5.1 Coupling regions and the user subroutines . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49
3.5.2 The python interface . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50
3.6 An interface for HOST . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53
4 Fluid-Structure Interaction in a Time-Accurate Coupling 55
4.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55
4.2 Staggered algorithms . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57
4.2.1 The conventional serial collocated scheme . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57
4.2.2 The parallel collocated scheme . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58
4.2.3 The serial non-collocated scheme . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 59
4.2.4 Staggered algorithms in rotorcraft aeroelasticity . . . . . . . . . . . 60
4.3 The uid/structure interface . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 63
4.3.1 CFD grid deformation technique . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 64
4.3.2 CFD airloads . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65
4.3.3 HOST airloads for an external structure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66
4.3.4 Denition of a uid-structure interface for the beam models . . . . 67
4.3.5 Transfer of the structure motion of the beam FE models . . . . . . 67
4.3.6 Denition of a uid-structure interface for the 3D models . . . . . . 68
4.3.7 Transfer of the structure motion of the 3D FE models . . . . . . . . 69
4.3.8 Transfer of airloads from the CFD to the 3D FE model . . . . . . . 73
4.4 Rotor control and trim . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 75
4.4.1 Amplication of the rotor controls . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79
5 Applications 83
5.1 7A rotor . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 83
5.1.1 Structural model . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 84
5.1.2 Fluid grid . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 85
5.1.3 Results . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 86
5.2 ERATO rotor . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 93
5.2.1 Structural model . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 93
5.2.2 Fluid grid . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 94
5.2.3 Conservation of the energy in the loads and motion transfers . . . . 97
5.2.4 Results . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 98
5.2.5 Discussion of the results . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 105
5.2.6 Computational cost . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 110
5.3 Comparison of coupling staggered algorithms . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 110
5.3.1 Remarks on the comparison of staggered schemes . . . . . . . . . . 115
Conclusions and Perspectives 117
References 124
v
CONTENTS
A Frames of reference 125
vi

Introduction
Description of the Problem
The analysis of the aeroelastic behaviour of helicopter rotors describes the interaction
between the structural dynamics and the aerodynamics. Aeroelastic simulation predicts
both the structural loads acting on the rotor and its aerodynamic performance. A thor-
ough understanding of rotor aeroelastics is of utmost importance because the design of
a rotor is the largest single factor determining the ight performance, handling qualities,
ride comfort and exploitation costs of the complete helicopter. Indeed, the rotor is the
core component of the helicopter because it accomplishes three basic roles: (1) generate
vertical lifting force; (2) provide propulsive force; and (3) provide steering control.
This functional compactness comes at a price, though. The oweld around the rotor
is very complex because it is highly three-dimensional, asymmetric and dominated by
unsteady aerodynamics. Additionally, depending on the ight condition, one or more of
the following phenomena may be encountered: blades ying into their own wake, transonic
speeds with shocks at the blade tip, ow separation, ow reversal and dynamic stall. The
unsteady airloads generated by the rotor are an important source of vibration.
Rotor blades undergo large amplitude motions in apping (out-of-rotor-plane), lead-
lag (in-plane) and feathering (pitch). The rotor blades are stiened by the centrifugal
loading. Yet the deections of the blades are still signicant and, contrarily to many
turbomachinery problems, Coriolis forces cannot be neglected. In addition, the pitch of
a rotor blade is changing constantly to control the rotor. The forces proper to a rotating
body, combined with the unsteady airloads and the pitch control input, trigger a sharp
structural response. The sudden changes of shape and position of the rotor blades imply a
modication of the ow around them, setting the scenario for a challenging uid-structure
interaction problem.
Current rotorcraft aeroelastic simulations rely mostly on the so-called rotorcraft com-
prehensive analysis codes. Comprehensive codes owe their name to their capacity to
encompass all of the technical disciplines that are necessary to perform aeroelastic sim-
ulations: structure, aerodynamics and ight mechanics models. Comprehensive codes
are popular among the helicopter manufacturers. The industry needs low computational
costs and a design-oriented, engineering usability. As a result, the uid and structure
models that are implemented in comprehensive codes are reduced to the minimum com-
1
Introduction
plexity that still yields reliable results. Typically, structure models are based on beam
theory. Aerodynamic models are based on blade element theory, which basically assigns
2D experimental polars to a number of blade span-stations, plus reduced models for the
induced velocity and rotor wake.
However, the physics-delity of the models in comprehensive codes is not enough to
predict accurately the aeroelastic phenomena taking place in important -and everyday-
ight conditions, such as high-speed or steep-descent ight (read landing). For these two
examples the shortcomings arise especially from failing to capture accurately the unsteady
airloads that follow the blades dynamics. Steep-descents when landing in urban areas are
a problem because they are noisy due to blade-vortex interaction phenomena. Expanding
maximum cruise speed is also very important for the helicopter to gain a larger share of
the transportation market by competing with xed-wing aircraft. In short, the accurate
analysis of the aeroelastic phenomena of a rotor is a key step towards improving the
designs of future rotors and hence, produce better helicopters.
But the accuracy of comprehensive codes is not only undermined by the type of ight
condition. The beam assumptions of the structure models do not t certain structural
elements that are not slender, like the rotor hubs. What is more, beam models may fall
short as well to represent advanced concepts such as aeroelastic tailoring of the rotor
blade via piezoelectric controls.
As a consequence of the limitations of comprehensive codes, the capacity of the heli-
copter industry to produce innovative designs and major breakthroughs -fuel consumption,
noise, ride comfort, etc- with respect to todays helicopters is also diminished.
Past Eorts
In order to tackle the shortcomings of the aerodynamic models of comprehensive codes,
computational uid dynamics (CFD) analyses are being increasingly used for rotorcraft
applications by coupling them to the comprehensive codes. CFD analyses can solve the 3D
mass, momentum and energy conservation equations of a uid, thus yielding high-delity
oweld representations.
The CFD coupling strategy has brought signicant improvements in aeroelastic pre-
diction accuracy. Recent eorts in coupling CFD with comprehensive analyses have been
published by Beaumier et al. [7], Pahlke and van der Wall [37], Potsdam et al. [46] and
Bhagwat et al. [10], among others.
Motivations of the Research
So far, research eorts in improving the prediction capabilities of comprehensive codes
have focused on the uid side by coupling with CFD methods. Yet however accurate
CFD methods might be, aeroelasticity is a coupled problem, where the structure response
matters just as much as the aerodynamics. Investing on computationally expensive CFD
2
makes sense as long as the structural dynamics keeps pace with the CFDs accuracy.
In this respect, the classical comprehensive structural dynamics models based on beam
theory have proved reliable enough.
Yet future structural models should embrace arbitrary geometries. In a rotor system
composed by blades, hub and control mechanisms, there are many elements unsuitable for
a beam representation. The newest bearingless hubs would benet from three-dimensional
structural models. Elastic swashplates would open the way to more accurate studies
on pitch control mechanisms. Even the latest blade designs, seeking a lower acoustic
signature, feature increasingly complex geometries, which puts a growing strain on beam
models for blades. Advanced structural models of the fuselage could also provide new
insight into rotorcraft vibration. The advent of morphing proles in the blades will require
the rotor blades to be modeled at least as a bi-dimensional structure.
These advanced structural models will be referred to as Computational Structural
Mechanics (CSM) in the remainder of this document.
Objectives and Context of the Research
The objective of this work is two-fold. First, to introduce 3D nite element (FE) based
structural dynamics models in the simulation of rotorcraft aeroelasticity. Second, to
develop the basis for a new, highly versatile tool for the analysis of rotorcraft aeroelasticity
with the capability to perform high-accuracy analyses.
These two objectives will be achieved by developing a computing environment or
framework to couple HOST, a rotorcraft comprehensive analysis developed by Eurocopter,
with a 3D nite element based structural analysis (CSM) and a CFD analysis.
Eective coupling will be accomplished through the use of a partitioned procedure.
In a partitioned procedure for rotorcraft aeroelasticity, each of the subsystems -uid,
structure, ight mechanics- is time-integrated by a dierent scheme that is tailored to its
mathematical model. Then the global problem is solved by a staggered algorithm that
exchanges information between the subsystems at each time-step.
For the coupling to have a practical utility and be user-friendly, the following three
constraints shall be observed:
1. The coupling must be modular, this is, it must be possible to replace, add or re-
move any of the participating codes. This is achieved by developing a modular
software architecture, in which every technical discipline is solved by a dedicated
code. Communication between the codes solves a multi-disciplinary problem.
2. The coupling must be able to analyze any random rotorcraft conguration: isolated
rotors, complete helicopters, tiltrotors and alike. This condition requires not only
an open software architecture, but also physical models that can represent any
geometry. This second condition is met by the CFD and 3D CSM methods.
3
Introduction
3. The delity of the aeroelastic analyses must be scaleable. This means that simple
or autonomous HOST computations must remain available. Yet, when greater ac-
curacy is needed in the uid and/or structure model, a coupling with an external
code CFD and/or CSM code is activated.
This research belongs to the SHANEL (Simulation of Helicopter Aerodynamics, Noise
and ELasticity) programme, a ve-year Franco-German cooperation between ONERA,
DLR
1
, Eurocopter France
2
and Eurocopter Deutschland
2
launched in 2006.
The developments engaged during this research will be pursued during the remainder
of the SHANEL programme, which ends in 2011. This work has been led in collaboration
with the Eurocopter Group. Therefore, the tools and methods here developed must be
in part regarded as a contribution to Eurocopters technological edge. ONERA and DLR
are also to gain better insight into rotorcraft aeroelasticity problems.
The multidisciplinary nature of aeroelasticity makes it a multi-team work. This study
has also been done in close teamwork with two other ONERA departments: the Ap-
plied Aerodynamics Department (DAAP) and the Computational Fluid Dynamics and
Aeroacoustics Department (DSNA).
This study takes advantage of the developments of a previous cooperation completed
in 2005, the CHANCE (Complete Helicopter AdvaNced Computational Environment)
project [17], in which a HOST/CFD coupling was developed.
What is new
This research introduces for the rst time:
3D nite element based structure models in rotorcraft aeroelasticity analysis.
A new method to modify automatically the rotor controls in order to yield a trimmed
solution while using a time-accurate coupling procedure. Rotor trim designates the
equilibrium of the rotor in steady ight (weight-lift, drag-thrust, pitch and roll
moments).
An innovative approach for the software architecture in partitioned procedures. This
includes software modularity, distributed computing and the use of public and in-
ternationally regulated data models to describe the data exchanged between codes.
Organisation of the Research
Naturally, there were many unknowns at the start of this project: from the most basic
questions on how to get several codes to communicate and exchange data to the details
1
Deutsches Zentrum f ur Luft- und Raumfahrt, Germanys national research centre for aeronautics and
space.
2
Eurocopter France and Eurocopter Deutschland GmbH belong to the Eurocopter Group and are a
helicopter manufacturer. The Eurocopter Group is 100% owned by the European Aeronautic Defence
and Space Company (EADS).
4
related to uid/structure interaction; which information was to be exchanged, when and
how. Would the simulations be stable? How to maximize accuracy?
As in every scientic work, the method consisted in discretising the large problem into
simpler units and addressing them in a scalating level of complexity.
The goal of the rst actions was to answer the most basic questions on the practi-
cal implementation of the coupling. The rst priorities were to set up a basic software
coupling environment, to choose a set of code-independent variables to be exchanged and
to learn how to get the CSM software (MSC.Marc) and HOST to exchange data. Code-
independent variables matter because the coupling must not be limited to a specic CSM
or CFD solver.
In order to ease the early developments, only beam elements were used for the rst
nite element model. This simple beam model represented nevertheless the 7A rotor, a
rotor that had already been analyzed by the HOST/CFD coupling during the CHANCE
programme. The results from that rst coupling were to be used as a comparison bench-
mark to validate the new developments.
Thus, the beam model became a development support that was used to implement
the minimum software infrastructure to get the codes running and exchanging data. This
implementation was carried out by reviewing the literature and consulting ONERAs
specialists in code coupling while observing the requirements of the SHANEL programme.
The beam-based rotor model in MSC.Marc was rst coupled with HOST. HOST pro-
vided the airloads and MSC.Marc the structural response. The next step consisted in
coupling the nite element model with CFD airloads.
Once the most basic software problems were solved, work resumed by extending the
uid/structure coupling to a third discipline, namely, the ight mechanics. A method
called active trim was developed. The active trim allows to modify the rotor controls
during the simulation until the forces generated by the rotor respect the in-ight equilib-
rium in terms of lift, thrust and pitch and roll moments, for example.
The developments for the beam nite element model were validated by comparing with
the equivalent HOST/CFD coupling of the CHANCE project. Then work resumed by
introducing a 3D nite element model of a rotor, yet a ctitious rotor -i.e., non tested- of
simple geometry to ease developments: rectangular blade planform and no twist. The goal
here was to upgrade the coupling capabilities in order to be able to handle 3D FE models.
Next, the work moved on to a more geometrically complex rotor for which experimental
measurements in the wind tunnel were available: the ERATO rotor.
The 3D nite element model of the ERATO rotor was coupled to CFD aerodynamics
and to HOSTs ight mechanics. Numerical solutions were compared to experimental
measurements. Investigations were carried out on the dierent staggered schemes by
comparing the solutions and also by looking at the conservation of the energy on the
uid/structure interface.
The organisation of the chapters does not follow strictly the chronology of the research;
instead, it was deemed more convenient to present rst all the developments and secondly
the results.
5
Chapter 1
Introduction to the Physics of a
Helicopter Rotor
This chapter introduces the dynamic and aerodynamic physical phenomena aecting ro-
torcraft aeroelasticity that are relevant to this work.
1.1 Rotor aerodynamics
The purpose of this section is to introduce the main phenomena in rotor aerodynamics that
will be later observed in the results chapter, with a special focus on nonlinear unsteady
aerodynamics, which is a dominant feature in rotor aerodynamics.
1.1.1 Introduction to Rotorcraft Nonlinear and Unsteady Aero-
dynamics
The value of a helicopter lies in its capacity to perform vertical ight: take-o and land
vertically and sustain hover ight. In these conditions the rotor works much as a conven-
tional propeller, with an inow that is perpendicular to the rotor disk plane. The thrust
generated by the rotor is fully vertical and therefore, no lateral forces push the helicopter
to move horizontally.
However, as soon as the pilot tilts the rotor forward to get moving, the rotor inow
is skewed by the helicopter airspeed and the oweld becomes asymmetric. The coming
paragraphs describe the source of this asymmetry and its consequences as a generator of
nonlinear and unsteady aerodynamics.
In forward ight, the rotor blade sees a component of the helicopter forward velocity
as well as the velocity due to its own rotation. On the advancing side of the rotor disk the
airspeed of the blade is increased above the rotation speed by the forward speed, while
on the retreating side the opposite is true, as shown in Figure 1.1. The most inboard
region of the retreating blade sees reversed ow. The dierent airspeeds of the advancing
6
and retreating blades create an asymmetric oweld. The asymmetric oweld triggers
in turn oscillatory airloads on the blades.
Figure 1.1: Velocity distribution on a rotor in forward ight.
As the helicopter forward speed increases, the advancing blade sees greater airspeeds,
and eventually the blade tip reaches transonic speeds. Similarly, the fraction of the
retreating blade under reversed ow grows larger with helicopter speed. The fraction of
the retreating blade on the outboard side that still sees normal ow generates lots of drag
because, as it will be seen later, the pitch of the retreating blade is very high to produce
enough lift despite the low airspeeds. In addition, above a certain helicopter speed, the
onset of shock waves in the advancing blade makes the drag to leap there. Since both the
wave drag of the advancing blade and the induced drag of the retreating blade take place
near the blade tip, the resulting drag-torque at the rotor head is signicantly magnied.
At some point the engine fails to provide enough torque, and it is this limit in engine
power that dictates the maximal cruise velocity.
In order to keep a straight forward ight, the rotor disk must not tilt sideways. If
the blade pitch were constant, the advancing blade would generate more lift than the
retreating blade and hence, the lift asymmetry would create a roll moment that would
break the level ight. Lift asymmetry is prevented by setting a minimum pitch to the
forward blade (pitch control is explained later in Section 1.2.1.1) and a maximum pitch
to the retreating blade. The dierence in pitch osets the dierence in airspeed. Blade
twist is also used to counter the radial speed distribution on the blades.
The asymmetrical oweld of the rotor in forward ight is only one of the multiple
complexities of rotor aerodynamics. There are at least three more key aerodynamic phe-
nomena that drive the critical rotor loads. These key aerodynamic phenomena are: wake
interaction, dynamic stall and tip transonic eects. Depending on the ight regime, one
out of the three phenomena dominates over the other two and determines the boundaries
of the ight envelope. The following paragraphs describe each of these phenomena and
their consequences on ight performance. An in-depth review of the subject was published
by Datta, Nixon and Chopra in [22].
7
1. INTRODUCTION TO THE PHYSICS OF A HELICOPTER ROTOR
Before proceeding into more detail, let us dene the azimuthal angle of a rotor blade
with the support of Figure 1.1. The azimuthal angle is an useful notation to indicate
the location of the blade on the rotor disk. It is denoted by and the origin lies on the
most downstream part of the rotor. = 90deg corresponds to full advancing blade and
= 270deg to full retreating blade.
Wake eects. Rotor blades y in the vicinity of the wake of their preceding blades in
the majority of ight conditions. This phenomenon has to be taken into account because
it aects signicantly the oweld around the blades.
Transition from hover to forward ight is greatly inuenced by wake eects. The rotor
wake impinges on the whole rear half of the fuselage and on the tail boom, which can lead
to aeroelastic phenomena such as tail shake and other cross-coupling phenomena between
the various degrees of freedom of the helicopter. Vibrations in a certain range of low
speeds are so strong that the helicopter has to be own through quickly. The oweld of
the tail rotor may be also perturbed by the wake depending on the ight condition.
In descending or low speed level ight the blades may encounter the vortices shed
by the preceding blades. This constitutes the so-called blade-vortex interaction (BVI).
Blade-vortex interaction is characterized by rotor vibratory loads and a loud popping
noise. BVI constitutes one of the largest sources of noise of the helicopter and is especially
relevant because it can be heard during the landing nal descent.
During high-speed cruise ight the wake is quickly convected downstream and therefore
less interaction occurs. Nevertheless, when the advancing blade ies close to the vortices
shed by the previous blades, it receives a high-frequency excitation that strengthens the
unsteady transonic phenomena described in the next paragraph.
Tip transonic eects. During high speed ight the advancing blade tip reaches tran-
sonic speeds, and the onset of shock waves limits the helicopter maximal cruising speed.
The three dimensional unsteady transonic ow eld creates moving shock waves on the
advancing blade, which causes the aerodynamic center to shift towards the trailing edge,
giving rise to large nose-down pitching moments. The shock-induced pitching moment
forces the blade to twist nose-down, thus reducing the lift at the blade tip.
Transonic eects are easily noticeable in most wind tunnel measurements reproduc-
ing high-speed ight. For instance, for the ERATO rotor, the evolution of the pitching
moment coecient C
m
at r/R=0.975 section over one rotor revolution is shown in Fig-
ure 1.2(a). It can be seen how, shortly after crossing the = 90deg azimuth (advancing
side of the rotor), the pitching moment at the blade tip becomes negative. In the same
gure it can be observed a second, larger, negative pulse around = 300deg. That is due
to dynamic stall, which is presented later.
Note that Figure 1.2(b) contains the aerodynamic pitching moment coecient, C
m
,
times the squared local Mach number, M
2
. Giving the product C
m
M
2
, rather than the
bare coecient C
m
of Figure 1.2(a), is more telling about the actual magnitude of the
8
(a) Pitching coecient C
m
. (b) Pitching moment C
m
M
2
.
Figure 1.2: Measured sectional airloads on the ERATO blade in high-speed ight.
airloads because the inclusion of the squared Mach number accounts for the dynamic
pressure.
Since the speed of the blade tip -and thereby the dynamic pressure- is much greater
in the advancing blade ( = 90deg) than in the retreating blade ( = 270deg), the
smaller of the two negative peaks in pitching coecient C
m
in Figure 1.2(a), located at
90deg, becomes actually a larger pitching moment C
m
M
2
in Figure 1.2(b) than that
due to dynamic stall.
Dynamic Stall. Dynamic stall is an unsteady ow separation phenomenon that occurs
on heavily loaded rotors -i.e., operating at high thrust or high altitude-. Dynamic stall
appears mostly on the retreating blade due to high angles of attack, and on the advancing
blade because of shock-boundary layer interaction.
As the airfoil pitches up, the trailing edge ow separates progressively due to negative
pressure gradient in the boundary layer, and a leading edge vortex appears. This vortex is
convected downstream along the upper side of the airfoil, yielding a negative nose-down
stall pitching moment. However, the lift does not stall while the low-pressure vortex
traverses over the airfoil. As soon as the vortex leaves the trailing edge the lift stalls,
but simultaneously the negative pitching moment reaches its maximum and the ow re-
attaches as the airfoil pitches down. This cycle forms hysteresis loops on the airloads
versus the angle of attack, see Figure 1.3
1
. High-frequency torsion-oscillating proles can
produce greater lift coecients at greater angles of attack without succumbing to stall.
1
Source: Imperial College London, Department of Aeronautics.
9
Insects such as the dragony take advantage of this phenomenon [51], since their wings
would not be able to lift them on a quasi-steady aerodynamics basis.
Dynamic stall triggers transient high-frequency torsional response and it is a source of
important blade vibratory loads, which can eventually limit the speed and loading of the
rotor. Because of its impact on rotorcraft performance (e.g. vibration, pushrod loads),
dynamic stall has beneted from intensive research. Popular dynamic stall models have
been proposed by Friedmann [27], Leishman [31], Petot [38] and Truong [53].
Figure 1.3: Lift coecient in dynamic stall.
Aerodynamic interactions The fuselage and the tail rotor also aect the ow past
the main rotor. In forward ight the fuselage induces an upwash in the innerboard part
of the blade, around the 180
azimuth, which increases the local angle of attack. An

increase of angle of attack leads to an increase in lift force. Then, by gyroscopic eect,
the blade aps a quarter of revolution later, generating a roll moment around the rotor
hub.
1.2 Structural dynamics
This section presents the main phenomena in rotor dynamics that are relevant to the test
applications of this work.
10
1.2.1 Introduction to rotor dynamics.
1.2.1.1 Mechanical description of a rotor.
The standard helicopter main rotor is composed of the blades, the hub, the pitch control
system and the lead-lag adaptors.
It has been seen in the aerodynamics section that, in forward ight, the airloads acting
on the blade are oscillatory and periodic over one revolution. These varying airloads
induce considerable bending motion on the rotor blades because the blades are slender
and hence, highly exible. The largest bending motion takes place out of the plane of the
rotor disk and is called apping motion. If the blades were simply clamped to the rotor
hub, root bending moments and blade stresses would quickly lead to structural failure of
the blade root, something that the early pioneers in rotary-wing ight quickly realized.
This problem was xed by introducing a ap hinge between the blade root and the rotor
hub. However, the out-of-plane apping motion of the blades becomes even greater with
the hinge and as a consequence, Coriolis forces induce important in-plane motion, called
lag. The amplitude of the lag motion is large enough as to require a second hinge to
alleviate the lag bending stresses.
Rotors equipped with ap and lag hinges are known as articulated rotors. Placing
a ap hinge and a lag hinge between the blade root and the rotor hub, as shown in
Figure 1.4
2
, alleviates the root bending moments by letting the blade have rigid-body
motion. In addition of the ap and lag hinges, there is a third articulation: the pitch
bearing. The pitch bearing allows to control the angle of attack of the blades (see below
Section 1.2.1.1) and hence, to control rotor aerodynamics.
The most recent rotor designs have replaced the articulations between blade root
and rotor hub by highly exible materials that still allow near rigid body motion of the
blades. The advantage of this new technology, baptised bearingless rotors, is that it
reduces the mechanical complexity of the rotor hub (fewer elements, no maintenance-
demanding bearings). Pictures of an articulated rotor and a bearingless rotor are shown
in Figure 1.5(a) and Figure 1.5(b), respectively.
Rotor control and gyroscopic eects. In a helicopter rotor each blade is actuated
in pitch. Blade pitch is used to regulate the angle of attack of the blade and hence, to
regulate how much lift it generates. Blade pitch is expressed as a Fourier series truncated
at the rst harmonic,
=
0
+
1C
cos +
1S
sin, (1.1)
where is the blade azimuth,
0
is called the collective control and the rst harmonics
1C
and
1S
are called the lateral and longitudinal cyclic controls, respectively. The reason
behind these names is explained shortly. The cyclic pitch is used by the pilot to tilt
the rotor plane towards the desired heading. The collective pitch is used to regulate the
2
Source: Helicopter Theory, by Wayne Johnson. Dover Publications, 1994.
11
Figure 1.4: Schematic of an articulated rotor hub showing one blade only.
(a) Mil Mi-4s articulated rotor. (b) EC135s bearingless rotor.
Figure 1.5: The evolution of technology in rotor hubs.
12
rotor thrust. The vertical component of the thrust is the lift force, while the horizontal
component is the propulsive force.
Figure 1.4 showed how a pushrod sets the blade pitch. This section has shown that
blade pitch control has three components: one collective and two cyclical angles. The
swashplate is the mechanical device that actuates the pushrods according to the three
pitch control angles. Figure 1.6 contains a schematic illustration of a swashplate. A
swashplate consists in two parallel disks separated by bearings. The upper disk is con-
nected to the blades via the pushrods and it rotates with them. The lower disk is connected
to the control input rods. In addition, the two disks can be tilted and displaced along the
rotor shaft. Collective pitch is adjusted by displacing the swashplate up and down along
the shaft thanks to a simultaneous and homogeneous displacement of the control input
rods. Cyclic pitch is achieved by tilting the swashplate thanks to the individual action of
certain control rods;
1C
actuates only the control inputs rods that lie in the longitudi-
nal direction ( = 0deg to = 180deg), thus tilting the swashplate longitudinally.
1S
actuates the lateral rods only.
Figure 1.6: A swashplate.
Gyroscopic eects. The angular momentum of a spinning rotor is very large and so
are the gyroscopic eects. The most practical consequence of gyroscopics aects how the
rotor controls are mounted. It has been explained that the helicopter is steered by tilting
the rotor in the desired heading direction. Rotor tilt is dened by the blade tip apping
path. For example, engaging a left-hand turn while in forward ight requires the blade
apping angle to be greater on the right side of the disk than on the left side. Since
apping is proportional to lifting force, it follows that apping is controlled by the pitch
angle of the blade.
A blade with positive angle of attack will generate lift and consequently, ap upwards.
Yet, as a consequence of gyroscopic precession, the apping will only happen a quarter of
13
a revolution after the lift force. For an increased apping at = 90deg, blade pitch must
be increased at = 0deg. That is why the cyclic control angle
1C
, although actuated in
the longitudinal direction of the disk -i.e., = 0deg to = 180deg-, is called the lateral
control angle. Similarly, the cyclic pitch angle
1S
is called the longitudinal control angle
despite acting on the lateral sides of the disk.
1.2.1.2 Blade dynamics
The purpose of this section is to introduce concepts and terminology that will be referred
to later in this document. For a comprehensive treatise in rotary-wing dynamics, the
books of Johnson [30] and Bielawa [12] are classics.
Notation of blade motion. The apping motion is denoted with the angle . The lag
motion is denoted by . Blade motion is typically described by Fourier series, like for the
blade pitch. For example, for the blade motion, the ap angle of the blade is expressed
as a function of the azimuth angle by the expression
=
0
+
1C
cos +
1S
sin, (1.2)
the same formulation applies for the lag angle . Note that the harmonics higher than
one are neglected for being small.
Forces acting on a rotor blade. Consider a spanwise segment of length dr and mass
m centered at a fraction r/R of a blade with radius R. The blade is articulated in lag
and ap. The lag and ap hinges are collocated. The angular speed of the rotor is .
The loads acting on this segment are:
An inertial force with three components for the ap, lag and pitch accelerations.
A centrifugal force m
2
r.
An aerodynamic force.
A Coriolis force. The Coriolis acceleration is twice the cross product of the angular
velocity vector and the velocity vector relative to the rotating frame.
Typical eigenfrequencies of a rotating blade. The centrifugal loads stien the blade
and hence, the eigenfrequencies of the blade tend to increase with the angular speed of
the rotor . The inertial loads due to rotation of the blade approximately increase the
square of the natural frequency
2
n
in proportion to the square of the rotation speed
2
.
This eect can be expressed as
2
n
=
2
0n
+
n
2
, where
0n
is the non-rotating natural
frequency and
n
depends on the mode.
The constant
n
diers for the ap and lag motions. While apping, the centrifugal
loads always have the same direction, as shown in Figure 1.7. However, in lag motion, the
14
centrifugal force is a follower force; the blade hinges around a point oset by a distance
e to the rotation center. Since this hinge oset e is relatively small with respect to the
blade radius, it follows that the centrifugal force is nearly aligned with the blade axis. As
a result, the restoring moment generated by the centrifugal force tends to zero as e 0
for the lag motion, whereas in ap motion the restoring moment depends on the angle .
Figure 1.7: Rotor blade out-of-plane apping.
Figure 1.8: Rotor blade in-plane lag.
The smaller restoring centrifugal moment that lag motion receives means that lag
motion is less stiened than ap motion. As a result, the lag eigenfrequencies of a rotating
blade rise with a smaller slope -i.e., smaller
n
- than ap eigenfrequencies as the rotor
angular speed is increased.
The
n
constant is equal for lag motion and torsion motion. Imagine a at blade fully
contained in the rotor disk spin plane and whose pitch axis is also contained in that plane.
If the blade rotates around the pitch axis, its leading and trailing edges will leave the rotor
disk spin plane and the restoring moment of the centrifugal force will act on them in the
same manner than for the ap motion. Nevertheless, the non-rotating natural frequency
of torsion
0
is much higher than those of ap and lag because there is no pitch hinge, so
the blade is not free to pitch.
Figure 1.9 illustrates the increase of an articulated blades eigenfrequencies -in red-
with rotation speed (assuming the blade in the vacuum). The straight yellow lines are
constant frequency curves, noted by 1/rev, 2/rev and so on. The notation n/rev means
that frequency is n times the rotor angular frequency. At = 0, there is a mode with
zero eigenfrequency; it corresponds to the rigid ap motion of the blade around the ap
15
hinge. This same mode follows the 1/rev curve as increases. Therefore, the of the
rigid ap mode is equal to one. The second lowest frequency at = 0 corresponds to the
rst lag mode. The lag motion, although also articulated, has a non-null non-rotating
eigenfrequency (
0
4Hz in the gure) due to the presence of the lead-lag damper. The
lag mode is observed to be nearly independent of the rotation speed. The rst torsion
mode appears above 100Hz for = 0 and presents a very mild slope as increases.
Its value is equal to one and it is equal to that of the rst ap mode. Yet since its
non-rotating frequency is higher,
0
6/rev, the proportional eect of is reduced,
=1
=
_
(6)
2
+ 1
2
= 6.08/rev.
It is also interesting to observe how certain modes exchange their behaviour. For
example, at around 60Hz mode 6 (for 6
th
largest non-rotating eigenfrequency) starts as
lag but switches to ap beyond = 30rad/s. At the same rotation speed, ap mode 5
switches to lag.
Figure 1.9: Campbell diagram.
Sources of couplings. One of the greatest complexities of rotating blade dynamics is
the variety of couplings between the ap, lag and pitch motions. Coupling eects arise in
blade dynamics principally from ve main sources:
16
1. General and usual misalignments of the blade section principal axes (both elastic
and inertial) from the spin plane due to all components of blade pitch angles and
built-in geometric twist;
2. Noncoincidence of the various elastomechanical centers within the blade sections
(mass center, elastic axis, neutral axis);
3. Skewness of the blades radial axis from the spin plane due to built-in coning or
apping;
4. Nonlinear eects of combined atwise and edgewise bending;
5. Nonlinear coupling between ap and lag motion due to the blade Coriolis forces.
In addition, the dynamic behaviour of articulated rotors depends strongly on the
order of the articulations -when not collocated- and on the oset of the articulations to
the rotation centre.
Another source of coupling is the kinematic k-coupling. The k-coupling is best ex-
plained by looking at Figure 1.4, in which the pushrod actuating the blade pitch bearing
is outboard of the ap hinge. If the pushrod is xed and the blade aps, the pitch of
the blade will be modied. This can be useful; pitch may be automatically reduced when
the blade aps upwards and inversely. Yet generally helicopter manufacturers counter the
k-coupling with a simple solution: extending the pitch actuator to the ap axis and letting
the pushrod be coplanar with the ap axis. A close look on the rotor of Figure 1.5(a)
reveals this construction.
17
Chapter 2
The Numerical Analyses
This work used three large software analyses: the rotorcraft comprehensive analysis code
HOST, the structural nite element solver MSC.Marc and the CFD method elsA.
HOST is a work tool at the aeromechanical engineering departments of Eurocopter.
ONERA has made and continues to make contributions to the development of HOST.
The choice of MSC.Marc, a structural nite element solver, was done prior to this
thesis and it was based mostly on its non-linear analysis capability. This is a must in
order to handle the large displacements, rotations and elastic deections of a rotor blade.
In the case of the CFD software, elsA is the most sensible choice for two reasons.
First, it is perfectly suited to rotorcraft applications because it integrates state-of-the-
art methods in the domain of rotorcraft CFD. Second, elsA is developed at ONERA for
research purposes but is also used by many of ONERAs industrial partners.
This chapter presents the numerical analyses HOST, elsA and MSC.Marc, including
for the latter the approach that was used to apply a general structural nite element
analysis to rotor dynamics simulation.
An overview of the rotorcraft comprehensive analysis code HOST is oered. The
HOST/CFD coupling developed in 2005 is described and compared to concurrent com-
prehensive/CFD analyses.
2.1 Advanced nite element analysis for rotor dy-
namics
It has been seen that the dynamics of a rotating blade feature large amplitude displace-
ments and rotations, nonlinear geometrical deformations and nonlinear couplings. Despite
the complexity of rotor dynamics, for most of the rotor designs ying today, beam models
give satisfying predictions of their dynamic behaviour. However, future technologies will
call for rened capabilities in structural modeling for reasons that are not strictly related
to dynamics. Two examples are oered next.
Modern helicopter blades are made of composite materials. Composite materials not
18
2.2 The nite element solver MSC.Marc
only are lightweight, but also oer a high degree of customisation. By appropriate ply
orientation, the designer can exploit the anisotropic properties of the bers and render
the blade more aeroelastically stable. This potential for aeroelastic tailoring has not been
adopted by helicopter manufacturers yet, who rely on composite blades mostly because
of their excellent fatigue characteristics, damage tolerance and reduced weight. But as
aeroelastic tailoring technologies become more mature, there will be an increasing need
in being able to model complex material behaviours.
Another technology likely to reach soon a satisfying degree of maturity is smart ma-
terials. The morphing of the blades by piezoelectric devices or alike will bring enormous
progress in terms of ight performance, vibration reduction and mechanical design. Mod-
eling a blade with morphing cross-sections requires to use at least 2D models such as
shells or plates.
MSC.Marc is a commercial o-the-shelf software for structural nite element analysis.
There are three good reasons to use it. The rst is its non-linear analysis capability, a
necessary requirement due to the large rotations and displacements that characterize rotor
dynamics. A second reason is the availability of user subroutines in Fortran that ease the
task of coupling MSC.Marc with external software (e.g. aerodynamics solvers). Thirdly,
ONERA already had positive experience with the use of MSC.Marc for the analysis of
rotor blade dynamics [55][56]. Another asset of MSC.Marc is that, since it belongs to
MSC software, the same company that develops Nastran, another popular structural
nite element package, nite element models for Nastran can be easily imported into
MSC.Marc.
On the minus side, the disadvantages related to the use of a commercial software
stem from the lack of complete mastery on the numerical procedures and algorithms
implemented in it. The source code is not available and the documentation is not always
as comprehensive or even accurate as one may desire. The consequences are that some
analysis options, short of exhaustive documentation, demand a time-consuming approach
based on trial-and-error to work out their application.
In this work MSC.Marc was used to solve transient dynamics problems via direct
integration of the nonlinear equation of motion,
M u +C u +K(u)u = F(u), (2.1)
where M is the mass matrix, C the damping matrix, K the stiness matrix (of which
more below), F the structural loading and u the nodal displacement. The overdot denotes
time derivative.
(2.1) is said to be nonlinear because the stiness matrix depends on the deformation
of the structure system. Indeed, K(u) is called the tangent nonlinear stiness matrix and
includes three terms: (1) the linear or small displacement stiness matrix; (2) the geo-
metric or initial stress stiening matrix (centrifugal stiening); and (3) the large or initial
19
2. THE NUMERICAL ANALYSES
displacement matrix. In addition, the structural loading (airloads, centrifugal loads) also
depends on the deformation.
A typical operator for integrating the equation of motion in time is the Newmark
scheme. The Newmark scheme is available in MSC.Marc and was used in this work. Its
generalized form is
u
n+1
= u
n
+ (1 ) t u
n
+ t u
n+1
u
n+1
= u
n
+ t u
n
+
_
1
2

_
t
2
u
n
+ t
2
u
n+1
(2.2)
where u is the displacement vector, a dot denotes time derivative and t is the time step,
so that time t
n+1
= t
n
+t. The particular form of the the Newmark scheme for = 1/2
and = 1/4, applied to the equation of motion (2.1) results in
_
4
t
2
M +
2
t
C +K
_
u = F
n+1
R
n
+M
_
u
n
+
4
t
u
n
_
+C u
n
(2.3)
where the internal load-vector R is obtained from the internal stresses as
R =
elem
_
V
T
dv, (2.4)
where is the strain-displacement relation and the stress tensor. (2.4) adds, for every
element, the integration of the internal stresses over the volume of the element.
The solution of (2.3) for u allows the implicit solution of the system,
u
n+1
i
= u
n
+ u
i
(2.5)
Notice that the operator (2.3) includes K(u), the tangent nonlinear stiness matrix.
Hence, (2.3) is solved iteratively by a full Newton-Raphson approach, in which the tangent
stiness matrix is reassembled at each iteration i. It is important to reassemble the
stiness matrix at each iteration in order to take accurately into account the geometrical
nonlinear phenomena of the rotor dynamics.
In this work the kinematics of deformation were solved by MSC.Marc using a total
Lagrangian formulation. The term Lagrangian implies that the nite element mesh is
attached to the material. And in the total Lagrangian approach the equilibrium is ex-
pressed with the original undeformed state as the reference. This method is appropriate
for rotor dynamics because of its moderately large rotations yet small and elastic strains.
MSC.Marc includes an extensive element library. This work used beam, shell and solid
elements. Although rotor blades undergo moderately large bending deections, they are
also very elastic. Therefore, the deformations are considered as a large displacement, small
strain problem. The advantage of having small strains is that changes in the stress-strain
law of elasticity of the materials can be neglected.
20
Centrifugal and Coriolis forces. In simulating the dynamic behaviour of a rotor
blade, it is essential to take into account the eect of the rotor rotational speed. When
solving the nite element problem in a non-inertial frame, the centrifugal and Coriolis
forces appear in the equations of motion as three additional terms,
M u + (C C
c
) u +
_
K
2
K
c
_
u = F +
2
K
c
u
0
, (2.6)
where u
0
is the position vector of the stationary system. The term C
c
u is commonly
referred to as the Coriolis force and the term
2
K
c
(u
0
+ Bu) is referred to as the cen-
trifugal force. Note that the centrifugal force term in the right hand side of the equation
behaves as a body force during the simulations.
This thesis detected that MSC.Marc fails to account for the Coriolis forces in its
time-domain simulations (whereas it should). This problem emerged after a simple inves-
tigation summarized in Section 2.2.1.6.
2.2.1 Adapting nite element analysis to rotor modeling
2.2.1.1 Rotor articulations.
The rotors that have been modeled in this study are research rotors in which the blades
are linked to the rotor hub by three articulations: the ap hinge, the lag hinge and the
pitch bearing. These articulations were schematically described by Figure 1.4, in which
the ap and lag hinges are confounded as a cardan joint.
In the nite element models, the three articulations were all concentrated into a
spherical joint because this option is easier than modeling the separate articulations.
A schematic of this system is shown in Figure 2.1. It has been checked that the spherical
joint approximation does not alter signicantly the modeshapes of the blade by comparing
the predicted non-rotating eigenfrequencies with measured data. No pitch-ap coupling
is introduced either because the pitch articulation is collocated with the ap hinge. The
spherical joint is modeled by two matching nodes (but belonging to contiguous beam
elements) free to rotate but rigidly attached in displacement.
2.2.1.2 The blade pitch control system
Like in a real rotor, each of the blades in the nite element model is equipped with a
pitch control system composed of a pitch horn articulated with a pushrod, as shown in
Figure 2.2. Since the mechanical properties of the wind tunnel rods were not available, it
was preferred to make them rigid and nearly weightless, so that they would not deform nor
undergo important inertial loads. The system works by prescribing a vertical displacement
upon the lower node of the pushrod (right at the point where it would be attached to the
swashplate). Horizontal displacements for this node are blocked, so it works as a slide
element. The pushrod is linked to the pitch horn by a spherical joint. The pitch horn is
solidly linked to the blade and acts as a lever.
21
Figure 2.1: Schematic of the spherical joint used in the nite element models.
Figure 2.2: The blade pitch control system in the nite element model.
22
For a null pitch angle ( = 0), the pitch horn is assumed to be horizontal and perpen-
dicular to the pushrod. Thus, for a desired pitch input angle , the vertical displacement
h to be prescribed on the pushrod is a simple trigonometric relation
= arcsin
_
r
2
(1 cos)
r
1
_
(2.7)
h = d + e = r
2
sin + r
1
(1 cos) (2.8)
2.2.1.3 The lead-lag damper
Like in a real rotor, each of the blades in the nite element model is equipped with a
lead-lag spring-damper system.
The spring/damper system is declared in MSC.Marc as a spring equipped with a
damping dashpot. One end of the spring/damper system is attached to the blade root,
a few centimeters outboard of the articulations, and the other end is attached to the
rotating frame of the blade. The force generated by this system is proportional to the
spring stiness k times the lag displacement plus the damping coecient c times
the lag velocity

of the point of the blade where the spring is attached, as given by
F = k + c
.
It is sometimes convenient to raise articially the damping coecient of the lead-lag
damper at the beginning of a simulation to help stabilize the lag motion, which has a low
frequency (around 1/3/rev).
2.2.1.4 Initializing the simulation
In the geometry denition of the FE model the blades are oriented with an initial pitch,
i.e., the root chord of the blade is rotated with respect to the rotor plane by a certain angle.
Ideally, this built-in pitch should be close to the typical operating values to minimise
the amount of pitch input into the FE model, because pitch input adds computation cost
to the FE simulation.
In any case, the pitch setting of each blade must be individually adjusted to be
ready for the coupling with the external airloads. The initial value of the pitch has been
previously estimated with an autonomous-HOST computation.
Initializing the simulation consists in setting the initial blade pitch by means of a
ramp function. Pitch input drives a rigid motion of the entire blade and therefore, pitch
variations must be smooth for the FE solver not to diverge.
The ramp period also serves to damp out the high-frequency oscillations in blade
elongation that arise as a consequence of the onset of the centrifugal loading. This
high-frequency damping is provided by the time-integration scheme of the FE solver,
as explained later in the time integration section, Section 2.2.3.
If a particular ight condition is to be simulated several times, it would be interesting
to save the restart le containing the already initialized solution because this initialization
is computationally expensive when using 3D FE models. Restart options are possible in
23
MSC.Marc and this work tried to use them, yet it failed due to obscure problems with
libraries in the user subroutines.
2.2.1.5 Non-inertial frames
In the nite element solver MSC.Marc the standard method to modeling rotating struc-
tures is to make use of a non-inertial frame of reference, this is, a frame xed to the
rotating body. A non-inertial frame of reference in MSC.Marc is dened by declaring a
rotation axis that is xed in space.
An advantage of using rotation-xed frames of reference is that the specication of the
FE model (the input le or card) is simpler compared to that of a rotating structure in
an inertial frame. The use of an inertial frame requires more intervention from the user,
an aspect that is demonstrated later in Section 2.2.2, where the inertial frame approach
was tested.
The disadvantage of using rotation-xed frames of reference is that phenomena such
as rotor shaft vibration -and thereby change of the spatial orientation of the rotation axis-
are neglected.
For the isolated rotor applications of this study a xed axis of rotation could be
assumed. However, shaft dynamics cannot always be neglected. Indeed, future work will
model complete helicopter congurations (fuselage plus rotor), and for that the vibration
of the rotor shaft will have to be taken into account.
Worries about the capacity of MSC.Marc to simulate structures rotating around a
moving axis were raised. It was then decided to conduct a small investigation, based on
the use of inertial frames, see Section 2.2.2, on how rotor shaft vibration could one day
be taken into account in MSC.Marcs simulations.
2.2.1.6 Testing Coriolis forces in the non-inertial frame
A small investigation was carried to check that, when MSC.Marc rotor models are solved
in a non-inertial frame, the Coriolis forces are correctly calculated.
The test was conducted with a very simple model representing an isotropic blade with
constant and symmetric cross-section. The blade was straight but presented a certain
angle with respect to the horizontal plane, which would be the rotor spin plane. The
length of the blade was equal to 1m and the FE model was discretised into four beam
elements of 0.25m each with constant mechanical properties. The bending stiness was
equal to 10000Nm
2
. The total weight of the beam was 20kg. The rotation speed was
equal to 1000rev/min. Figure 2.3 shows a side view of the undeformed geometry of the
blade (line coloured in lilac).
According to the MSC.Marc manual, a distributed load of type 103 (which includes
centrifugal and Coriolis loading after entering the angular speed
2
in rad/s and dening
an axis of rotation) was applied to all four beam elements of the blade. One end of the
blade was clamped to the rotation axis, which was vertical. The other end was free.
24
A simulation in the time-domain was performed. The centrifugal loading was not
ramped but fully applied from time zero. Since the undeformed blade lay out of the
rotation plane, the onset of the centrifugal loading triggered large amplitude oscillations
in apping. The amplitude of the apping oscillations was almost equal to 0.36m (36%
of the blade span) and the frequency slightly superior to 1/rev.
Figure 2.3: No Coriolis forces showing up.
As a consequence of the blade velocity relative to the rotating-frame associated to the
apping motion, it was expected to observe in-plane motion due to the Coriolis force.
The Coriolis acceleration is twice the cross product of the angular velocity vector and the
velocity vector relative to the rotating frame.
Disappointingly, no Coriolis coupling appeared. The blade apped signicantly, but
this motion remained conned in the xz plane, with a velocity v = (v
x
, 0, v
z
). The cross
product of this velocity vector with the angular velocity vector on the z-axis ( = (0, 0, ))
should have generated a Coriolis force acting on the y-direction. As a result of these y-
direction Coriolis forces, the blade should have underwent displacements, however small,
in the y-direction. Yet y-displacements were strictly zero throughout the simulation. A
shot of the deformed blade is shown in Figure 2.3. The zeros above the deformed blade
-in black- are the y-displacements.
The fact that no coupling is observed between ap and lag motion due to Coriolis
forces suggests a malfunctioning of the Coriolis loading in MSC.Marcs simulations in a
non-inertial frame in the time-domain. This problem has been duly reported to the MSC
Software company, who is now xing it.
This result will need to be taken into account when assessing the numerical solutions.
25
(a) Simple rotor model (b) Gyroscopic precession
Figure 2.4: Model for testing MSC.Marc in a xed frame.
2.2.2 About the MSC.Marc simulations in an inertial frame
The solution to simulate rotors rotating around a moving axis consists in using an inertial
frame of reference. Instead of declaring a xed axis of rotation, it is possible to prescribe
an angular velocity to a node and let this node drive the rotation of the rest of the
structure. Then, by prescribing the angular velocity on a node of the rotor shaft, it
is possible to drive the rotation of the entire rotor while allowing for shaft vibration.
This approach has been tested with a simple exercise; the model shown in Figure 2.4(a)
represents an horizontal-axis rotor. A counter-clockwise angular velocity is prescribed
through the right end of the rotor shaft (see red arrows). This same node is xed in
all three displacements but free to rotate. Gravity is prescribed along the vertical axis
(Z-axis). As the simulation starts, the rotor head starts to drop, but then the gyroscopic
eect induces the precession towards the right, shown in Figure 2.4(b), in agreement
with the vectorial product = M
g
H
s
, where M
g
is the gravity moment and H
s
the
rotor spin angular momentum.
Unfortunately, the use of inertial frames in which the structure rotates brings addi-
tional issues.
One of them is the angular acceleration. The large rotational inertia of the rotor has
to be accelerated from rest to the nominal rotation speed, which at best would be com-
putationally expensive, particularly for 3D FE models. Indeed, it would take too long to
stabilize the response, especially for the low-frequency lead-lag motion. Angular acceler-
ation can be bypassed by prescribing an initial velocity -corresponding to the stabilized
rotation regime- to each of the nodes of the mesh at the simulation start. But these initial
velocities would have to be calculated by the user, which for large FE models is a tedious
and error-prone operation.
26
A second issue is related to the frames of reference for the input and output quanti-
ties during the coupling. Even with the use of strategically placed local frames, transfer
operations would not be as direct as when using a rotating rotor frame.
In conclusion, the non-inertial frame used in MSC.Marc for the simulation of isolated
rotors was preferred to the inertial frame because: (1) from a dynamics point of view it is
easier to initialize because accelerations due to rotor torque are avoided; (2) it simplies
the specication or input card of the nite element model; and (3) it provides user-
friendlier frames of reference for inputs/outputs.
2.2.3 Time integration
For dynamic transient analysis, MSC.Marc oers three time-integration operators:
1. Newmark-beta operator
2. Houbolt operator
3. Central dierence operator
The central dierence operator is an explicit method limited to rapid dynamics analy-
ses with very small time-steps, like crash-shock phenomena. The Houbolt operator is
interesting in that it provides high-frequency damping, but so does the Newmark scheme
with the right choice of parameters and at a better accuracy. The Newmark scheme is
a widely accepted time-integrator for structural dynamics problems because its implicit
character guarantees the stability of the response irrespectively of the time-step, whereas
the stability of explicit methods is conditioned to the use of small time-steps relative to
the frequencies of the studied problem. These frequencies are not only physical, but also
include the very high frequencies that follow the spatial discretisation used in the nite
element method.
The Newmark algorithm is based on a set of two relations expressing the forward
displacement u
n+1
and velocity u
n+1
in terms of their current values and the forward and
current values of the acceleration,
u
n+1
= u
n
+ (1 ) h u
n
+ h u
n+1
u
n+1
= u
n
+ h u
n
+
_
1
2

_
h
2
u
n
+ h
2
u
n+1
(2.9)
where h is the time step, so that t
n+1
= t
n
+h. A dot denotes time derivative. The choice
of the parameters and determines the accuracy and stability properties of the scheme.
This work used = 5/6 and = 4/9. This choice of parameters provides good accu-
racy while introducing numerical damping for the higher-frequencies. How much exactly
27
is argued in the coming paragraphs, following the analysis by Geradin and Rixen in [28].
Writing the equations of motion at times t
n
and t
n+1
M u
n
= C u
n
Ku
n
F
n
M u
n+1
= C u
n+1
Ku
n+1
F
n+1
(2.10)
and introducing the Newmark relations, previously multiplied by M, in them yields
M u
n+1
= M u
n
+ h(1 ) (C u
n
Ku
n
+F
n
) + h
_
C u
n+1
Ku
n+1
+F
n+1
_
Mu
n+1
= Mu
n
+ hM u
n
+ h
2
_
1
2

_
(C u
n
Ku
n
+F
n
)
+ h
2
_
C u
n+1
Ku
n+1
+F
n+1
_
(2.11)
By noting q
T
= [ u
T
u
T
], Eqs. 2.11 can be recast in matrix form
q
n+1
= Aq
n
+g
n+1
(2.12)
where
A = H
1
1
H
0
(2.13)
g
n+1
= H
1
1
b
n+1
(2.14)
H
1
=
_
M + hC hK
h
2
C M + h
2
k
_
(2.15)
H
0
=
_
(1 ) hC M (1 ) hK
_
1
2

_
h
2
C hM
_
1
2

_
h
2
K M
_
(2.16)
b
n+1
=
_
(1 ) hF
n
+ hF
n+1
_
1
2

_
h
2
F
n
+ h
2
F
n+1
_
(2.17)
Matrix A is called the amplication matrix of the integration scheme. Stability analyses
can be performed from its eigenvalues.
For zero structural damping (C = 0), and decomposing the equations of motion into
a system of normalized decoupled equations, the amplication matrix can be written for
every mode of angular frequency
j
as
A =
_
1

2
h
2
1+
2
h
2

2
h
_
1

2
2
h
2
1+
2
h
2
_
h
1+
2
h
2
1
1
2
2
h
2
1+
2
h
2
_
(2.18)
its eigenvalues
i
being the solution of its characteristic equation
_
2
_
+
1
2
__

2
h
2
1 +
2
h
2
_
. .
2
_
_
+ 1
_

1
2
__

2
h
2
1 +
2
h
2
_
. .
2
= 0 (2.19)
28
The eigenvalues can be expressed
1,2
= e
i
(2.20)
where
=
1
_

1
2
_
2
(2.21)
= atan
_
_
_
1
1
4
_
+
1
2
_
2
2
1
1
2
_
+
1
2
_
2
_
_
(2.22)
The algorithm will only be stable if 1, which implies
1
2
. Furthermore, the
characteristic equation (Eq. 2.19) will only have complex eigenvalues if
_
+
1
2
_
2
4
4
2
h
2
(2.23)
which holds true for any frequency parameter h if

1
4
_
+
1
2
_
2
(2.24)
Numerical damping can be introduced in the Newmark operator by making > 1/2
by a factor , = 1/2 + , but it deteriorates the accuracy of the numerical response.
This deterioration is quantied next by analyzing the spectral radius of the algorithm, its
period error and its numerical damping as a function of the frequency parameter h.
Three cases have been considered. The rst is the baseline, non-damped, Newmark
algorithm ( = 0). The second uses = 0.05. The third uses the factor chosen in the
present work for MSC.Marc, = 1/3. In all cases = 1/2 + and =
1
4
_
+
1
2
_
2
.
As increases, so does the damping in the higher frequencies. In rotor dynamics, only
the rst eight to ten modes are physically meaningful. The highest frequencies of interest
are usually around 8/rev. For a rotor rotating at = 1000rev/min 100rad/s, this
means = 800rad/s. The time step is constrained by the time-accurate coupling with
the CFD method, which imposes time steps of the order of h 2 10
4
s. Consequently,
the frequency parameter h takes values around 0.16.
The spectral radius is equal to the modulus of the largest eigenvalue
i
. It has an
asymptotic behaviour as h , which allows to study the stability of the algo-
rithm over the whole frequency domain.
Figure 2.5 shows the spectral radius of the Newmark operator for = 0, = 0.05
and = 1/3. In the concerned frequency factors, h 0.16, the spectral radius
of the damped algorithm with = 1/3 is still very close to that of the undamped
algorithm. So for the low frequencies the accuracy goes nearly unaected.
29
Figure 2.5: Spectral radius of the Newmark algorithm.
The period error compares the period of the numerical response to that of the exact
one.
T
T
=
h
1 (2.25)
Figure 2.6 shows again how at the frequencies of interest in rotor dynamics (around
h 0.16) the most damped solution is still very close to the undamped one.
Figure 2.6: Period error of the Newmark algorithm.
The numerical damping is obtained from
=
ln(||)
(2.26)
30
2.3 The CFD code elsA
Figure 2.7 shows the numerical damping. Here lie the starkest dierences between
damping levels at the frequencies of concern. But the absolute value is still reason-
able.
Figure 2.7: Numerical damping of the Newmark algorithm.
In conclusion, the amount of numerical damping introduced in the Newmark scheme by
taking = 1/3 and then = 1/2 + = 5/6 and = 4/9 is highly suitable for the
rotor dynamics problems treated here. In the range of frequencies that dominate the
blade response, the accuracy of the algorithm is nearly as good as that of the undamped
scheme. Yet the undesirable higher-frequencies, such as those triggered by the centrifugal
loading onset or initial blade pitch adjustment, are strongly damped.
2.3 The CFD code elsA
The development of elsA software was initiated by ONERA in 1997. This multiapplication
CFD software solves the Euler or Reynolds-Averaged Navier-Stokes equations for all the
aerospace congurations from the low subsonic regime to hypersonic, including xed wing,
rotary wing, turbomachinery, space launcher and missile congurations. It uses cell-
centered nite volume discretisation for multi-block meshes, including overset and patched
grid capabilities. It has a wide range of numerical techniques available for space and time
resolution, as well as for turbulence modeling.
For rotor applications, the resolution in space is achieved by using a 2
nd
order centered
discretisation in space with Jamesons articial viscosity. For the resolution in time, the
dual time-stepping method or the Gear implicit sub-iterative method are available to
converge towards a 2
nd
order accurate solution. These techniques allow the use of large
azimuthal steps: at least = 1.2deg for the present simulations.
31
The mesh deformation technique for the unsteady rotor aerodynamics is presented for
convenience later in Section 4.3.1.
Reference [47] is a recent paper by Renaud et al. where the state-of-the-art capabilities
of elsA for rotor simulation are exploited to analyze blade-vortex interaction phenomena.
[13] is another recent paper summarizing the status of elsA for all kind of applications.
2.4 The rotorcraft comprehensive analysis code HOST
2.4.1 Introduction
Why comprehensive codes for rotorcraft analysis
The design and analysis of rotary-wing aircraft demands numerical tools capable of mul-
tidisciplinary analysis. In fact, the modelling of the in-ight behaviour of a helicopter
involves at least three disciplines: (1) aerodynamics; (2) structural dynamics; and (3)
ight controls. Furthermore, three types of analyses are required: (1) stabilized periodic
response; (2) transient response in the time domain; and (3) stability in the frequency
domain.
Comprehensive codes owe their name to their capacity to encompass the three afore-
mentioned technical disciplines and the three types of analysis. Thus, these codes can
perform a wide variety of analyses including vehicle performance, aerodynamics and ro-
tor loads, vibration, control system dynamics, aeroelastic stability, and ight dynamics,
among others.
The rotorcraft comprehensive analysis code HOST
The rotorcraft comprehensive code HOST (Helicopter Overall Simulation Tool) is devel-
oped and used by the helicopter manufacturer Eurocopter. It serves to address a wide
variety of rotorcraft analyses and design problems, such as vibration, aerodynamics, hub
loads, aeroelastic stability or ight mechanics. It can model a large variety of rotorcraft
systems, from an isolated rotor to the complete aircraft, including helicopters, tiltrotors
and alike. In the industry environment these problems need to be addressed in a practical
fashion, with a design-oriented usability and minimal computational costs.
HOST can perform three types of analyses: simulation, equilibrium and stability. The
rst two work by solving a set of nonlinear equations of motion, whereas stability problems
solve linearized equations of motion around a state previously obtained with the nonlinear
equations of motion. This work will only address time-simulation analyses.
HOST describes a rotorcraft system by picking and assembling models from a model
pool. Each model is characterised by a specic set of degrees of freedom, the equations
handling these degrees of freedom and their control options. Among the most basic models
one can cite the blade model, the rotor hub model, the swashplate model, the lead-lag
damper model, the fuselage model or the aerodynamics model.
32
The models are hierarchically organized following a parent-child scheme. A parent
model can have several child nodes, e.g., the rotor hub parent model can have n blade child
models. Each model has as many input/output nodes as attachments to other models.
It is through these input/output nodes that forces and motions are communicated to the
immediate neighbouring model(s), as explained shortly.
Irrespectively of the problem category -i.e., simulation, equilibrium or stability-, HOST
applies the same basic algorithm. This algorithm is used to obtain the second time-
derivative of the state vector -i.e., state acceleration- from the values of the degrees of
freedom composing the state vector and their rst time-derivatives.
Once HOST has calculated the state vector acceleration, it then proceeds to the specic
treatment of the problem under study. In the case of a simulation, acceleration is used
to integrate the solution in time. This HOST basic algorithm is presented in the next
section.
A more exhaustive presentation of HOST can be found in [9].
2.4.2 The basic HOST algorithm
The basic HOST algorithm consists in sweeping up and down the model hierarchy, see
Figure 2.8. The rst sweep is called the kinematics sweep. Motions are passed from
parent to child models by stepping up the hierarchy. The second sweep is called the loads
sweep. Forces are passed from child to parent models by stepping down the hierarchy.
Forces include aerodynamic, inertial and elastic loading.
Figure 2.8: The basic HOST algorithm.
Once the state vector acceleration has been obtained, the simulation analysis integrates
the state vector from time t to time t + t. Several methods spanning from 1
st
to 4
th
order are available for this integration: Euler, Gill, Runge-Kutta, Adams-Bashforth. All
of them are explicit integration methods.
33
2.4.3 Aerodynamics
Rotor aerodynamics. The aerodynamics model for rotor blades in HOST is based on
blade element theory. The blade is discretized into a series of spanstations. For each
spanstation, its angle of attack and Mach number are deduced from the kinematics of the
blade. Table lookup is then used to obtain the aerodynamic coecients as a function of
angle of attack, Mach number and prole type. The tables containing the aerodynamic
coecients were obtained experimentally by testing 2D proles in a wind tunnel.
If the unsteady aerodynamics option is being used, HOST will also use the sectional
accelerations in feathering and heaving motion to add to the pitching moment a term
from Theodorsens unsteady theory.
Additionally, corrections are available in order to take into account, among others,
sweep angle, 3D rotational eects, Reynolds number eects or dynamic stall.
Induced velocity. The ow velocity with respect to the prole due to the structural
motion is only a component of the proles total velocity with respect to the air. In ad-
dition, it is necessary to calculate the ow velocity due to rotor inow, which is strongly
aected by the rotor wake, before making use of the table lookup methods. There are
several models in HOST for the induced velocity, including analytic, free-wake and pre-
scribed wake methods. Their details are out of the scope of this document and can be
found in [16]. But it is important to outline the fundamental variables that determine
the induced velocity because these variables will be exchanged when HOST airloads are
coupled to an external structure solver.
Induced velocity is related to the quantity of air convected through the rotor. For
a given rotor disk area and air density, the ow momentum induced by the rotor is
proportional to the induced velocity. Given that momentum dictates the generated thrust,
it follows that the induced velocity can be deduced from thrust. And since thrust is
correlated with the apping of the blades, apping can be used for the calculation of
induced velocity.
This work used the Meijer-Drees induced velocity model [24] because its simplicity
makes it the fastest -and default- method in HOST. The Meijer-Drees model assumes
that the induced velocities v
i
are a linear function of the spanwise position r/R and a
harmonic function (with only the 1
st
harmonic) of the azimuth ,
v
i
(, r) = v
i0
+
r
R
(v
i1C
cos + v
i1S
sin) (2.27)
where v
i0
, v
i1C
and v
i1S
are functions of the rotor thrust. More particularly, the cyclic
components v
i1C
and v
i1S
depend on the rst harmonics of the apping angle of the blade,
1C
and
1S
. Consequently, HOST needs the blade apping motion in order to correctly
calculate the induced velocity.
Should the prescribed-wake (METAR) or free-wake (MESIR) methods be used, in-
duced velocity would be then calculated by lifting line theory, equilibrating the blade
circulation with that of the wake by means of the Biot-Savart law. In those cases, the
34
apping angle should not be any longer necessary. Instead, blade position and velocity are
used. These methods have not been used in this work because they are time-consuming
and the extra-accuracy in the airloads was not required.
Summarizing, HOST needs the following variables to calculate the airloads on a rotor
blade: quarter-chord velocity and acceleration and blade apping angle.
2.4.4 Structural dynamics
This section summarizes the method implemented in HOST to calculate the dynamics of
the rotor blades. It will be seen that beam theory is used, but not with nite element
theory. Instead of the classical assemblies of mass and stiness matrices using shape
functions, HOST has a practical engineering-approach that is described next.
There are two methods in HOST for the modeling of the blade dynamics: the rigid
blade and the soft blade methods.
What both have in common is that the blade is represented as an assembly of rigid
segments connected by virtual joints and distributed along a straight axis. This straight
axis is assumed to be colinear with the blades axis, which is dened as the pitch axis.
Center of gravity and elastic axis osets are still enabled.
During the kinematics sweep, the motion of the j elements constituting a blade is
reconstructed from the rotor head and sweeping the blade segments until the blade tip.
V
j+1
= V
j
+
j
dr
j+1
(2.28)
j+1
=
j
+
j+1
(2.29)
j+1
=
j
+

j
dr
j+1
+
j
(
j
dr
j+1
) (2.30)
j+1
=

j
+
j+1
+

j

j+1
(2.31)
where V
j
and
j
are the j-th joints velocity and angular velocity, respectively, dr
j+1
is
the position of the joint j +1 with respect to the joint j. is the relative angular velocity
between two segments. The dot denotes time derivative.
The rigid blade method allows no relative motion between segments at the joints.
Therefore,
j
,
j
are only non-zero at the ap, lag and pitch mechanical articulations.
Hence, the blades hinge rigidly around the ap, lag and pitch articulations.
The soft blade or elastic model is based on beam theory. It models the bending (in
both ap and lag) and torsion deformation, but axial elongation and shear are neglected.
Modal decomposition is used to further reduce the number of unknowns. For every joint
a lag rotation is rst calculated and then followed by a ap rotation. The pitch rotation is
not calculated joint after joint but rather as a single total rotation around the pitch axis
outboard of the pitch bearing. The reconstruction of these rotations provides the defor-
mation and displacement of the elastic axis of the blade. Since the torsion deformation is
restricted to a rotation around the elastic axis (which is also the blades axis), it follows
that the elastic axis undergoes no displacement due to torsion.
35
Let (
k
j
,
k
j
,
k
j
) denote the rotations in lag, ap and torsion at the j-th joint of the
blade for the k-th mode. The torsion rotation and the incremental bending rotations at
the j-th joint are expressed as
j
=
k
q
k
k
j
(2.32)
d
j
=
k
q
k
_
k
j

k
j1
_
(2.33)
d
j
=
k
q
k
_
k
j

k
j1
_
(2.34)
where q
k
is the generalized coordinate of the k-th mode. The modal decomposition
notation is also used for the velocity vector
_
j
, d
j
, d

j
_
and the acceleration vector
_
j
, d
j
, d
j
_
.
The above angles are used in the soft blade approach to compose the angular velocity
j
=
_
j
, d

j
, d
j
_
T
and the angular acceleration
j
=
_
j
, d
j
, d
j
_
T
of the j-th joint
rotations, where
j
= 0 except in the pitch bearing (for there is no incremental torsion
between two elements), the motion of the articulations is calculated during the kinematics
sweep using (2.28)-(2.31).
During the loads sweep, the aerodynamic, inertial and elastic loads that follow the
deformation of the blade during the kinematics sweep are calculated. Then, for every
mode k, the generalized coordinates of the acceleration are calculated by enforcing the
Lagrange equation
d
dt
_
T
q
k
_
T
q
k
+
U
q
k
= W
k
G
, (2.35)
where T is the kinetic energy, U the potential or elastic energy and W
k
G
the work of the
external loads on the k-th mode. The kinetic energy and its time derivative are calculated
from the terms (2.28)-(2.31) and the elements masses and inertias. The strains (or rather,
curvatures) in bending and torsion to calculate the elastic energy are obtained by deriving
the rotation matrices between articulations.
2.4.5 Review of the start point: the HOST/CFD coupling
The CHANCE project. The CHANCE project took place between 1999 and 2005.
It was an international cooperation between ONERA, DLR, IAG
1
and Eurocopter. The
objectives of the CHANCE programme were to develop and validate CFD tools for sim-
ulating the oweld around the complete helicopter. An important part of the project
consisted in performing CFD analyses of isolated rotors taking into account the blades
elasticity. This was achieved by coupling HOSTs blade dynamics model with an external
CFD solver.
1
Institut f ur Aerodynamik und Gasdynamik, University of Stuttgart.
36
The CFD software was elsA in France and FLOWer in Germany. HOST prediction
accuracy in aeroelastic simulations was improved as a result of the coupling with the CFD.
Overviews of the results obtained during the CHANCE project are available in [17] and
[19].
The HOST/CFD coupling. The HOST/CFD coupling developed during the CHANCE
project is available in two forms: weak (or loose) and strong (or tight) coupling. In the
weak coupling, structure motions and CFD airloads are exchanged on a per revolution
basis, in the form of periodic solutions. In the strong coupling, structure motions and
CFD airloads are exchanged at every time step in the form of instantaneous solutions.
Both methods are summarized in the next two subsections.
2.4.5.1 HOST/CFD weak coupling.
This method assumes that the rotor response is periodic. Its algorithm is:
An estimation of the rotor periodic response is initiated by HOST,
The rotor periodic state over one revolution is sent to the CFD software, which
calculates the periodic aerodynamic eld,
This aerodynamic eld is then used in HOST to correct its internal aerodynamics
and loads to a new periodic response of the rotor,
Iterations continue until equilibrium is reached.
The success of this method lies on three key elements:
1. HOST can yield periodic responses, including trim (see below), expressed as a
Fourier series,
2. HOST continues to calculate airloads using its conventional aerodynamics and only
the dierence between the CFD airloads and the HOST airloads from the previous
iteration are used to correct the conventional HOST airloads. This can be written
as
F
n
=

F
n
HOST
+
_
F
n1
CFD

F
n1
HOST
_
(2.36)
As the solution converges, each of the terms in the preceding equation converges as
well, implying that the total airloads converge to the CFD airloads.
3. The periodic response includes the trim. Trim is the in-ight equilibrium of the
rotor. It consists in calculating the rotor controls generating the aerodynamic loads
that satisfy equilibrium. For example, the lift must counter the weight, the propul-
sive force must counter the drag and both pitch and roll moments must be zero to
keep a straight level ight.
37
The weak coupling has two advantages. The rst is that the rotor trim is achieved by the
periodic analysis in HOST. The second one is that convergence requires less iterations,
in terms of CFD rotor revolutions, than the strong coupling. On the minus side, simula-
tions are limited to steady ight conditions. No transient (e.g. maneuver) ight can be
simulated.
2.4.5.2 HOST/CFD strong coupling.
In the strong or time-accurate coupling, structure motions and CFD airloads are ex-
changed at every time step in the form of instantaneous solutions.
This method has a wider scope of application than the weak coupling, since time
dependent maneuver conditions can also be analyzed in addition to steady-ight condi-
tions. The exchange of structure motions and airloads must be done carefully in order to
maximize the solution accuracy.
In order to produce a time-accurate solution, the main idea in the strong coupling
algorithm is to shift the uid and structure integrations by half a time-step (theoretical
background with literature references is given in Section 4.2). This algorithm can give
second-order time-accuracy in the HOST-elsA coupling. The algorithm is summarized
below
Advance the structure in time from time t
n1/2
to t
n+1/2
,
Predict the structural deections at t
n+1
,
Update the uid grid to the predicted structural deection,
Advance the uid in time from time t
n
to t
n+1
. Output airloads at time t
n+1
,
Use the airloads at time t
n+1
to time-integrate the structure from t
n+1/2
to t
n+3/2
.
The above cycle is run until stabilization with xed rotor controls. As a result, the strong
coupling does not yield trimmed solutions. The trim is approached manually at the end of
each run by means of a sensitivity matrix giving the dependence ratio of the trim variables
with respect to the rotor controls. This sensitivity matrix is calculated beforehand with
autonomous-HOST computations. More details on rotor trim can be found in Section 4.4.
The HOST/CFD strong coupling procedure developed under the CHANCE programme
was a precursor of the present work and is often cited in the remainder of this document.
That is why the couplings main features are presented below. An in-depth description
can be found in [18].
Scope of application. The original HOST/CFD strong coupling can simulate isolated
rotor congurations. The rotor hub is assumed rigid and only the motion of the blades is
accounted for. Blade motion has three components: (1) pitch prescribed by the pushrod;
(2) rigid displacements in lead-lag and apping (made possible thanks to the articulations
38
between the blade and the hub); and (3) elastic deections in torsion (twist), in-plane
bending (lead-lag) and out-of-plane bending (apping). All of these blade motion com-
ponents are modelled by HOST. The uid grid in the CFD analysis is deformed following
the blade motion given by HOST.
At ONERA, the CFD code used for the CHANCE coupling was elsA. It was used to
solve both the Euler equations for inviscid ow and the Reynolds-Averaged Navier-Stokes
equations for viscous ow. However, changing the free-ow direction during simulation
run-time is not possible yet. Consequently, maneuver ight simulations are not possible
yet either. Therefore, the analyses performed during CHANCE were limited to steady
ight conditions.
New software modules for HOST and elsA were developed for the strong coupling.
Their details are omitted here, but the next paragraph introduces briey the software
architecture on how HOST and elsA communicated.
Software architecture. HOST and elsA run on two separate computers. Communi-
cation is established with a TCP/IP socket connection. The cycle of the communication
process is summarized next.
After each time-step HOST sends the structural motion via the socket connection to
elsA who is waiting for the data. As soon as elsA acknowledges the data reception, HOST
goes into wait mode, waiting for the next airloads, that are to be calculated by elsA.
In this communication procedure there is no actual master of the coupling. Instead,
the two codes switch alternatively from send to receive modes.
Exchanged data. The uid/structure interface is dened by a line, the blade quarter-
chord line.
During a simulation in the time-domain HOST uses a modal projection of its beam
model. The blade in HOST is discretised with a nite number of span-wise nodes.
The uid grid in elsA represents the true geometry of the blade. The surface grids are
however deformed following a line description of the blade motion. elsA integrates the
pressure distribution -and shear distribution when viscous analysis is used- over strips of
the blade surface to yield nodal airloads along the quarter-chord. These are specied as
three forces and three moments.
The nodes of the structure in HOST are prescribed so as to match the location of the
span-stations from which elsA deforms its mesh. This avoids interpolating the structure
data. The nodal airloads given by elsA are located at mid element. HOST also expects
them at mid element -and not on the nodes for which motion is calculated-. So no airloads
interpolation is done either.
The surface grids dening the blades are deformed from the motion given by HOST.
This motion contains all of the pitch control inputs, rigid and elastic displacements of the
blade.
HOST sends, for every blade of the rotor and for every spanstation of a blade, the
current coordinates of the quarter-chord plus a direction cosine matrix. The direction
39
cosine matrix expresses the rotation of a frame of reference xed to the cross-section of
the distorted blade to a non deformation-dependent frame of reference.
Data management. The HOST/elsA strong coupling was a pioneer in the use of stan-
dard data models for code coupling purposes in the rotorcraft community. A data model
denes how data is represented, stored and manipulated. The reason for using a pub-
lic standard is that it boosts the interoperability because procedures and results can be
easily exchanged with other users of the same data model. Public data models have also
been used -and developed- in this new work. This point is addressed in more detail in
Section 3.3.2.
2.4.5.3 Results and references.
The CHANCE programme gave rise to a large host of publications. A non-exhaustive list
of references related to CHANCE follows.
Two PhD theses, focused on code coupling, were completed in the frame of the
CHANCE project: Serveras in 2002 [49] and Altmikus in 2004 [5]. Servera et al.
presented in 2000 [50] an early weak coupling of HOST with the Euler code WAVES.
Altmikus et al. presented in 2000 [3] and then in 2002 [2] studies on the time-wise accu-
racy of strongly coupled procedures. The same author, still in 2002, presented in [4] an
often-cited work comparing the weak and strong coupling procedures, to nd they gave
the same results for the application studied.
Cantaloube and Beaumier documented in 2001 [14] the implementation of the ALE
technique for mesh deformation in elsA.
Beaumier produced in 2003 [6] and 2005 [8] two comprehensive technical reports on
HOST/CFD coupling.
Pomin and Wagner presented in 2002 [44] strong coupling results of the 7A rotor.
Pahlke and van der Wall reported rst in 2002 [36] and then in 2005 [37] weak coupling
simulations using the S4 rotor simulation code and the CFD code FLOWer.
Summary results of the weak and strong HOST/elsA couplings were presented by
Beaumier et al. in 2005 [7]. Still in 2005, Poinot et al. presented the application of CGNS
in rotorcraft coupling [42]. Finally, CHANCE results overviews were presented in two
conferences in 2005 by Costes et al. [17][19].
2.4.6 Concurrent comprehensive/CFD couplings
Coupling rotorcraft comprehensive analyses with external CFD methods to improve the
accuracy of the airloads and obtain better wake descriptions has been a thriving research
activity in the recent years, thanks to the emergence of reliable unsteady Euler/RANS
solvers. Several other research teams working on rotary-wing aeroelasticity have developed
comprehensive/CFD couplings that are similar to the HOST/CFD coupling that has been
just presented.
40
However, none of the previous or concurrent couplings had attempted yet to use 3D
nite element based structural dynamics in their aeroelastic simulations. According to
what is published, all aeroelastic simulations developed so far use beam theory for the
dynamics modeling. Hence, this work has introduced for the very rst time advanced 3D
FE methods in rotorcraft aeroelasticity.
Another rst of this work is its capability to adjust the rotor controls during a time-
accurate coupled simulation. Time-accurate couplings -data exchanges done at each time
step- are criticized by the literature for not being able to modify the rotor controls and
hence, for not being able to yield solutions that respect a set of target aerodynamic forces.
The publications cited below are given to draw an approximate picture of the global
activities in code coupling for the aeroelastic analysis of rotorcraft. But they do not
constitute the groundwork of the present study because their methods are already very
similar to those used for the HOST/CFD couplings.
The coming paragraphs present a selection of concurrent comprehensive/CFD cou-
plings on the basis of publication assiduity. In this respect, the most active teams outside
Europe are three: (1) the Aeroightdynamics Directorate at the US Army Research, De-
velopment & Engineering Command at NASA Ames Center; (2) The Georgia Institute of
Technology; and (3) the University of Maryland. Their publications share two common-
alities: aeroelastic analysis is applied to isolated rotor congurations; and the blades are
modeled with beam theory.
Potsdam et al., from NASA Ames, presented in a paper [45] and subsequently in an
article [46] a loose coupling between the rotorcraft comprehensive analysis CAMRAD II
and the CFD solver OVERFLOW-D. In that work the coupling was of loose (or weak)
type, this is, the codes are coupled on a per revolution, periodic basis. The RANS CFD
grid contained 26.1 million points. By comparison, the present work used RANS grids
of 2.1 million points. Results are calculated for the UH-60A rotor (for which it exists
an extensive ight-test database) for three ight conditions: high-speed, low-speed and
high-thrust. The agreement of the results with experimental data is very good for the
rst two ight conditions (though the mean is systematically removed from the pitching
moment comparisons); for the high-thrust conguration agreement is still respectable.
Lim et al., from NASA Ames, used comprehensive/CFD loose coupling in [33] to
study blade-vortex interaction (BVI) airloads that dominate descending forward ight.
The coupled codes were CAMRAD II and OVERFLOW-2. Since BVI requires a ne
conservation of the vortices shed by the blade tips, rened RANS grids of up to 107
million points were used.
Nygaard et al., again from NASA Ames, presented a detailed paper [35] documenting
the implementation of both weak and strong coupling between the comprehensive code
RCAS and the CFD solver OVERFLOW-2. Nygaards work is noteworthy in that it
studied the convergence properties of the loose coupling.
Datta et al., from the University of Maryland, presented in [23] and [20] an implemen-
tation of weak coupling between the comprehensive code UMARC and the CFD method
41
TURNS. A remarkable feature of Dattas work is that the CFD grid contained only one
blade and the far wake inow was obtained from a free wake model.
More recently, in 2007, Bhagwat et al., from NASA Ames, applied the RCAS /
OVERFLOW-2 coupling in both its tight and weak form to the analysis of a pull-up
maneuver [11]. The idea behind the use of weak coupling for maneuver analysis is to con-
sider the maneuver as a series of quasi-steady solutions. Thus, weak coupling was used
to simulate 3 out of the 40 rotor revolutions that made up the maneuver using average
rotor controls (known from ight testing). The CFD grid contained 4.4 million points.
The airloads and structural loads using the weak coupling were almost as good as those
with a time-accurate strong coupling. Bhagwat pursued the work and presented in 2008,
with Ormiston [10], an even more detailed analysis of the UH-60 pull up maneuver after
having corrected a mistake in the o-grid speeds found in the rst release of the study.
Publications by researchers at the Georgia Institute of Technology include those of
Abras and Smith [1] and Smith [52]. The rst one discusses methodological aspects of the
comprehensive/CFD couplings when using unstructured grids in CFD solvers, something
relatively uncommon: none of the publications cited in this section used unstructured
grids. The second publication discusses conservation issues in the transfer of structure
motion and airloads between non-matching meshes. It is probably the rst publication
to address properly the issue of energy conservation at the uid/structure for rotorcraft
applications.
Finally, a more detailed review of code coupling for rotorcraft aeroelasticity by Datta
and Johnson can be found in [21]. That publication includes, in addition, a comparison
of the state-of-the-art partitioned analyses for xed wing aircraft, turbomachines and
rotorcraft aeroelasticity.
42
Chapter 3
Development of a Framework for
Code Coupling
The framework for code coupling is the software infrastructure that allows the two or
more individual applications of a partitioned procedure to exchange information.
The purpose of this chapter is to present the framework for code coupling that was
developed as a necessary rst step of the present work. The introduction describes briey
the problems and modus operandi. The second section introduces the specications that
had to be observed by the new coupling. Then a third section justies the solutions
adopted to meet the specications and how these solutions were implemented. Finally,
the here developed software interfaces of MSC.Marc and HOST are documented.
3.1 Introduction
What is the problem. Getting two or more codes, originally conceived as separate
applications, to exchange data at every time-step of their respective simulations is a
challenging task; not only with respect to the physics of the global solution, but also from
a software point of view.
When this work started there was no software infrastructure upon which HOST, the
CSM and the CFD could share their solutions. Hence, it was necessary to set up a software
infrastructure, independent of the physics of the problem, into which the dierent codes
would be plugged.
Modus operandi. The idea of connecting two or more codes to simulate a complex
system is not new. However, most of these kind of works have been traditionally developed
by their would-be users using their own tools and starting from scratch. Nowadays, the
surging popularity of partitioned approaches due to increasingly cheaper computational
power is bringing standard practices for code coupling within the scientic community.
The objective of these emerging best practices for code coupling is to ensure that soft-
ware developments are lasting, general and portable. It is also very important to minimize
43
3. DEVELOPMENT OF A FRAMEWORK FOR CODE COUPLING
the complexity of the coupling environment in order to ease software maintenance and
updating. These practices will be reviewed in more detail shortly.
The development of the new coupling framework adopted these emerging practices,
all while observing other requirements agreed by the SHANEL partners. The coming
sections detail the development constraints and the adopted solutions to build a solid and
reliable coupling framework.
3.2 Coupling specication
The coupling framework must fulll three major requirements. The rst one is that
HOSTs autonomous analysis capacity shall be preserved. The couplings are only ac-
tivated when extra-accuracy is needed. The second requirement concerns modularity;
HOST may be coupled with the CFD, the CSM or both. External models may represent
a subcomponent of the HOST model (e.g., HOST performs a complete helicopter simula-
tion yet only the main rotor is CSM/CFD modeled). The third requirement is to produce
a general coupling that is not dependent on the CFD and CSM codes used for this work.
The coupling framework shall be compatible with other similar codes and interoperability
is highly desirable.
3.3 Adopted solutions
In order to match the coupling specication requirements presented in the previous sec-
tion, the development of the coupling framework was based on three axes of action: (1)
choice and implementation of a programming model; (2) choice and implementation of a
data model; and (3) choice of a programming language for the framework. Each of these
axes of action is explained in a dedicated subsection below.
It will be shown that the chosen options took advantage of existing tools because
this minimized the amount of new developments. In addition, the choices led to a lean
software architecture that maximizes modularity and facilitates code maintenance and
updates. Finally, the choices were also done trying to adopt solutions that boosted the
interoperability with other partners.
3.3.1 Programming model
The programming model of the coupling framework is based on component architecture.
Component architecture designates an architecture in which applications are neatly sep-
arated according to their function. The key idea is that each application participating
in the coupling shall be regarded as a component independent of the other applications.
Components are designed with standard, clearly dened interfaces which tend to protect
them from changes in the software environment outside their boundaries. In a simulation
involving several components, the modication of one of them or even its replacement
44
3.3 Adopted solutions
by a similar one should not aect the other components. In the present developments,
in which up to three applications run coupled -HOST, CFD and CSM-, each of these
applications is considered as a component.
3.3.2 Data model
A data model is an abstract model that describes how data is represented and accessed.
The use of a public, common and standardized data model boosts interoperability with
other users of that data model. This becomes especially advantageous as the amount of
data increases.
An example of data model is the CFD General Notation System (CGNS). The CGNS
standard provides a public data model for CFD related data: meshes, solutions,etc. The
CGNS standard is backed by many of the leading industry and research aeronautics
institutions worldwide. It consists of a collection of conventions, and free and open soft-
ware implementing those conventions. It is self-descriptive, machine-independent, well-
documented, and administered by an international steering committee. It is also an
American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA) Recommended Practice.
This work took advantage of the previous experience in the CHANCE project in using
the CGNS standard for rotorcraft applications [43][42].
Since the CGNS standard was not conceived to describe structure data, a temporary
CGNS-like data model was created for the structure data given by HOST.
Nonetheless, the restriction of CGNS to CFD-related data only is likely to be over soon.
An action of the SHANEL project (in which this thesis participated) was to submit an
extension proposal of the CGNS norm to describe structure data to the CGNS Steering
Committee
1
[41]. The acceptance of the proposal was under good way at the time of
writing this document.
This work used the CGNS notation for uid data and the CGNS-like notation for
the structure data rst used in the CHANCE project. The layout of the CGNS uid
data structures used in this work is shown in Table 3.1. It can be seen that the data is
structured in a tree-like fashion, with parent and children nodes. For instance, a blade
of the rotor constitutes a region. The uid data attached to a type of region follows a
pattern. The layout of the CGNS-like structure data is shown in Table 3.2.
In conclusion, the advantages of using CGNS are numerous: it provides a common,
consistent and precise specication of the uid data, together with the libraries and tools
needed for manipulation. Furthermore, the CGNS standard is portable because it is
platform independent. By having a standard interface, the replacement of the CFD by
similar, CGNS-compliant ones is greatly facilitated.
1
ONERA belongs to the Steering Committee of the CGNS organisation, www.cgns.org.
45
CGNSLibraryVersion
StrongCoupling-v01 Blade-1 ZoneType bladeNumber
FlowSolutionGlobal GridLocation
IterationNumber
RadialPosition
ChordLength
BladeAzimuth
BladeSectionForceXSquareMach
BladeSectionForceYSquareMach
BladeSectionForceZSquareMach
BladeSectionTorqueXSquareMach
BladeSectionTorqueYSquareMach
BladeSectionTorqueZSquareMach
Blade-2
Blade-3
Blade-4
Table 3.1: CGNS uid data tree
CGNSLibraryVersion
StrongCoupling-v01 Blade-1 Host bladeNumber
sumTime
bladePsi
pointMotion
pointSpeedMotion
angularMotion
angularSpeedMotion
frameTransformMatrix
Blade-2
Blade-3
Blade-4
Table 3.2: Structure data tree sent by HOST or MSC.Marc
46
3.4 Architecture of the framework
3.3.3 Programming language for the framework
The scripting language Python was chosen as programming language for the framework
for two reasons. The rst is that Python is a powerful tool for data handling. It includes
a network server-client communication system, based in the XML-RPC protocol, which
provides an easy and high-level (i.e., user-friendly) means to perform remote procedure
calls on distant machines. This feature was adapted in this work to distribute the coupling
components over a network of computers, as shown later.
In addition, Python is an open-source software, well established and documented and
with a strong support of worldwide developers. Python is a popular choice among prac-
titioners of partitioned procedures; and since it is open-source software, many scientists
post the Python applications that they develop on the Internet.
3.4 Architecture of the framework
The architecture of the coupling framework, schematically described by Figure 3.1, illus-
trates the application of the concepts of component architecture approach, data model
and distributed computing.
Figure 3.1: Coupling architecture
The architecture of the proposed approach consists of a scaleable, highly-modular set
of software tools distributed over various processors. HOST is the keystone of this soft-
ware assembly. It keeps its current analysis autonomy, based on simple, computationally
inexpensive aerodynamics and structural models. But when a high-delity representation
of a particular system is needed (e.g., the main rotor in a complete helicopter simulation)
couplings with the CFD and/or CSM models of that system are activated. In all cases
HOST provides the aircraft ight control. The coupling is open to any CSM or CFD
solver that can handle the CGNS standard.
Each component has a Python interface that links it to the coupling framework. This
Python interface also acts as a CGNS translator. The components do not communicate
47
directly with each other but rather, they are all clients of a single server. This server
is a passive application and acts as a data hub. It simply stores and delivers CGNS-
formatted data upon request from a client. Typically, the server stores only the n last
iterations in order to bound memory consumption. The server is always activated and
available. The user can access the server during the simulation, for debugging purposes
for example.
3.4.1 Network distributed computing
The various codes used in this work (HOST, CFD, CSM) are installed and run on distant
hardware platforms with heterogeneous architectures; there are Sun 32-bit, HP-UX 64-bit
and other. Distributed computing is an advantage because the simultaneous use of several
processors reduces the overall computation time.
The type of couplings herein developed exchange information at each time-step. Up
to thousands of data exchanges are performed in the course of a simulation. Exchanging
this information via les would be more time consuming than via network and that is
why the network option was preferred. Yet a network-based exchange system had to be
found.
The Python built-in xmlrpc library provides the network communication. It is based
on remote procedure call technology. This procedure consists in that the functions dened
in the data server are executed locally in the server upon remote request from the clients.
The functioning of the server is simple: it receives requests to either store data or deliver
data. When one of the coupled codes produces a solution, it requests the server, via
the code interface, to store this solution. The same code will then request to the server
information calculated by another code. If that information has not been made available
to the server yet, the request is repeated after a short lapse of time.
3.4.2 Properties of the new coupling framework
As a result of the adopted solutions, the coupling framework developed in this work
exhibits the following properties:
Modularity and Generality Applications are independent. For instance, the uid
solver is unaware whether structure motion is given by HOST or the CSM.
Distributed computing The applications run on dierent computers and consequently,
can run in parallel.
Network communication The applications participating in the coupling communicate
via network up to hundreds of times during a simulation.
Freedom of staggered algorithm The coupling framework sets no constraints on the
order in which data exchanges between the codes are performed. Changing the type
of staggered algorithm is straightforward.
48
3.5 An interface for MSC.Marc
This section presents the interface that has been developed for the nonlinear nite element
solver MSC.Marc. This interface serves to couple MSC.Marc with external codes by ac-
complishing two roles. The rst role is to input and output data into and from MSC.Marc
during a simulation. The input data can be boundary conditions of multiple types: air-
loads, prescribed displacements or velocities, and more. Output data include nodal dis-
placements, nodal velocities or reaction forces. The types of accepted input/output data
are dened by MSC.Marc and one must conform to them, since MSC.Marc is a com-
mercial o-the-shelf software and thereby modifying the source code is not possible. The
second role of the interface is to convert the format of the data between the MSC.Marc
format and a common or standardized format used by all the codes participating in the
coupling.
3.5.1 Coupling regions and the user subroutines
Coupling Regions in MSC.Marc. Coupling regions are that part of the nite ele-
ment model where the interaction with the external solver takes places. The coupling
region can consist of elements, surfaces or volumes. On coupling regions, the basic me-
chanical quantities (e.g.: coordinates, reaction forces, external forces, displacements) can
be exchanged with an external solver via calls to the user subroutines. Figure 3.2 shows a
3D model of a blade in which the leading and trailing edge have been dened as coupling
regions and can be seen highlighted.
Figure 3.2: The highlighted leading and trailing edges are the coupling regions.
49
User subroutines in MSC.Marc. MSC.Marc has a set of user subroutines that pro-
vide an application programming interface (API) to couple MSC.Marc with external nu-
merical solvers. These user subroutines are written in Fortran. The user subroutines avail-
able in the MSC.Marc code coupling interface allow to get and set information from/to
the coupling regions that have been dened on the FE model. The user subroutines are
classied into three groups:
CPLREG INIT; Initialize coupling regions for a coupled analysis with an external
solver. This subroutine is called once at the start of the simulation. It is used for
checking general coupling parameters as well as for extracting the structure interface
mesh data.
CPLREG EXCHANGE; Exchange data on coupling regions. This subroutine is
called at the start and at the end of each coupling step. Typically, the call at the
start will set the values of the prescribed quantities for this step and the call at the
end will extract the new values of quantities -deformation, velocity, etc- computed
during the time-step.
CPLREG FINALIZE; Finalize coupled analysis with an external solver. This sub-
routine is called once, at the end of the analysis.
MSC.Marcs user subroutines in Fortran constitute the low-level layer of the interface.
In this case low-level designates the fact that the Fortran code is independent of the nite
element model and that the user rarely needs to enter and modify the Fortran sources.
The high-level layer of the interface, in which the user sets the particular parameters
needed for every simulation, is based on Python and detailed in the next section.
3.5.2 The python interface
The second role of the interface, the format converter role, is based on a Python script.
This is the high-level part of the interface, the one with which the user interacts by
specifying the necessary options for the coupling.
The Python interface collects the structure solutions from MSC.Marc -e.g., structure
deformations- and converts these solutions into a standard format. For example, if the
nite element model output is expressed in mm and in the rotating rotor frame, the user
may order the conversion of the output into S.I. units and perform a frame change in
order to prepare the data for the standardized coupling format. Another task typically
done in the Python interface is the prediction of the structure state at time t
n+1
from the
latest CSM solutions up to time t
n
. The Python script is also responsible for receiving
the uid data in CGNS format and interpreting it (regions, frames, units) before sending
the actual airloads to the FE solver through the Fortran user subroutines.
The advantages of using Python in the interface are numerous. Python is a powerful
tool for data handling, partly thanks to the fact that integers, oats and characters can
be easily mixed in lists and sorted. Furthermore, Python includes libraries for network
50
communication that are extremely simple and useful in the frame of code coupling, where
the codes often run in distant platforms.
Communication between Fortran and Python is provided by the Message Passing
Interface (MPI) protocol. This communication consists in the exchange, via memory, of
tables of integers, oats and characters between the two programming languages. It is
here acknowledged that this is a particular use of the MPI protocol that deviates from
the standard MPI practices. MPI is meant to be a protocol to allow parallel computing
of a single application over several processors and thus reduce computation time. In the
MSC.Marc interface, both Fortran and Python run in the same processor, and MPI is
purely used as a means to exchange data between two dierent programming languages.
There exist other approaches to link Fortran and Python, usually referred as Fortran
wrapping for Python. The wrapping approach makes of the Fortran code a library that
can be called from Python. However, in the present interface, the Fortran subroutines
are not called exclusively by the Python script, but also by the MSC.Marc kernel. In this
case the wrapping task requires superior computer technology skills, whereas the choice
of MPI allowed a quick setup of the data share scheme between Fortran and Python.
The dierent layers constituting the MSC.Marc interface are shown in Figure 3.3.
The upper part of this gure shows the MSC.Marc application and its user subroutines
in Fortran. Then the MPI application makes it possible to pass data between Fortran
and Python. Finally the high-level layer, the Python interface, performs the operations
detailed in the previous paragraphs and provides as well the network connection for data
exchange with other solvers.
Figure 3.3: MSC.Marc interface for code coupling
Having introduced MSC.Marcs user subroutines, their accompanying coupling regions,
the MPI protocol and the Python script, it will be next shown the algorithms that control
51
the data exchanges during a simulation.
Table 3.3 summarizes the data exchanges between the user subroutines in Fortran and
the Python script using the MPI protocol. These data exchanges were done using MPI
blocking calls. This means that the program execution will be suspended until the message
buer is safe to use. The MPI standards specify that a blocking SEND or RECV does not
return until the send buer is safe to reuse (for MPI SEND), or the receive buer is ready
to use (for MPI RECV). Thereby, communication calls between the two executables must
take place in pairs of send/receive functions. This constraint is addressed by means of
matching functions. For every function in executable A there is a matching function
in executable B. The general interface layout presented in Table 3.3 is divided into three
sections, corresponding to the three user subroutines available in the MSC.Marc code
coupling interface.
MSC.Marc API Python script
CPLREG INIT MPI Init
For every coupling region:
send cplreg info recv cplreg info
send cplreg mesh recv cplreg mesh
CPLREG EXCHANGE For every coupling region:
recv cplreg input send cplreg input
(MSC.Marc integrates in time)
send cplreg output recv cplreg output
CPLREG FINALIZE MPI Finalize
Table 3.3: Interface functions
A typical sequence of commands from the Python script is shown in Algorithm 1:
Algorithm 1 (Typical layout of the Python interface)
Coupling Initialization
initialize coupling parameters: number of iterations, names of the coupling
regions, switch on/o options, etc
get the initial nite element mesh in order to calculate interpolation coecients
with the CFD mesh
Coupling exchange
Do for each iteration
Set Input
- get, via network connection, airloads in CGNS format
- get, via network connection, rotor control data
- convert CGNS-formatted data into MSC.Marc format (units, frames)
52
3.6 An interface for HOST
- prescribe airloads onto the blades
- prescribe pitch angles onto the blades via the pushrods
Get Output
- get blade deformation
- get pushrod loads
- get rotor hub loads
- if necessary, change units and frame
- if requested, predict structure state at t + t
- convert output data into the standardized coupling format
- broadcast, via network connection, the structure output
Coupling End
The development of the interface for the CSM solver was done with a progressive
approach; the early developments used a simplied nite element model of the 7A rotor,
made of beam elements only. Later, a 3D nite element model of a blade with simple
geometry (ADM blade) was used to push farther the interface capabilities.
3.6 An interface for HOST
The HOST code, as opposed to MSC.Marc, does not include any application for coupling
with external codes. In the CHANCE project (2000-2005), during which HOST was
coupled to a CFD software, communication was achieved thanks to a socket connection
between HOSTs subroutines in Fortran and the CFD software. This socket connection
provided a bidirectional process-to-process communication and was customized to that
rst coupling, which implies that it lacked the modularity and generality required for this
work. Thus, a new interface for HOST had to be developed.
The role of the new HOST interface developed in this work is to provide an access for
data input-output. Following the coupling specications given in Sec. 3.2, the interface
can handle standard data models that maximize the interoperability.
The layout of the HOST interface is identical to that of the MSC.Marc interface
described in Sec. 3.5; there is a part of the interface, closer to the HOST kernel, made
of Fortran subroutines (HOST itself is in Fortran). The other part of the interface is
a Python script. Like in the MSC.Marc interface, data exchange between Fortran and
Python is provided by the MPI protocol. The Python script is in charge of reading the
incoming external data and feeding it to HOST, via MPI, into HOSTs format. Conversely,
the Python script receives HOST output data, converts it into the standard format and
uploads it to the server, via network, for the other codes to download.
During a HOST simulation, data is exchanged once per time-step or increment. The
call to the interface, schematically described by Figure 3.4, is placed between the kinemat-
ics sweep and the loads sweep (refer to Sec. 2.4 for HOST details). In Figure 3.4, pscin
53
stands for parcours simulation cinematique and is the name of the subroutine doing the
kinematics sweep. pse stands for parcours simulation eorts and is the name of the
subroutine doing the loads sweep.
The coupling does not change the normal HOST workow. HOST continues to use
the same functions and algorithms that it uses on autonomous simulations. But when
the coupling is activated, HOST fetches the external data instead of using its own. For
example, in the loads sweep, the external hub loads given by the CSM are taken instead
of calling the HOST subroutine that calculates them.
t
n
t
n+1
pscin data exchange pse pscin data exchange pse
Figure 3.4: HOST interface
A typical sequence of commands from the Python script is shown in Algorithm 2:
Algorithm 2 (Typical layout of the Python interface of HOST)
Coupling Start
Do for each iteration
Get HOST Output
- get rotor controls
- if requested, get HOST airloads and rotate them into the right frame
- convert output data into the standardized coupling format
- broadcast, via network connection, HOSTs output
Set HOST Input
- if requested, get, via network connection, structure motion in CGNS format
and calculate absolute velocities
- get, via network connection, rotor state data
- prescribe structure motion
- prescribe rotor state
Coupling End
The HOST interface presented in this section has some limitations. HOST is a large
and complex program and producing a general interface able to handle any random he-
licopter conguration was out of the scope of this work. It is planned in the SHANEL
project to develop a more general and consistent coupling interface for HOST.
54
Chapter 4
Fluid-Structure Interaction in a
Time-Accurate Coupling
In a time-accurate simulation of a partitioned uid-structure interaction problem the uid
and structure subsystems are time-integrated by dierent schemes and their solutions are
exchanged at each time-step. In other words, time-accuracy refers to the capability to
solve transient problems whose solution is continuously varying as a function of time.
Time-accurate partitioned problems are solved using a staggered algorithm. A stag-
gered algorithm regulates the timing of the data exchanges between the subsystems in
the partitioned procedure.
This chapter is organized in three sections following an introduction. The introduction
has a triple role: (1) to motivate the use of time-accurate procedures in this work; (2) to
present the context in which the transfer of motions and loads between the structure and
uid meshes were developed; and (3) to underline an important dierence of rotorcraft
aeroelasticity with respect to xed-wing and turbomachinery aeroelasticity. The rst sec-
tion after the introduction summarizes the state-of-the-art theory in staggered algorithms
for computational aeroelasticity. It then describes the application of the theory to the
present coupling. The second section is dedicated to the transfers of structure motion
and airloads between the non-matching meshes of the uid and structure subsystems.
The third and last section presents a discipline that is unique to rotorcraft aeroelasticity
problems: rotor control and trim.
4.1 Introduction
Why time-accurate coupling. Previous works in rotor simulation faced two choices
for the coupling of a CFD solver and a rotorcraft comprehensive analysis: to use either a
weak coupling approach or a strong (time-accurate) one.
It has been seen in Section 2.4.5.1 that the weak coupling assumes that the solu-
tion is periodic over a rotor revolution and hence the structure motions and airloads are
55
4. FLUID-STRUCTURE INTERACTION IN A TIME-ACCURATE
COUPLING
exchanged on a per revolution, periodic basis.
Yet in this work there was no possibility to use the weak coupling due to the use of
a nite element solver. A nite element solver, compared to a rotorcraft comprehensive
analysis, lacks a fundamental feature for weak coupling: the capacity to perform analyses
that yield a periodic solution of the rotor dynamics over one rotor revolution. This type of
analyses are called equilibrium analyses within the rotorcraft community. They assume
that the solution is periodic and therefore the unknowns of the problem become the
coecients of the Fourier series of the state variables. These Fourier series describe the
aeroelastic response of the rotor over a revolution.
The only means to obtain a periodic solution with a nite element structural solver is
to integrate the solution in time until it becomes periodic. And for this operation the FE
solver has to be coupled anyway with an aerodynamics solver to get motion-dependent
airloads and the ensuing aerodynamic damping. Furthermore, reaching periodicity by
time-integration is lengthy, mostly due to the slow damping of the low frequency lag
motion.
In conclusion, weak coupling and its underlying concept of periodic responses makes
no sense when solving the structural dynamics by a nite element method.
The unavailability of weak coupling should not be regarded as constraining though.
On the contrary, weak coupling is less general than strong coupling because it cannot be
used for transient simulations, given that it assumes periodic solutions. And, in addition,
this work has developed a method that eliminates the -up to now- main and long criticized
drawback of strong coupling: the impossibility to yield solutions that respect rotor trim.
Rotor trim. Rotor trim, or in other words, the need to predict the rotor controls in
addition to the uid/structure interaction problem, makes one of the largest dierences
of rotary-wing aeroelasticity when compared to xed-wing and turbomachinery aeroelas-
ticity. This issue is addressed in the last section of this chapter.
Transfers of structure motion and airloads between non-matching meshes.
The coordinates of the nodes of the nite element model do not match those of the uid
solver. As a result, interpolations must be done each time data transfers are done between
the two discretisations.
One advantage of having a highly modular software architecture is the ability to ex-
ploit external modules that are dedicated to interpolation operations. However, such
interpolation modules were not available yet. In the meantime, this work developed sim-
ple methods to interpolate across the uid/structure interface. Transfer operations are
addressed in Section 4.3.
56
4.2 Staggered algorithms
The concept staggered algorithm refers to the scheme used to synchronize the data
between the uid and structure subsystems during a coupled simulation.
The research work of C. Farhat, a professor at Stanford University, in the eld of
staggered -and iteration-free- schemes for aeroelastic computations is commonly cited as
a well-founded theoretical basis. The present work, within the limits of its particular
constraints, has tried to apply the published theory. The terminology used in this section
has been borrowed from Farhats publications.
4.2.1 The conventional serial collocated scheme
The most basic staggered scheme is the conventional serial collocated. The term collo-
cated refers to the fact that both the uid and structure subsystems stop at the same
time-stations when advancing their solutions in time. The generic cycle of this scheme, de-
scribed below, is shown in Figure 4.1, where Q denotes the structure state vector, W the
uid state vector, the superscript n designates the n-th time-station and the superscript
P denotes prediction. The steps of the cycle are described as follows:
Step 1. Transfer the ow state W
n
into a structural load.
Step 2. Time-integrate the structure subsystem to advance it from t
n
to t
n+1
.
Step 3. Transfer the motion of the structure Q
n+1
to the uid.
Step 4. Update the position of the uid grid. Then, time-integrate the uid subsystem
from t
n
to t
n+1
.
The step numbers appear in green in Figure 4.1 and in the remainder of the gures of
this section.
Figure 4.1: Calculation order of the conventional serial collocated scheme.
57
COUPLING
However, as mathematically demonstrated in [40], the serial collocated scheme is only
rst-order time-accurate, irrespectively of the accuracy of the individual ow and struc-
tural solvers. For the same computational cost, modied versions of the conventional
serial collocated scheme can give better accuracy.
4.2.2 The parallel collocated scheme
It is sometimes desirable to reduce the total aeroelastic simulation time by using a parallel
scheme in which the uid and structure integrations are performed simultaneously. This
is especially valuable in the uncommon cases -at least in rotorcraft aeroelasticity- where
the computation time of the structural solution is of a similar order of magnitude than
that of the uid. The parallel collocated scheme is depicted in Figure 4.2. Its generic
cycle is summarized next:
Step 1. Predict the structural displacement at time t
n+1
. Transfer the ow state W
n
into a structural load.
Step 2. Update the position of the uid grid to match the predicted structural displace-
ment. Then, time-integrate in parallel the uid and structure subsystems from t
n
to t
n+1
.
Figure 4.2: Calculation order of the conventional parallel scheme.
The parallel collocated scheme is not optimal either in conserving the energy at the
uid/structure interface. Piperno and Farhat demonstrated both mathematically and
with an example in [39] that the parallel scheme is only rst-order energy-accurate, mean-
ing that the sum of the works performed by the temporal discretisation of the uid and
structure subsystems at their interface is of the order t. The conservation of energy at
the uid/structure interface is critical to the accuracy of the aeroelastic solution.
58
4.2.3 The serial non-collocated scheme
Lesoinne and Farhat proposed in [32] an iteration-free staggered scheme for the solution of
transient aeroelastic problems that is second-order time-accurate. The basic idea behind
this scheme is to oset the uid and structure integrations by half-a-time-step, rendering
the scheme non-collocated. This osetting requires the use of a structural predictor.
The serial non-collocated scheme is shown in Figure 4.3. Its cycle can be described as:
Step 1. Transfer the ow state W
n+1/2
into a structural loading F
n+1/2
S
.
Step 2. Time-integrate the structure subsystem from t
n
to t
n+1
.
Step 3. Predict the structural displacement at time t
n+3/2
.
Step 4. Update the position of the uid grid to match the predicted structural displace-
ment. Then, time-integrate the uid subsystem from t
n+1/2
to t
n+3/2
.
Figure 4.3: Calculation order of the serial non-collocated scheme.
In [26], Farhat et al. demonstrated mathematically and by simulation of a complete F-
16 conguration that the serial non-collocated scheme can be second-order time-accurate.
It achieves this accuracy by a superior conservation of the energy at the uid/structure
interface (and provided that a few other conditions later detailed are met).
However, second-order time-accuracy does not necessarily require noncollocating the
subsystems integrations. The publication above proposes another second-order time-
accurate scheme that is collocated. In that case second-order time-accuracy is achieved
by: (1) predict the structural displacement at time t
n+1
; (2) update the position of the
uid grid to match the predicted structural displacement and then time-integrate the uid
from t
n
to t
n+1
; and (3) use the ow state W
n+1
to build the structural loading F
n+1
S
for
integrating the structure subsystem from t
n
to t
n+1
.
The results and mathematical proofs referenced to in the citations of this section are
based on certain assumptions:
Linear model of the structure, with equations of motion M u(t) +C u(t) +Ku(t) =
F(t).
59
COUPLING
Nonlinear model of the uid system (i.e., the Euler or Navier-Stokes equations). Yet
the airloads must be a smooth function of the position of the structure.
And the staggered schemes that qualify for achieving second-order time-accuracy do so if
and only if:
The structure time-integrator is second-order time-accurate (which the Newmark
method is),
The uid time-integrator is second-order time-accurate,
The structural prediction is at least second-order time-accurate,
The ow-induced structural loading F
n
is evaluated from the ow eld W
n
, this
is, the aerodynamic load vector is constructed from the latest time instance of the
ow eld.
Assuming linear structural dynamics is acceptable for most xed-wing problems. But
rotorcraft dynamics often involve nonlinear phenomena. And the typical unsteady aero-
dynamics of a rotor include phenomena such as stall, resulting in airloads that are not
a smooth function of the structure position. However, around a given stabilized ight
condition, rotorcraft dynamics can be assumed linear and the nonlinear airloads may be
assumed to elapse over a too little span of time as to have an important eect.
4.2.4 Staggered algorithms in rotorcraft aeroelasticity
Staggered schemes for rotorcraft aeroelasticity problems have rarely been a research topic
of its own, for there were other more pressing matters, such as uid grid deformation or
data transfers, the latter including interpolation aspects between non-matching meshes.
Hierholz and Wagner [29] and then Altmikus et al. [2][3] were the rst, to the authors
best knowledge, to start addressing the issue of time-accuracy in coupled simulations
of helicopter rotors. Their work drew from the theory published by Farhat, Piperno et
al. that has been presented in Section 4.2. The subsequent HOST/elsA strong coupling
developed during the CHANCE programme took also advantage of that theory.
Nygaard et al., from NASA Ames, report in [35] satisfyingly accurate airloads pre-
dictions of the UH-60 rotor in a high speed forward ight using a rst-order time-
accurate coupling scheme (and despite having implemented as well the more-accurate
non-collocated version of Section 4.2.3). However, the time-step in that work is small,
equivalent to an azimuthal step of = 0.25deg. By comparison, the minimal azimuthal
step used in the present work is = 1.2deg.
60
4.2.4.1 Available staggered schemes in the MSC.Marc/HOST/elsA coupling
All of the three staggered schemes presented in Section 4.2 are available in the new
coupling. The rst one, the conventional serial staggered scheme (see Figure 4.1), has
a straightforward implementation because no structural predictor is required. It oers
though the lowest accuracy and at no lower computational cost. It was therefore decided
to implement a structural predictor based on the three-step, third-order explicit Adams-
Bashforth formula
y
n+1
= y
n
+ t
_
23
12
y
n
4
3
y
n1
+
5
12
y
n2
_
(4.1)
Thus, at the end of each time-step, the nodal displacements and velocities just given
by the CSM plus those of the two previous increments are used to make a structural
prediction. The computational cost of this prediction is negligible, but it allows to use
the more accurate staggered schemes as described next.
The parallel collocated scheme, graphically depicted in Figure 4.4, is summarized
as follows. Both the uid and structure solvers start at time t
0
= 0. Yet no structural
prediction for the uid grid deformation can be done until the 3 steps of the structural
predictor, (4.1), have been initialized. Thereby, the rst 3 or more coupling iterations
are actually done with a serial scheme: the structure is time-integrated from time t
n
to
t
n+1
. Structural deections at t
n+1
are used to integrate the uid from t
n
to t
n+1
. Fluid
output at t
n+1
is used to integrate the structure from t
n+1
to t
n+2
. This serial pattern
is pursued until a structural prediction can be accurately done. Then, the CSM outputs
two structural deections simultaneously: u
n
and the prediction u
n+1
P
(step 11, shown
in green in Figure 4.4). Once the uid has used u
n
to integrate from time t
n1
to t
n
,
the parallel stencil begins. From then on, the uid grid is deformed using predicted
deections.
Figure 4.4: Launching the parallel collocated scheme.
The serial non-collocated scheme, shown in Figure 4.5, is operated as follows. elsA
starts not at = 0, but = /2. The start azimuth is a parameter of the elsA
61
COUPLING
simulation and is here used to oset the uid and structure integrations. Structural
predictions cannot be done until at least the rst 3 steps of the Adams-Bashforth predictor
(4.1) have been initialized. During the initialization period, the uid grid is deformed with
a trivial structural prediction, u
n+1/2
P
= u
n
. When eventually a structural prediction
can be accurately done, the consistent non-collocated scheme begins eectively.
Figure 4.5: Launching the serial non-collocated scheme.
Switching from one type of staggered scheme to another is immediate thanks to the
modularity of the coupling framework.
4.2.4.2 Sources of deterioration of the accuracy of the coupling
It has been seen that the conservation of the energy at the uid/structure interface is im-
portant because it prevents the introduction of articial numerical damping in the aeroe-
lastic simulation, which would otherwise deteriorate its accuracy. Piperno and Farhat
identied in [39] three factors undermining the energy conservation at the uid/structure
interface:
The structural predictor does not guess exactly the position of the structure at t
n+1
;
therefore
_
x
n+1
x
n
_
=
_
u
n+1
u
n
_
(4.2)
where u denotes the structure position and x denotes the uid grid position.
The motion scheme of the dynamic uid mesh
The time-discretisation of the transfer during [t
n
, t
n+1
] of the aerodynamic data
from the uid to the structure, that is, at which precise time has the oweld been
evaluated to output the airloads.
The last point is of particular concern in the current status of elsA. The airloads that
elsA outputs at time t
n
correspond actually to t
n1
. This is so because, to output airloads
at t
n
, elsA evaluates the ux at t
n1
, even though it has already calculated the ux at
t
n
. This issue may deteriorate the accuracy of the coupling and it is to be corrected in a
coming delivery of elsA.
62
4.3 The uid/structure interface
The uid structure interface title of this section refers to the contact region between
uid and structure through which structure motion and airloads are exchanged.
The need for a uid structure interface arises from the fact that the uid and struc-
ture governing equations are solved on separate domains or grids with dierent spatial
discretisations. As a result, the transfer of quantities between the non-matching spatial
discretisations requires some kind of interpolation.
Context
It has been said that one of the objectives of this work is to produce a general coupling in
which the sophistication of the models is scaleable. Hence, the structural models of the
rotor blades may be based on beam representations or 3D representations. Similarly, the
aerodynamic loads may be given by HOST and its semi-analytic methods or by a full 3D
CFD method. And all combinations of structure model and aerodynamics model should
be feasible.
The consequence of this scaleability is that the data transfer across the uid/structure
interface should be able to handle any combination of the two types of structure interface
with the two types of aerodynamics interface.
Nevertheless, it is later shown that elsA, despite using a 3D mesh representing the true
geometry of the blade, uses a line-based interface. This means that elsA expects structure
motion to be expressed as a line deformation and that elsA gives the aerodynamic loading
as a set of concentrated loads along this line. The developments done during this work
were adapted to this constraint of elsA.
The consequences are that both beam models and 3D FE models may be coupled to
the CFD, but in both cases the deformation of the blade has to be projected onto a line.
This is anyway the natural option for the beam model, but the 3D FE model requires
some more manipulation, as described later in Section 4.3.7. Table 4.1 summarizes the
combinations of uid and structure geometries that were handled in this work.
As the SHANEL project continues after this thesis, it is planned to develop an inter-
polation toolbox that would handle any combination of uid and structure models. This
toolbox would be yet another module plugged into the coupling architecture. It would
read the CGNS trees coming from the uid and from the structure, recognize the type of
data and manipulate it accordingly.
Aerodynamic interface
Structure interface line surface
line

surface

Table 4.1: Summary of available combinations of uid and structure geometries.
63
COUPLING
Fluid/structure interface of a 3D FE model with a CFD method. When a
geometrically rigorous FE structural model of the blade is available, the most direct
approach would be to deform the wet surface of the CFD grid following the structure
motion and to apply the pressure -and shear stress when viscous ow is used- distribution
given by the CFD over the surface of the FE model. This approach, already used in xed-
wing and turbomachinery aeroelasticity, has never been done in rotary-wing aeroelasticity
because, so far, all the couplings with CFD used structural beam models for the blades.
Besides, this approach presents the following disadvantages in terms of added complexity:
the surface of the 3D FE model has to respect the real geometry of the blade to be
able to receive a pressure distribution.
the interface being a surface, large chunks of data must be handled
interpolations between two non-matching surface discretisations are costly
dicult interpretation of the transferred quantities and thereby dicult software
debugging
This increased complexity should however pay back in terms of superior accuracy in
structure motion and airloads transfers, but the gains are hardly worth the extra cost.
This is suggested by concurrent CSM/CFD analyses like [46] that, by coupling structural
beam models to advanced CFD methods, have obtained results in very good agreement
with the experimental data all while using simple uid-structure interfaces dened by
the quarter-chord line. In the current state of the things, priority shall be given to the
individual accuracy of the structure and oweld models.
4.3.1 CFD grid deformation technique
The grid deformation technique for rotor applications in elsA was developed during the
CHANCE project (1999-2005) by Cantaloube [15][14]. The present work exploited this
capability of elsA without adding new developments.
The grid deformation technique is limited to structured meshes with C or O topology
in the chordwise direction and H topology in the spanwise direction, noted j. A number
of blade j-proles is dened, which are the intersection of the blade with the topological
mesh j-planes, as shown in Figure 4.6.
First, the surface grids dening the blades are deformed by letting each j-prole (air-
foil) undergo a rigid body motion, composed of translations and rotations. Thus, prole
deformation cannot be modeled. In order to minimize the uid grid deformation, the
blades already have some pitch in the initial uid grid.
Second, the volume grid is adjusted to account for the motion of the surface of the
blade. The volume grid is deformed by topological planes. Each j-prole of the blade
induces the deformation of the volume grid points in the same j-plane. The volume grid
64
Figure 4.6: Grid deformation by spanwise topological planes.
planes outboard of the blade follow the deformation of the blade tip prole. Deformations
are damped to a null value at the external boundary of the grid.
The uid grid is deformed to take into account the rigid-body movement of the blades
and their elastic deection. Rigid-body movements include collective and cyclic pitch
controls. The structure solver provides information that comprises both rigid-body and
elastic deections. Structural data is given at time t
n+1
in a tree like the one shown in
Table 3.2 so that elsA can update the position of the uid mesh to integrate in time from
t
n
to t
n+1
.
The structure motions must be specied as the coordinates of the quarter-chord line
plus rotation matrices dening the orientation of the proles. The rotation matrix is the
matrix relating the section frame, which is attached to the distorted blade section, to
the rotating rotor frame. These six motions contain the control inputs and elastics. The
geometric twist of the blade is already included in the CFD grid.
The forward tilt angle of the rotor shaft,
q
(see Figure 4.16), is xed at the simulation
start and cannot be modied during run-time. This was a problem because the rotor shaft
angle is one of the four trim control variables. As a temporary solution before this problem
was corrected by the elsA developers, one of the four trim targets had to be dropped, as
explained in the trim control section 4.4.
4.3.2 CFD airloads
elsA integrates the calculated pressure distribution and the shear forces for viscous ows
over the blade surface in order to provide nodal loads along the quarter-chord line, see
65
COUPLING
Figure 4.7. These nodal loads consist of the three force components and the three moment
components. elsA provides the airloads contained in a CGNS tree like the one shown in
Table 3.1).
Figure 4.7: Locations for structural input and airloads output on the CFD grid.
4.3.3 HOST airloads for an external structure
The advantages of using a partitioned approach include the possibility to choose how
much delity is needed for a given model. Lower delity models are usually faster and
smaller, and, depending on the study case, their accuracy can be satisfying. Rotorcraft
comprehensive methods, contrarily to CFD analyses, for example, oer the ability to
isolate and examine individual parts of the problem and thus help provide insight and
fundamental understanding.
In this context, it might sometimes be interesting to use comprehensive aerodynamics
rather than a computationally intensive CFD analysis. It is for this reason that a coupling
of MSC.Marc with HOST airloads was developed.
Recalling what has been presented in the Section 2.4.3, when no wake is modeled,
HOST calculates the blade airloads from three variables: (1) velocity; (2) acceleration;
and (3) blade apping angle. In a coupled analysis these variables are provided by the
CSM.
Yet MSC.Marc was used in a non-inertial frame (rotating rotor frame, shown in Fig-
ure A.3), and, as a consequence, the structural displacements, velocities and accelerations
are relative to that frame. Velocity terms due to the rotation of the rotor and its transla-
tion in space -the rotorcraft ight velocity- must be added to the MSC.Marc results. This
is done by the coupling interface of HOST, as detailed next.
Calculating absolute velocities. The velocity terms due to ight speed are rst cal-
culated in the xed rotor frame (FRF), see Figure A.3, from the free ow velocity, U
66
and the rotor shaft angle,
q
(see Figure 4.16). Then they are converted into the rotating
rotor frame (RRF), Figure A.3, using the blade azimuth, .
V
RRF
flight
=
_
_
cos sin 0
sin cos 0
0 0 1
_
_
. .
FRF RRF
_
_
U
cos
q
0
U
sin
q
_
_
(4.3)
The velocity terms due to rotor rotation are simply the vectorial product of the rotor
angular velocity, and the coordinates of the i
th
section of the blade in the rotating rotor
frame, r
i
,
V
i
RRF
rotation
= r
i
RRF
(4.4)
Discretisation. Problems related to non-matching uid/structure discretisations when
coupling MSC.Marc with HOST airloads can be easily bypassed. This is thanks to the
exibility with which the blade discretisation in HOST can be changed. It suces to
impose a list of radii matching that of the nite element model. As a result, there is no
need to interpolate the structure motion nor the airloads.
4.3.4 Denition of a uid-structure interface for the beam mod-
els
Generally, a beam model of a blade is assimilated to the quarter chord line of the blade
because that is the approximate location of the elastic axis. There is not much choice to
dene a uid/structure interface for the structural beam models; the nodes of the beam
elements are used to read the blade motion and to input the external airloads.
Furthermore, it is later shown in the results for the 7A rotor that the radial location
of the nodes along the blade was enforced to match that of the CFD spanstations, so that
interpolations in the structure transfer were avoided.
4.3.5 Transfer of the structure motion of the beam FE models
Reading the displacements and translation velocities of a beam blade from its nodes is
simple. However, when it comes to the rotations in ap, lag and pitch (which are needed
for the aerodynamics) new diculties arise.
Unlike comprehensive structural models, nite element models do not work directly
with variables such as the blade apping, lead-lag or feathering angles. It is up to the
user to evaluate these quantities from the nodal displacements and rotations -the latter
only available when beams and shells are used- of the nodes.
In the case of the beam model, displacements alone are not enough to dene the
orientation of the cross-sections. And interpreting the orientations from the nodal x, y
and z rotations is ambiguous because the order and projections in which MSC.Marc gives
the angles are unknown.
67
COUPLING
4.3.5.1 Dummy nodes
In order to determine the rotation angles of the blade, each of the nodes of the beam model
for which its orientations were to be extracted had a pair of dummy nodes associated.
These dummy weightless nodes were attached with a weightless rigid link to the beam
node, so that structural properties were not aected. Both of the links lay in the plane
dened by the cross-section, at a user-dened distance from the blade. One link belonged
to the horizontal plane, the other to the vertical. This conguration is shown in Figure 4.8.
Figure 4.8: Dummy nodes for cross-section orientation on beam nite element models.
The dummy nodes, being xed to the cross-section, constitute a section-xed frame
(Figure A.5). Then, for each cross-section, the rotation matrix from the section frame to
the rotating rotor frame (Figure A.3) is directly given by Eq. 4.5.
T
RRF
SF
=
_
_
| | |
x y z
| | |
_
_
(4.5)
where y is the unit chord-wise vector from the dummy node in the horizontal plane to the
beam node in the blade, z is the unit thickness-wise vector from the beam node to the
dummy node in the vertical plane and x is the vectorial product of z and y, x = z y.
4.3.6 Denition of a uid-structure interface for the 3D models
The denition of a uid-structure interface means declaring the nodes or elements of the
3D nite element model that will be used for exchanging quantities (motion, airloads)
with the uid.
68
The most natural option would be to use the entire surface of the blade and map the
uid grid deformation on it. Yet Section 4.3.1 exposed that the uid grid deformation
technique in elsA requires as input a projection of the blade motion onto the quarter
chord line. So this work conformed to this constraint by projecting the deformation of
the 3D blades into a line.
Assuming that the cross-sections do not deform signicantly, a practical choice is the
nodes along the leading and trailing edges. Yet due to a limitation in the MSC.Marcs
coupling features, which do not accept declaring a coupling region from a set of nodes,
the declared coupling regions are the upper and lower shells composing both leading and
trailing edges, as shown in Figure 4.9. The Python interface of MSC.Marc, at the simu-
lation start, collects all the nodes of these shells and picks the nodes at the intersection.
From then on, these nodes are used for reading the structural motion and inputing the
external airloads.
Figure 4.9: Intersection of the upper and lower shells constituting the leading edge.
Example: the ERATO rotor. The ERATO rotor is one of the test applications
presented in the next chapter. The interface of the ERATO rotor blades with the uid is
composed by the nodes of the leading and trailing edges, as shown in Figure 4.10(b). The
motion of the quarter chord line that the CFD expects is constructed from the motion of
the leading and trailing edges, as described later. Conversely, the airloads given by the
CFD along the quarter chord line are distributed between the leading and trailing edges
of the nite element model.
4.3.7 Transfer of the structure motion of the 3D FE models
Figure 4.11 shows the CFD surface mesh of a generic blade in which a cut has been done
on the plane dened by the chords. The green and orange nodes at the leading and trailing
69
COUPLING
(a) 3D nite element model of the ERATO blade. (b) Leading and trailing edges.
Figure 4.10: Fluid-structure interface of the ERATO blade.
edges, respectively, represent the structure nodes for which deformation is known. The
blue line represents the quarter-chord line, and the nodes along this line are the sections
at which the CFD expects the motion input. Motion at the blue nodes is interpolated as
a function of blade radius from the structure nodes in two steps; rst structural motion
is interpolated along the leading and trailing edges at the radii of CFD input-stations;
second the motion of the quarter-chord is constructed from the motion of the leading and
trailing edges.
In the 3D nite element model, as opposite to the beam models, no dummy nodes
are needed any longer to determine cross-section orientation. The technique consists in
using the coordinates of the leading and trailing edges to obtain the orthogonal right-
handed triad of vectors (x
, y
and z
) xed to the cross-section -the so called section

frame, Figure A.5-. The technique is illustrated in Figure 4.12. A chord-wise vector, y
,
is dened from the trailing edge to the leading edge. A second vector, q
, is dened from
the trailing edge to the quarter-chord of the contiguous section. Their cross product gives
a vector normal to the blade chord plane, z
, which is in turn cross multiplied with the

chord-wise vector y
to obtain a span-wise vector normal to the cross-section, x
.
The unit vectors x
, y
and z
can be written as the direction cosine matrix T, which

is the rotation matrix from the section frame (SF) to the rotating rotor frame (RRF,
Figure A.3)
T
RRF
SF
=
_
_
x
1
y
1
z
1
x
2
y
2
z
2
x
3
y
3
z
3
_
_
(4.6)
70
Figure 4.11: Structure motion transfer to uid grid.
Figure 4.12: Obtaining the coordinate system xed to the cross-section.
71
COUPLING
_
_
x
y
z
_
_
RRF
= T
RRF
SF
_
_
x
y
z
_
_
SF
(4.7)
4.3.7.1 Osetting rotation terms due to geometric twist
In addition, the twist of the blade must also be taken into account when constructing
the cross-section orientation matrices. Indeed, the aerodynamics solver (either HOST
or the CFD) already integrate geometric built-in twist information in their calculations.
The CSM shall send information regarding only structure displacement and deformation,
but not geometric twist. Thereby, in order to avoid sending to the CFD or to HOST
orientation matrices that include rotation terms due to blade geometric twist, these terms
have to be systematically corrected upon the matrices calculation at each iteration.
In order to oset the rotation terms due to geometrical twist, see Figure 4.13, the
following procedure was implemented:
Figure 4.13: Taking into account twist distribution.
at the simulation start, when the CSM outputs data for the yet undeformed struc-
ture, direction cosine matrices T
RRF
SF
i
are calculated for every section.
The rotation matrix from the i
th
section to the 0
th
section (the innermost section,
for which grid pitch is dened in the CFD) is given by
T
SF
0
SF
i
=
_
T
RRF
SF
0
1
T
RRF
SF
i
(4.8)
The rotation matrices between sections are computed once for all at the simulation
start and stored.
72
From then on, the rotation terms due to geometrical twist are oset from the rotation
matrices
T
RRF
SF
i
= T
RRF
SF
i
_
T
SF
0
SF
i
1
(4.9)
where the T
RRF
SF
i
is the orientation matrix computed at each new time-step and
the inverse of T
SF
0
SF
i
(transpose for these orthogonal rotation matrices) had been
computed at the simulation start.
4.3.8 Transfer of airloads from the CFD to the 3D FE model
The CFD airloads are given as three force components and three moment components
along the quarter-chord. But the structural interface nodes are located along the leading
and trailing edges of the blade, as shown in Figure 4.14. Therefore, some kind of transfer
was required to convert the CFD airloads into a structural forcing.
Figure 4.14: ERATO blade. Non-matching uid and structure discretisations.
4.3.8.1 Conservation of total loads and energy
When the uid and structure discretisations are not equal, an algorithm is used to dis-
tribute the uid loads onto the structure. This transfer in space must satisfy two require-
ments. The rst one is that the net structural forcing must be equal to the net pressure
and shear distribution on the cell surfaces of the uid interface. Since in this work the
structure was loaded by concentrated forces on the nodes, this can be expressed as
i
f
S
i
=
_
S
F
(pn +n) dS, (4.10)
where i are the nodes constituting the interface of the structure model, f
S
are the structure
nodal loads, p is the pressure distribution, is the viscous shear distribution, S
F
is the
blade surface on the uid grid and n is the normal to the surface.
73
COUPLING
There is however an innite number of nodal load sets that can satisfy the conservation
of the total loads. A second requirement is used to determine the correct one, stated as
the conservation of energy. For this purpose, the structural virtual work performed by the
displacement r of the concentrated loads must be equal to that of the original distributed
loads over a displacement u of the uid grid
i
f
S
i
r
i
=
_
S
F
(pn +n) udS. (4.11)
Thus, in an energy conservative load transfer, loads are transferred across the uid/structure
interface without articial dissipation or creation of energy. This is important because it
means that no positive or negative damping is articially applied onto the structure.
4.3.8.2 Application of a conservative load transfer
In the present study the CFD integrates the pressure and shear distribution to yield
directly the equivalent nodal loads over the quarter-chord line
f
F
j
=
_
S
F
(pn +n) D
j
dS, (4.12)
where D
j
is some function with a local or global support on S
F
. This integration is
assumed to be load and energy conservative because it is done internally in the CFD
software using the uid grid [25].
In order to apply nodal loads on the structure, it was assumed that the blade sections
are rigid, which is indeed a good hypothesis because a blade section is very sti. Then,
the CFD forces are distributed on the structure nodes of the leading and trailing edges
on a 75% and 25% proportion, respectively. This guarantees respecting the loads tensor.
Moments are integrally applied on the leading edge, which also respects the loads tensor
because the leading edge and the quarter-chord are parallel.
The CFD airloads, expressed as a piece-wise distribution along the blade span, are
then integrated over the CSM segments -a CSM segment being dened as the length of
span surrounding each structure node-. The integration consists in performing a fractional
weight based on the fraction of the length of the uid segment present in each structure
segment
f
n
S
i
=
N
j
f
n
F
j
dc
j
(4.13)
where f
S
i
is the total load on the structure segment i at time step n, f
F
j
is the total load
on uid segment j at time step n and dc is the fraction of segment j that lies on segment
i. This process is described by Figure 4.15, where a distribution of CFD lift is integrated
over the CSM segments of a generic blade.
74
4.4 Rotor control and trim
The CFD airloads integration is used for all six airloads components. The blade
leading edge discretisation is not necessarily equal to that of the trailing edge. In such
cases, the CFD airloads distribution is integrated separately.
Figure 4.15: Integration to transfer CFD airloads over structure discretisation.
A small investigation was carried on the ERATO application to evaluate how conserva-
tive were the load transfers. The results of this investigation are presented in Section 5.2.3.
The aeroelastic simulation of a rotor requires, in addition to the modeling of the uid-
structure interaction, a method to control the rotor operating state. The isolated rotor
operating state is dened by the rotor pitch control angles -collective
0
and cyclic
1C
and
1S
- and the rotor shaft attitude
q
shown in Figure 4.16. These parameters determine
in turn the rotor thrust, which can be decomposed into lift and propulsive force, and the
blade apping, which is used to tilt the rotor disk and thus steer the aircraft.
Trim designates the equilibrium of the aircraft in steady ight. For example, in order
to hold a level forward ight, the lift must counter the weight, and the propulsive force,
the drag, while the rotor disk must remain laterally level. The trimmed condition is
achieved by rotor control.
The importance of trim lies in the fact that numerical results are better compared
to wind tunnel measurements if the simulation matches the experimental trim. The
75
COUPLING
comparison would not be fair if, for example, the numerical rotor did not generate the
same thrust than the test rotor. Unlike turbomachinery and xed-wings, rotary-wing
aeroelasticity must comprise ight mechanics in addition to the coupled uid-structure
analysis.
In previous works [7][35], trimmed solutions in strong coupling were obtained by re-
peating manually an iterative process made of three steps. This consisted in running rst
a simulation with constant controls until convergence. Then compare the trim variables
to their targets. Correct consequently the controls and relaunch the simulation. This pro-
cess had to be repeated three or four times. It is a tedious operations that increases the
computation time, not only because the simulation has to be stopped, but also because
trim can only be evaluated at best once per revolution.
This work has introduced a new approach, called active trim, which consists in cor-
recting the rotor controls during the time integration, at each time-step. In order to better
present the active trim method, the trim variables are introduced rst.
Controls of the isolated rotor. The isolated rotor has four control variables. Three of
them are the blade pitch control angles (collective
0
and cyclic
1C
and
1S
). The fourth
one is the rotor shaft angle, pictured in Figure 4.16. The shaft angle is not actuated
directly by the pilot in real ight, but it is controlled in the wind tunnel.
Figure 4.16: Denition of the rotor shaft angle
q
.
Trim variables. Since the isolated rotor has four controls, it follows that the trim must
be limited to four targets. The trim variables used in this work are those of the wind
tunnel tests and are listed next.
1. Lift coecient, Z
b
. HOST calculates this coecient with the following expression
Z
b
= 100
F
z
1/2S
b
V
2
tip
, (4.14)
76
where F
z
is the lift force, the air density, V
tip
the blade tip speed (due to
rotation only) and S
b
, the total surface of the blades. The total surface of the
blades is the number of blades N times the blade chord c times the blade span
b, S
b
= Nbc.
2. Propulsion coecient, C
XS
P
. HOST calculates this coecient with the following
expression
C
XS
P
=
F
x
1/2S
b
U
2
, (4.15)
where F
x
is the propulsive force and U
, the free-ow speed. Note that the

S
P
in C
XS
P
stands for surface pales.
3. First longitudinal apping harmonic,
1C
. Coecient multiplying the cosine
of the azimuth in the blade apping expression (Eq. 4.16). It is the longitudinal
tilt of the rotor disk.
=
0
+
1C
cos +
1S
sin (4.16)
4. First lateral apping harmonic,
1S
. Coecient multiplying the sine of the az-
imuth in the blade apping expression (Eq. 4.16). It is the lateral tilt of the
rotor disk.
Flapping laws. A apping law describes the apping motion of the rotor blades in
steady ight. Flapping laws are used in wind tunnel campaigns when testing isolated
rotors. For example, if a straight ight condition is being reproduced, the rotor must
not generate lateral force. In short, the rotor disk must not be tilted sideways, which
corresponds to a null lateral apping angle,
1S
= 0. For the longitudinal apping angle
1C
there are two approaches:
1. The Modane apping law. The rst lateral apping harmonic is null,
1S
= 0.
The rst longitudinal harmonic is equal and of opposite sign to the longitudinal
cyclic control pitch angle,
1C
=
1S
. This identity was observed to be
approximately true in real helicopter ight and it was then decided to enforce
it on the isolated rotor in the wind tunnel.
2. The American apping law. Both rst apping harmonics are null.
1S
= 0
and
1C
= 0. This law minimizes the bending eorts on the rotor shaft.
The wind tunnel measurements shown in this work were done with the Modane apping
law for the 7A rotor and the American law for the ERATO rotor.
Just as in the case of manual trims, the active trim option is based on the knowledge
of the sensitivity O/C of the trim objectives O with respect to the rotor controls C.
The eect of rotor controls depends on the ight condition and hence, the sensitivities or
gradient matrix must be calculated for every dierent ight condition that is analyzed.
77
COUPLING
The method to calculate the gradient assumes that the rotor behaviour is linear around
the ight condition and it consists of the following steps: rst an autonomous HOST trim
computation for the studied ight condition is done. This gives the set of controls that
respects trim. Then the sensitivities of the trim variables with respect to rotor controls
are derived by introducing a small perturbation in one of the controls and looking at
the variations in the trim variables. Repeating this procedure for each control gives the
matrix of sensitivities of the trim with respect to the controls,
J =
_
_
O
1
C
1

O
1
C
4
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
O
4
C
1

O
4
C
4
_
_
. (4.17)
For a given trim objectives vector O
0
there is a corresponding control vector C
0
, which
can be found by
C
0
= C +J
1
(O
0
O) , (4.18)
where C is the current control vector and (O
0
O) is the dierence between the objective
trim and the actual trim. In order to have a continuous adjustment of the trim, it is
proposed to use a continuous control correction of the type
dC
dt
=
1
a
(C
0
C) , (4.19)
which is an ordinary dierential equation whose solution is C = C
0
+(C
0
C
i
)e
1
a
t
, where
C
i
is the initial control value and a is a time constant representing the delay after which
63% (for t = a, e
1
= 0.36) of the solution is attained. For t = 0.69a (ln(0.5)), 50% of
the solution is attained, and for t = 4.6a (ln(0.01)), 99% of the solution is attained.
Substituting the term (C
0
C) of (4.18) in that of (4.19) yields
dC
dt
=
C
O
(O O
0
)
1
a
. (4.20)
At each time-step HOST evaluates the dierence between the current trim and the
target trim and updates the rotor controls.
_
1C
1S
q
_
_
n+1
=
_
1C
1S
q
_
_
n
t
1
a
J
1
_
O O
0
_
(4.21)
where the bar in

O indicates that the variable has been averaged over the latest rotor
revolution.
Convenient values of a were around 1.5 revolution periods. The value of a can be
adjusted in HOST through the expression
a =
3T
k
, (4.22)
78
where T is the period of a rotor revolution and k a user parameter detailed later. The
greater the value of k is, the greater the amplication of the rotor controls. If k is too big,
the controls will tend to overshoot the solution and convergence may be delayed. The
next section reports a small investigation to optimize the value of k and examples of the
active trim.
4.4.1 Amplication of the rotor controls
In order to nd a convenient value for the amplication factor k in (4.22), tests were done
with autonomous HOST simulations. The simulations started from a perturbed trim state
and had to reach a target trim. The 7A rotor was used for this exercise.
The target trim was that of a test performed in the wind tunnel for the 7A rotor in
high-speed level ight, dened by a Z
b
= 12.5, Modane apping law and C
XS
P
= 0.1.
The perturbed start trim was Z
b
= 16.0,
1s
= 1deg and
1c
+
1s
= 1deg. C
XS
P
was not
perturbed and thus was equal to 0.1. The rotor shaft angle
q
was not piloted during
the simulation in order to imitate the CFD aerodynamics, in which the
q
angle cannot
be modied during run-time yet. The propulsive coecient C
XS
P
was left out of the
trim targets because this variable, if initialized properly with the right
q
, remains quite
independent of the variations in the rotors collective and cyclic pitch controls.
Two exercises were done. The rst one compared the eect of dierent time constants
on the convergence of the trim. Two k values were tested, k = 3.0 a = T and
k = 1.0 a = 3T. The convergence of the lift coecient Z
b
and the collective pitch
control are shown in Figure 4.17. Please note that the lift coecient is not exclusively a
function of the collective control, but nevertheless these two variables are plotted together
because they are strongly correlated. Similarly, the cyclic pitch controls have a dominant
eect on the cyclic apping of the blades. The convergence of the rst apping harmonics
and the cyclic controls is shown in Figure 4.18. As expected, the smaller time constant a
yields faster response but also tends to oscillate more.
The second exercise compared two simulations with equal time constants but dierent
gradients. The objective of this exercise was to prove that the accuracy of the gradient
is not critical to the convergence of the active trim problem. One gradient was obtained
from HOST trim computations in which the blades were rigid, this is, their only motion
was rigid motion around the articulations. The second gradient was obtained by using
exible blade computations. Therefore, the second gradient was derived from a higher-
delity simulation. The k factor used for these simulations was equal to 1.5 (a = 2T).
In the convergence of the lift coecient and collective control, see Figure 4.19, only
minor dierences can be observed. Figure 4.20 reveals that with the rigid blade gradient
the longitudinal control overshoots more starkly than with the exible gradient. These
dierences are due to the fact that the simulations used the rst eight elastic modeshapes
of the blades and thereby the blade behaviour was closer to that predicted in the exible
blade gradient. After ten revolutions, the rotor controls by the two gradients are nearly
equal and have practically converged to their nal value. The important point is that the
79
COUPLING
Figure 4.17: Lift coecient and collective control convergence for k=3.0 and k=1.0.
Figure 4.18: First apping harmonics and cyclic controls convergence for k=3.0 and k=1.0.
80
quality of the gradient is not critical to the convergence of the active trim.
Figure 4.19: Lift coecient and collective control convergence.
From the previous exercises it seems that a time constant between a = 2T (k = 1.5)
and a = T (k = 3.0) is optimal with respect to the trade-o between rate of convergence
and oscillatory behaviour of the rotor controls. When using a = 3T (k = 1.0), the
convergence was too slow. k = 1.5 gives a sharper reaction while remaining stable. This
was checked in Figure 4.21, which shows the trim convergence over 25 revolutions for
k = 1.5 and proves that the solution remains stable.
The here found optimal value for the time constant can only be regarded though as
a rule of thumb. The ideal value will vary with the particular aerodynamic behaviour of
every rotor. The optimal value for an autonomous HOST simulation will not necessarily
be the same for a coupled CFD/CSM analysis.
81
COUPLING
Figure 4.20: First apping harmonics and cyclic controls convergence.
Figure 4.21: Full trim convergence.
82
Chapter 5
Applications
The results are presented in chronological order, reecting the evolution of the develop-
ments in an increasing degree of complexity.
The early developments were done using a simple structural beam model of the 7A
rotor. This served not only to get acquainted with MSC.Marc and its built-in tools for
external couplings, but also as a support to develop the software framework.
Then work moved on to the rst application using 3D FE modeled blades. The ADM
rotor was used for this purpose because it has a very simple geometry and a 3D FE model
was available from another study. The simple geometry of the ADM rotor constituted a
good development support to upgrade the MSC.Marc interface from beam to 3D models.
However, the lack of experimental data for this rotor motivated a quick transition to
another rotor for which there were experimental measurements.
The ERATO rotor was chosen as an application because a 3D FE model of its blades
was available at ONERA from a previous dynamics study [55]. The ERATO blades
feature a complex geometry. In this case a 3D structural model is interesting because the
current beam model in HOST fails to predict accurately the modeshapes. Moreover, the
simulation of the ERATO rotor in high-speed level ight constitutes a validation test-case
of the SHANEL project.
5.1 7A rotor
The 7A rotor was chosen as the rst application because it has been thoroughly studied at
ONERA and more particularly, it had been the study rotor of the coupled HOST/CFD
analyses of the CHANCE project back in 2005. The same CFD model could be used.
Numerical results from that rst coupling and wind tunnel measurements were available
for comparison and hence, validation.
The 7A rotor is a four-bladed rotor tested in ONERAs S1MA wind tunnel. The blade,
shown in Figure 5.1, has an aspect ratio equal to 15 and rectangular planform. It has a
chord of 0.14m and a radius of 2.1m. The ONERA prole OA213 is used from the blade
root to r/R=0.75. Then the prole evolves until r/R=0.90 to become an OA209. Each of
83
5. APPLICATIONS
the three spanwise regions dened by the proles has a dierent linear twist. Maximum
twist is found at r/R=0.75 and is equal to -4.54deg.
Figure 5.1: 7A blade denition.
Flight condition. It was chosen to simulate the same ight condition than in the
CHANCE project with the HOST/CFD coupling to be able to compare the results. This
ight condition has been tested in the wind tunnel. It reproduces a high-speed level ight,
corresponding to the wind tunnel counter 312. This counter is dened by an advance
ratio
1
of = 0.4 (316.65 km/h), a lift coecient Z
b
= 12.5, a propulsive coecient
C
XS
P
= 0.10 and the Modane apping law, this is, zero lateral rotor tilt (
1S
= 0) and a
rst longitudinal apping angle harmonic equal and of opposite sign to the longitudinal
cyclic control (
1C
=
1S
).
5.1.1 Structural model
The nite element model of the 7A rotor, shown in Figure 5.2, was made ad hoc for this
work. The objective was to have a simple and computationally inexpensive model that
would help in the developments. That is why only beam elements were used. Each blade
consists of 44 beam elements. The blades are clamped separately and thereby assumed
mechanically independent.
The beam element (number 98 in the MSC.Marc element library [34]) is an elastic
beam with transverse shear. Each of its two nodes has the three displacements plus the
three rotations as degrees of freedom. Linear interpolation is used for displacements and
rotations. Since the type of analysis here used assumed large displacements but small
strains, large curvature changes in the beam element were neglected.
The location of the beam nodes was enforced to match the radial discretisation at
which the uid grid expects structure motion, thus avoiding interpolations. Nevertheless,
the CFD airloads, which are given at the center of the segments enclosed by the input
radii, do require interpolation.
1
The advance ratio is dened as the ratio of ight speed V
flight
over blade tip speed V
tip
(due to
rotation only), = V
flight
/V
tip
.
84
5.1 7A rotor
Figure 5.2: 7A rotor nite element model with close-up view on the pitch control system.
5.1.2 Fluid grid
The CFD model of the 7A rotor used in the present study was obtained from a past
study by Beaumier et al. [7], in which it had been coupled to HOST. It is a viscous ow
(Navier-Stokes) model of the isolated 7A rotor.
The grid consists of four blocks, one per blade, as shown in Figure 5.3. Noting the
blade radius by R, the block outer boundaries lie at 2R in the span-wise direction and
1.5R in the thickness-wise direction. Each block, of C-H topology, includes 189 nodes
chord-wise (of which 132 wrapped around the prole), 57 nodes span-wise (of which 32
on the blade) and 49 nodes thickness-wise, resulting in a total number of grid points for
the complete rotor of 2.1 10
6
approximately.
Figure 5.3: The multi-block mesh of the 7A rotor.
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5. APPLICATIONS
A 2
nd
order centered discretisation in space with Jamesons articial viscosity was
used. The resolution in time was achieved by the dual time stepping method in the rst
tests. Later the Gear method was used, which improved substantially the prediction of the
sectional pitching moments. The computationally inexpensive algebraic model of Michel
was used for turbulence.
Other concurrent rotorcraft CSD/CFD studies like [10], [35], or [46] do not use less
than 4.4 10
6
points, so the present grid is relatively coarse. This is not however a concern,
because in a rst time the priority was to develop the coupling, whereas high-accuracy,
detailed analysis comes second.
5.1.3 Results
5.1.3.1 Validation by comparison with HOST/CFD results
Nine rotor revolutions were simulated. During the rst three revolutions the airloads were
given by HOST. They were used to initialize the rotor dynamics at a low computational
cost. After the third revolution the airloads were provided by elsA. The rotor controls
were generated by HOST during all the revolutions. Results are rst presented for the
sectional airloads, which are compared to experiments and to previous HOST/CFD strong
coupling results from the CHANCE programme back in 2005. Then the convergence of
the trim and rotor controls is presented.
Figure 5.4 shows the sectional airloads at two blade spanstations: r/R=0.70 and
r/R=0.975. The results obtained by coupling MSC.Marc/HOST/elsA are plotted in blue,
whereas the 2005 HOST/elsA results are plotted in green. It can be seen that, as ex-
pected, the new coupling reproduces very closely the previous results. This similarity was
expected because the CFD method is the same and the beam model in MSC.Marc does
not provide signicant advantages over the beam model in HOST. The 2005 HOST/elsA
results were obtained after 9 revolutions, during which the simulation was stopped six
times in order to evaluate the trim and adjust the rotor controls. The new results were
obtained after 9 revolutions as well, although only the last 6 of them were done with CFD
airloads. Rotor controls were automatically corrected at each time-step throughout the
nine revolutions.
The convergence of the non dimensional lift coecient Z
b
and of the collective control
is shown in Figure 5.5. The convergence of the apping trim variables and cyclic controls
is shown in Figure 5.6. In both gures a perturbation of the trim variables is observable
at the start of the fourth revolution. This is due to the switch from HOST airloads
to CFD airloads. A fair convergence to the trim objectives is attained after six rotor
revolutions. Another revolution is yet necessary for the controls to start stabilizing. In
the last revolution, the relative error of the rotor lift coecient, Z
b
, with respect to its
trim objective is 0.77%. The absolute error of the Modane apping trim variables in
Figure 5.6 is 0.027deg for the rst lateral apping harmonic,
1S
, and 0.023deg for the
variable
1S
+
1C
. The absolute variation of collective control during the last revolution
86
5.1 7A rotor
(a) Pitching moment r/R=0.70 (b) Normal force. r/R=0.70
(c) Pitching moment. r/R=0.975 (d) Normal force. r/R=0.975
Figure 5.4: 7A sectional airloads.
87
5. APPLICATIONS
is -0.008deg. For the lateral control this variation is of 0.003deg and for the longitudinal
control, -0.004deg. The rotor propulsive force coecient, C
XS
P
, (not plotted), although
left out of the trim, stays satisfyingly close to the trim target.
Figure 5.5: 7A rotor. Collective control and rotor lift coecient.
In conclusion, the successful reproduction of the HOST/CFD results validates the new
HOST/MSC.Marc/elsA coupling. The active trim is also validated. The next section
compares the results to experimental measurements.
5.1.3.2 Comparison with experimental results
The agreement of the numerical results with the experiment was rst discussed after
the HOST/CFD results in 2005 [7]. Experimental airloads are especially elusive in the
advancing blade area ( < 180deg), where the negative peaks in normal force and pitching
moment are largely underpredicted.
Figure 5.7 shows the sectional airloads at two blade spanstations: r/R=0.70 and
r/R=0.975. The results obtained by coupling MSC.Marc/HOST/elsA are plotted in blue.
The 2005 HOST/elsA results are plotted in green and the experimental results, in red.
The negative peaks in pitching moment at 90deg are due to the well-known
downstream shift of the center of pressure of an airfoil past transonic ow. This negative
pitching moment induces an important nose-down twist of the blade tip, which reinforces
in turn the already negative lift, see Figure 5.7(d). Note that lift at the tip of the
88
5.1 7A rotor
Figure 5.6: 7A rotor. Cyclic control and apping trim.
advancing blade would be negative even in a rigid blade. What makes it negative is
the strong geometric twist of the blade combined to a low pitch setting. A second, local,
minimum in lifting force is found at the retreating blade ( 270deg), as the ow velocity
slows down to a minimum.
There is a second interesting feature in Figure 5.7(d): the experimental lift remains
roughly constant during a short lapse comprised between = 40deg and = 80deg.
This is probably due to blade-wake interaction. In high-speed level ight, blade-vortex
interaction is not a dominant phenomenon because the wake is quickly convected past the
rotor, which is strongly tilted forward. But there is limited wake interaction in the rst
quadrant, which could explain the experimental lift perturbation. This phenomenon has
been studied by Potsdam et al. on the UH-60 rotor in [46] and by Pahlke and van der
Wall for the 7A rotor in [36] and [37]. None of these investigations succeeded in capturing
properly the sectional lift of the blade tip in the lower vicinity of = 90deg.
Another important aspect is that the wind-tunnel conditions were not included in the
CFD model. The rotor control angles provide evidence of some of the consequences of this
simplication. Table 5.1 summarizes the values of the rotor control angles as obtained
by HOST, the HOST/CFD coupling and the new coupling. The largest deviation with
respect to experiment occurs for the lateral control angle,
1C
, which is underpredicted by
more than 2 degrees. Rodriguez proved in [48] that this is a consequence of the fuselage-
like support on which the 7A rotor was mounted in the wind tunnel (see Figure 5.8),
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5. APPLICATIONS
Figure 5.7: 7A sectional airloads.
90
5.1 7A rotor
which was not included in the present CFD model. The support induces an upwash in
the upstream part of the rotor, increasing thus the local incidence in that region. The
opposite is true on the rear rotor. Longitudinal variations of the angle of attack induce,
via gyroscopic eect, a lateral tilt of the rotor, and that is why more lateral control input
is needed in the experiments.
0

1C

1S

q
Experiment 14.54 3.43 -3.70 -13.75
HOST 14.14 0.65 -3.29 -13.18
HOST/elsA 14.76 1.35 -3.78 -13.17
HOST/MSC.Marc/elsA 14.01 1.53 -3.69 -13.18
Table 5.1: 7A rotor pitch control angles (deg).
Figure 5.8: 7A rotor in S1MA wind tunnel.
The coupling method may be held responsible for some of the discrepancy with the
experimental data. But, for the 7A rotor, the largest potential for improvement lies in
the CFD analysis. This is illustrated in the next section.
5.1.3.3 Improving the 7A rotor results
The results presented above used the Dual Time Stepping method as time-integration
scheme for the CFD. The accuracy of the airloads can be signicantly improved by simply
switching to the Gear method, leaving all other things equal.
The simulations of the previous sections were re-run with the Gear method. Figure 5.9
shows the sectional airloads at two blade spanstations: r/R=0.70 and r/R=0.975. It can
be seen, compared to Figure 5.7, that the amplitude of the negative pitching moments is
substantially improved, especially near the blade tip, at r/R=0.975.
91
5. APPLICATIONS
Figure 5.9: Improved 7A sectional airloads using the Gear method.
92
5.2 ERATO rotor
5.2 ERATO rotor
The ERATO (
Etude dun Rotor Acoustiquement Optimise) rotor is the outcome of a

research project seeking to design a blade with minimum acoustic signature. Each of its
four blades (see Figure 5.10) features a complex chord and twist distribution, forward and
backward sweep and a prole evolution including up to four dierent proles. Like the
7A rotor, it has a rotor diameter equal to 4.2m.
Figure 5.10: ERATO blade denition.
Flight condition. The simulations presented here reproduce a high-speed level ight
(advance ratio equal to = 0.423) tested in wind tunnel. The trim condition in the wind
tunnel is dened by a non dimensional rotor lift coecient, Z
b
= 12.48, a non dimen-
sional propulsive force coecient of 1.6 and null pitching and roll moments around the
hub, which is equivalent to a null cycling apping (
1S
=
1C
= 0, American apping law).
The use of advanced structure models for this blade is interesting because HOSTs
structure model underpredicts the torsional response, which is critical to an accurate
aeroelastic analysis. This fact is illustrated in Figure 5.11, where the measured torsion
component of the third rotating ap mode is compared to a prediction done with the 3D
nite element model and with HOSTs model. The latter underpredicts the amplitude of
the torsion component.
The high content of torsion in the ap mode is explained by the ap-torsion coupling
introduced by the backward sweep of the blade tip.
5.2.1 Structural model
The 3D nite element model of the ERATO blade is shown in Figure 5.13. The model
was built by K.V. Truong with the minimum number of elements necessary to reproduce
the measured modal frequencies, see below. Still, each blade consists of around 13,000
elements, including beams, shells and cubic hexahedra. The corresponding number of
degrees of freedom per blade is roughly estimated at around 40,000.
Eigenfrequencies of the ERATO blade. The FE model of the ERATO blade repro-
duces accurately the experimental eigenfrequencies that were measured in two conditions:
clamped blade and free-free conditions (suspended blade). As Truong reported in [54],
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5. APPLICATIONS
Figure 5.11: Torsion deection of the third rotating ap mode of the ERATO blade.
the maximum relative error of the predicted eigenfrequencies for the rst 6 modes with
respect to the measurements is equal to 4%. Truongs report contains as well the pre-
dicted Campbell diagram of the ERATO blade that is shown in Figure 5.12.
Each blade of the FE model is equipped with a pitch control system and a lead-lag
damper. In order to trim the computation costs of the four bladed rotor, two MSC.Marc
applications run in parallel, each containing two blades, see Figure 5.14. This is possible
because the blades are assumed mechanically independent (rigid hub). Running parallel
CSM applications is possible and easy thanks to the modularity of the coupling framework
developed in this work.
The two parallel applications run the same input le. Despite containing only two
blades, this le is already over 56,000 lines long (in which the user often has to navigate),
so its half size compared to that of the entire rotor makes it more practical. This comes
as a second advantage after the reduced computing time.
It would have been technically possible to run four MSC.Marc applications -a blade
each- in parallel, but there were not as many MSC.Marc software licenses available.
5.2.2 Fluid grid
Inviscid model. The rst simulations were carried out with an inviscid Euler model,
for lower computational cost. Multi-block grids (one C-H block per blade) were used for
the simulation of the isolated rotor, see Figure 5.15. Each block has 141 nodes along the
chord direction, 40 nodes in the spanwise direction (of which 26 over the blade) and 26
nodes in the direction normal to the rotor plane, resulting in a total number of nodes for
the complete rotor over 5.8 10
5
.
A 2
nd
order centered discretisation in space was used. The time integration was done
with the implicit Gear method. The azimuthal step was equal to = 1.2deg.
94
5.2 ERATO rotor
Figure 5.12: Predicted Campbell diagram for the ERATO blade.
Figure 5.13: 3D nite element model of the ERATO blade.
95
5. APPLICATIONS
(a) (b)
Figure 5.14: Two nite element models run in parallel.
Figure 5.15: Multi-block grid used for inviscid simulations of the isolated ERATO rotor.
96
5.2 ERATO rotor
Viscous model. A second set of simulations was done using a viscous RANS ow
model. The grid is a rened version of the Euler one. The complete rotor grid has around
2.1 10
6
points. There is one C-H block per blade. Each block has 189 nodes along the
chord direction, 57 nodes in the spanwise direction (of which 32 over the blade) and 49
nodes in the direction normal to the rotor plane.
A 2
nd
order centered discretisation in space with Jamesons articial viscosity was
used. The resolution in time was achieved by the Gear method. The algebraic model of
Michel was used for turbulence.
5.2.3 Conservation of the energy in the loads and motion trans-
fers
A small investigation was carried on the ERATO application to evaluate how conservative
were the load transfers between the CFD and the 3D FE model.
It consisted in comparing the energy on the uid and structure interfaces, W
F
and
W
S
, respectively. This was done by evaluating the work done by the ow-induced force
F with the displacement vector r plus that of the moments M with the rotation vector
during a given time-step,
W =
N
i=1
(F
i
r
i
+M
i

i
) , (5.1)
where the i subscripts denote the discrete nodes of the uid or structure systems. The
following procedure was repeated at each time-step:
Step 1. Receive airloads F
F
and transfer them to structural loading F
S
with the method
exposed in Section 4.3.8,
Step 2. Advance the structure in time from t
n
to t
n+1
,
Step 3. Evaluate structural energy,
W
S
=
N
S
i=1
_
F
Si
_
r
n+1
i
r
n
i
_
+M
Si
n+1
i

n
i
__
, (5.2)
where N
S
is the number of structural nodes in the uid/structure interface and r
n
i
is the position of the i-th node at time t
n
.
Step 4. Interpolate structure motion to uid discretisation as explained in Section 4.3.7,
but without using structural prediction,
Step 5. Evaluate uid energy. Since uid loads are given at the cell center but uid
mesh deformation is prescribed at the cell nodes, displacements are averaged at the
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5. APPLICATIONS
cell center
W
F
=
N
F
1
j=1
_
F
Fj
_
r
t
j+1
r
t
j
2
_
+M
Fj
t
j+1
t
j
2
__
, (5.3)
where N
F
is the number of uid nodes in the uid/structure interface and r
t
j
is
the displacement of the j-th node during a time-step.
The reason for not using structural prediction in the above scheme is that the point
here was to evaluate the spatial energy conservation in the loads transfers within a given
time-step. The predictor is used to improve the energy conservation in the temporal
discretisation of the staggered scheme. But it does not guess exactly the position of the
structure at t
n+1
. So the uid grid deformation x
n+1
, based on this prediction, will not be
equal to that of the structure, u
n+1
, when it eventually reaches t
n+1
. In consequence, the
structure predictor is, albeit modestly, a factor undermining spatial energy conservation.
The computation simulated a hover ight, with constant rotor control angles. Only a
sixth of a revolution was simulated because there was no need for a stabilized response;
the spatial transfer algorithms work the same in transient or stabilized regime.
The results here shown contain only the energy due to the vertical displacement times
vertical force, W = F
z
r
z
, for one blade, because there were uncertainties in the calcu-
lation of the angles and an error related to the frames of reference was found in the
manipulation of the x and y displacements. This is however not a problem, because the
algorithm for spatial transfers is the same for all displacement and rotation components.
If it works for one it works for all.
Figure 5.16 shows the uid and structure energies as calculated by the expressions
(5.2) and (5.3). The right vertical axis of the same gure shows the relative work error,
calculated as (W
F
W
S
)/W
S
)100. It can be seen that the relative error is bound under
0.5%. This result proves that the motion and loads transfer algorithms between the 3D
FE model and the CFD model of the ERATO blade preserve well the energy at the
5.2.4 Results
This section presents the results of the simulation of the high-speed ight condition of the
ERATO rotor. Results are rst shown for a simulation that used an inviscid ow model.
Then a second set of results is shown corresponding to a viscous ow model.
5.2.4.1 Euler CFD, inviscid oweld
Eight rotor revolutions were simulated with the following parameters:
Common time-step for the CFD, the CSM and HOST equivalent to an azimuthal
step of = 1.2deg.
98
5.2 ERATO rotor
Figure 5.16: Conservation of the energy in the transfers at the uid/structure interface.
Half a time-step oset between the uid and structure integrations (staggered scheme
presented in Section 4.2.3).
The damping coecient of the spring/dash-pot system was increased by a factor of
10 during revolutions 1, 2 and then linearly ramped down to a factor of 1 during
revolutions 3,4.
Active trim constant k = 1.5, yielding an amplication factor of the controls a = 2T.
Sectional airloads for the C
n
M
2
and C
m
M
2
at two blade spanstations, r/R=0.75 and
r/R=0.975, are shown in Figure 5.17. Airloads are compared against autonomous-HOST
results and experimental measurements. Unfortunately, no coupled HOST/CFD results
were available for the ERATO rotor, and this work did not have the time to perform
them.
Similarly to the 7A rotor results, the amplitude of the negative peaks in lift and
pitching moment in the advancing blade ( 90deg) are underpredicted. There is
a small phase shift as well between simulation and experiment. More generally, the
frequency content of the numerical airloads is lower than that of the experiment.
The HOST results were obtained by performing a trim computation with HOST ver-
sion 10, trying to get as much accuracy as possible, using the unsteady aerodynamics
option plus the prescribed-wake method METAR. The rst 7 modes were used for the
modal projection. HOST airloads are notable in that they have a higher frequency con-
tent, closer to experiment. The amplitude of the negative peaks in lift in the advancing
99
5. APPLICATIONS
blade are better predicted by HOST than by the CFD, especially near the blade tip, at
r/R=0.975, see Figure 5.17(d). Note however that, for this spanstation, HOSTs negative
peaks in lift and pitching moment on the advancing blade have a larger phase shift with
respect to experiment than the CFD airloads. Finally, pitching moments are substantially
better predicted by the CFD than HOST, although both CFD and HOST fail to capture
the dynamic stall in the retreating blade, observable around the azimuth 300deg in
Figure 5.17(c).
Figure 5.18 compares the blade tip torsion against HOSTs results and experimental
measurements. The backward sweep of the ERATO blade leads to minimum torsion when
the blade tip of the advancing blade ( 90deg) undergoes transonic speeds. The aft-
swept blade tip, pulled down by negative lift, acts as a lever introducing pull-up pitch
to the rest of the blade. The frequency of the measured torsion is 5/rev, whereas both
HOST and the coupling results yield a 4/rev frequency. This is understandable, given the
low frequency content of the pitching moment excitations.
b
is shown in Figure 5.19. The convergence of the cyclic apping angles (trim targets)
and cyclic controls is shown in Figure 5.20. The rotor propulsive force coecient (not
plotted), although left out of the trim, stays satisfyingly close to the trim target. There is
a mild overshooting tendency in the rotor controls, but in the last four revolutions their
variation is satisfyingly conned within a range of 0.20deg.
5.2.4.2 Reynolds-Averaged Navier-Stokes CFD, viscous oweld
Next, results are shown for the ERATO high-speed ight condition, but using a viscous
oweld modeling. These results are actually older than the inviscid ones presented just
above. In fact, after this simulation it was found that the spring denition of the lead-
lag dampers of blades 2 and 4 was wrong due a mistake in the frames of reference. It
was then decided to repeat the simulation with correct spring settings but using the less
computationally intensive inviscid modeling.
Another small issue emerged after the simulation. One of the inputs of the CFD
analysis is the Reynolds number at the blade tip. As a result of copying the CFD card
of the 7A rotor analysis, the Reynolds number prescribed for the ERATO rotor was that
of the 7A, which is equal to 2 10
6
. Although both rotors have a similar airspeed at the
blade tip, the chord of the ERATO blade tip is half that of the 7A blade. Therefore, the
Reynolds number should have been halved.
Eight rotor revolutions were simulated with the following parameters:
Common time-step for the CFD, the CSM and HOST equivalent to an azimuthal
step of = 1.2deg.
Parallel collocated staggered scheme (staggered scheme presented in Section 4.2.2).
The damping coecient of the spring/dash-pot system was increased by a factor of
100 during revolutions 1 and 2, by a factor 50 during revolution 3 and then linearly
100
5.2 ERATO rotor
Figure 5.17: ERATO sectional airloads by Euler CFD.
101
5. APPLICATIONS
Figure 5.18: ERATO rotor, blade tip torsion. Euler CFD.
Figure 5.19: ERATO rotor. Collective control and rotor lift coecient.
102
5.2 ERATO rotor
Figure 5.20: ERATO rotor. Cyclic control and apping trim.
ramped down to a factor of 10 during revolution 4 and nally ramped linearly down
again to a factor 1 during revolution 5. Later it was deemed, by looking at the lag
displacements and on an engineering judgment basis, that damping was too stark.
Consequently, the damping coecient was lowered in the subsequent simulations
(i.e., the simulation with inviscid Euler CFD).
Active trim constant k = 2.0, yielding an amplication factor of the controls a =
3T/k = 1.5T.
Sectional airloads for the C
n
M
2
and C
m
M
2
at two blade spanstations, r/R=0.75 and
r/R=0.975, are shown in Figure 5.21. The viscous airloads provide a very substantial im-
provement compared to the inviscid results in Figure 5.17, particularly in terms of pitching
moment. The amplitude of the negative peak in pitching moment of the advancing blade
is now better predicted, both for r/R=0.75 and r/R=0.975.
b
is shown in Figure 5.22. The convergence of the cyclic apping angles (trim targets) and
cyclic controls is shown in Figure 5.23. The rotor propulsive force coecient (not plotted),
although left out of the trim, stays satisfyingly close to the trim target.
Most remarkably, trim convergence is not as fast and smooth as for the previous
results. This is in good part due to the use of a greater amplication of the rotor control
corrections (k = 2.0 here against k = 1.5 in the inviscid results). There is an overshooting
tendency in the rotor controls and trim variables. And it seems that the collective control
103
5. APPLICATIONS
(a) Pitching moment. r/R=0.75 (b) Normal force. r/R=0.75
Figure 5.21: ERATO sectional airloads by Reynolds-Averaged Navier-Stokes CFD.
104
5.2 ERATO rotor
will converge to a value higher than in the inviscid case, which is reasonable, considering
the greater drag generated by a viscous ow.
Figure 5.22: ERATO rotor. Collective control and rotor lift coecient.
5.2.5 Discussion of the results
Assessing rotor aeroelastic solutions is a bit of a chicken and egg dilemma. It is not easy to
tell if the shortcomings of the coupled solution arise from the ow modeling, the structure
modeling, or both. Generally, capturing accurately the highly unsteady 3D oweld is
more challenging than simulating the structural dynamics. But the coupling method can
also be a source of inaccuracy. This section contains some comments on problems related
to the individual disciplines. The next section studies in more detail the consequences of
the coupling method.
When comparing results to experimental data it must be kept in mind that the ERATO
simulations were more of a test exercise than a high-delity analysis. Indeed, simulation
runs were often repeated as new errors emerged. And, given the high computational cost
of the solutions (see Section 5.2.6), this adjustment process was lengthy, with further work
still being necessary.
Compared to experiment, the main shortcomings of the predicted airloads -both for
inviscid and viscous owelds- are a too low frequency content and diculties in capturing
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5. APPLICATIONS
Figure 5.23: ERATO rotor. Cyclic control and apping trim.
the negative peaks in lift and pitching moment in the advancing blade: their amplitudes
are underpredicted and their location is shifted to an azimuth a few degrees lower than
experiments.
The dynamic stall in the retreating blade is not captured at all by the C
n
M
2
and
C
m
M
2
coecients of the viscous airloads. In the retreating blade the Mach number M
is at its lowest, which may further dampen any C
n
or C
m
perturbation. A check was
done by comparing the bare normal coecient C
n
and pitching moment coecient C
m
to
those of experiment. These coecients should reect better a small perturbation on the
pressure distribution and thus be more sensitive to the dynamic stall. In Figure 5.24(b) it
can be seen, at 290deg, a sharp but short rise in the experimental lift, denoting the
start of the dynamic stall. The CFD lift does not capture this. Similarly, Figure 5.24(a)
shows a smooth CFD pitching moment curve where the experiment undergoes a sharp
and deep negative peak. A plausible argument for the lack of stall capturing could lie in
the turbulence model. Note that this work used the simplest turbulence model available
in elsA, namely the algebraic model of Michel. More sophisticated turbulence models
could improve the prediction of ow separation phenomena.
Another ow feature that remains elusive takes place near the blade tip, at the
r/R = 0.975 section, in the rst quadrant, close to = 90deg. The pitching moment,
Figure 5.21(c), can be seen to surge before plunging into a deep negative peak. Simulta-
neously, the lift force, Figure 5.21(d), presents in the same azimuthal location not a surge
but a modest lift gain that tends to counter an otherwise fast reduction in lift. Arguably,
106
5.2 ERATO rotor
(a) Pitching moment C
m
. r/R=0.975 (b) Normal force C
n
. r/R=0.975
Figure 5.24: ERATO. RANS CFD sectional coecients, r/R=0.975.
these phenomena are due to blade-wake interaction. This hypothesis has already been
advanced in the 7A rotor results, with references to literature, but is recalled next.
In high-speed level ight, blade-vortex interaction is not a dominant phenomenon
because the wake is quickly convected past the rotor, which is strongly tilted forward.
But there is limited wake interaction in the rst quadrant, which could account for the
perturbations in the airloads. Indeed, a vortex shed by a preceding blade could rise the
local incidence angle of the advancing blades tip, provided the vortex passes close enough.
This claim is further supported by the observation that the convergence of the airloads
was slowest in the rst quadrant, as shown in Figure 5.25.
The uid grid for the viscous RANS analysis of this study contains 2.1 10
6
points,
which is far less than many other concurrent studies, and is not conceived for optimal wake
conservation. It would be interesting to use a rened grid to see its impact on the solution.
As a last remark on the viscous results, it is here recalled that the Reynolds number
was accidentally set to a value double of the right one (2 10
6
instead of 1 10
6
). Although
this may not have a signicant impact, it does nonetheless push in the wrong direction:
it removes viscosity. Greater viscous forces, as compared to inertial, may help in improv-
ing stall prediction, for example. Furthermore, in the viscous simulation, the springs of
blades 2 and 4 were dened in a wrong frame of reference. In addition, the springs of
all four blades had an excessive damping, which did not let the structure breath normally.
Like in the 7A rotor, the support rig of the rotor in the wind tunnel was not in-
107
5. APPLICATIONS
Figure 5.25: ERATO. Convergence of the RANS sectional airloads, r/R=0.975.
cluded in the CFD models. The primary eect of the support is to induce an upwash on
the inboard part of the rotor blade, near 180deg azimuth, thereby increasing the normal
force in this region. No sectional airloads have been shown for such inboard blade sections.
The blade tip torsion (obtained with inviscid airloads) has been shown in Figure 5.18.
The shape of the coupled solution reproduces fairly well that of the experiment, but the
following dierences can be observed: there is a constant phase lag between solution and
experiment, the solution being in advance. The solution does not twist as much as the
experiment in the = 200deg and = 270deg regions. More generally, the amplitude
of the solution oscillations is too low. And the rst torsional peak at = 30deg is
not captured at all. This makes both HOST and the coupled solution to have a 4/rev
frequency in torsion, instead of the experimental 5/rev.
A look at the predicted Campbell diagram for the ERATO blade, Figure 5.12, reveals
that there are no modes in the 5/rev frequency when the normalized rotation velocity is
equal to 1 (i.e., the nominal rotor rotation speed ). By contrast, the Campbell diagram
does show the third ap mode to cross the 4/rev harmonic at the nominal rotation speed.
It has been seen in Figure 5.11 that the third ap mode contains a lot of torsion deection
due to the aft-swept tip of the ERATO blade. Therefore, it is coherent that the predicted
torsion in Figure 5.18 does not exhibit 5/rev harmonics but 4/rev, which corresponds
actually to a ap mode.
Furthermore, an analysis of the frequency content of the inviscid airloads shows that
the amplitude of the 4/rev and 5/rev -and nearly all other harmonics- is largely under-
108
5.2 ERATO rotor
predicted with respect to experiment, see Figure 5.26; together with the lack of 5/rev
modes, it is natural that the structure does not respond at that frequency. And, given
the lower amplitude with respect to experiment of the inviscid loads, the underprediction
of the twist amplitude appears coherent as well.
The presence of a 5/rev component in the measured torsion response remains unclear,
given that no modeshapes are predicted at that frequency. And the nite element model is
believed to be accurate because the discrepancies between measured and predicted eigen-
frequencies of the non-rotating blade dier at maximum by 4%.
Figure 5.26: Harmonic analysis of the inviscid airloads on the ERATO rotor.
Summarizing, there is no strong evidence of aws in the mechanical model, save for
the Coriolis forces, which are not modeled at all by MSC.Marc, as Section 2.2.1.6 proved.
The lack of Coriolis forces is not expected to deteriorate much the solution though.
An interesting exercise to test the quality of the 3D FE mechanical model would be
to prescribe the experimental airloads. This was not done due to lack of time. And such
tests introduce problems of their own, since the experimental airloads are only available at
5 or 6 spanstations and therefore extensive interpolations and extrapolations are required.
109
5. APPLICATIONS
A second and important exercise would be to compare the here presented results for
the ERATO rotor obtained by the HOST/MSC.Marc/CFD coupling with the predictions
of a HOST/CFD coupling. This exercise would allow to use the same aerodynamic model
on both simulations and thus focus on the comparison of the dynamics predictions by the
3D FE model and by the beam model in HOST. Again, this comparison was not done due
to lack of time to prepare the HOST/CFD coupling for the ERATO rotor. It is planned
to perform this simulation shortly.
5.2.6 Computational cost
All simulations used ve processors, scattered over three computers, simultaneously. MSC
Marc runs were done on a HP-Itanium cluster with 1.4GHz processors, using one processor
for each of the two parallel two-bladed nite element models. A third processor on this
cluster hosted the coupling server. The server hardly requires computing power and can
be run anywhere. HOST, which consumes very little computing power as well, was run on
a SUN computer. The CFD was run on a NEC SX-8 vectorial supercomputer with 2 GHz
processors. Due to a limitation in the grid deformation tool, the four blocks of the rotor
grid had to be run on a single processor. For the CFD options used here, each time-step
took approximately 2 wallclock minutes for RANS simulations and less than 30 seconds
for Euler simulations. A time-step in MSC.Marc took approximately 2 wallclock minutes.
Therefore, a rotor revolution made of 300 increments with RANS CFD can be obtained in
approximately 10 wallclock hours if a parallel staggered scheme is used. For a converged
solution of 8 rotor revolutions, 80 wallclock hours are necessary. This computation time
doubles if a serial staggered scheme and RANS CFD are used. Computations times are
expected to diminish signicantly in the near future as CFD accepts parallelization and
MSC.Marc is run on the supercomputer.
5.3 Comparison of coupling staggered algorithms
Three staggered schemes are compared in this section. The objective is to conrm the
literature claims on the dierent versions of coupling algorithms.
The procedure consisted in simulating the three initial ERATO rotor revolutions in
the high-speed ight condition of the previous sections, after starting from scratch each
time. The time-step was increased by a factor of 3 with respect to the time-step used for
the results of the previous sections. The new time step was equivalent to = 3.6deg.
This three-fold increase of the time-step was done in order to put a greater strain on the
time-accuracy of the staggered schemes.
The inviscid Euler CFD model was used because ow accuracy was not a priority and
it would save computational resources. For further simplication, the active trim was not
used initially. Instead, xed rotor controls were used.
The following three staggered schemes were tested: the serial collocated (SC), the
parallel collocated (PC) and the serial non-collocated (SNC).
110
The comparison criterion was the work performed by the uid and structure subsys-
tems on the uid/structure interface.
Figures 5.27 5.29 show the time-histories of the integrated works W
F
and W
S
per-
formed by the uid and structure subsystems on the uid/structure interface of a sin-
gle blade and computed using the serial collocated, parallel collocated and serial non-
collocated schemes. These works are evaluated as
W
F
=
n
1
W
n
F
, W
S
=
n
1
W
n
S
, (5.4)
where W
n
F
and W
n
S
are the works performed by the uid and structure subsystems during
the time interval [t
n1
, t
n
]. The evaluations of W
n
F
and W
n
S
are done as follows
W
S
=
1
2
_
F
n
S
+F
n+1
S
_
T
_
u
n+1
S
u
n
S
_
, (5.5)
W
F
=
1
2
_
F
n
F
+F
n+1
F
_
T
_
x
n+1
F
x
n
F
_
(for SC and PC), (5.6)
W
F
=
1
2
_
W
n+1/2
F
+ W
n+3/2
F
_
(5.7)
=
1
4
_
F
n1/2
F
+F
n+1/2
F
_
T
_
x
n+1/2
F
x
n1/2
F
_
(5.8)
+
1
4
_
F
n+1/2
F
+F
n+3/2
F
_
T
_
x
n+3/2
F
x
n+1/2
F
_
(for SNC), (5.9)
where F are the airloads, including three forces and three moments. u
S
and x
F
represent
the position of the structure and uid nodes at the uid/structure interface, respectively.
Due to a mishandling of the frames of reference, the x and y components of the work
were badly calculated. The works plotted in the gures below correspond only to the work
performed by the vertical force and vertical displacements along the z direction. This is
anyway a good indicator because lift and apping account for most of the work at the
Figures 5.27 5.29 show that the serial non-collocated (SNC) scheme is the one violat-
ing in the least the conservation of the energy at the uid/structure interface. The works
performed by the uid and structure subsystems using the SNC scheme look coincident
in Figure 5.29. With the SNC, the relative variation (W
F
W
S
) /W
S
oscillates between
0.15% and 3% (apart from two oshots at the very start of the simulation). Thereby,
the serial non-collocated scheme does preserve the energy at the uid/structure interface
better than the parallel and serial collocated schemes, in agreement with what has been
published in [26].
Despite the evident dierences in energy conservation at the uid/structure inter-
face of the dierent staggered schemes, when the aeroelastic solutions (i.e., airloads and
structural displacements) are compared, dierences between the schemes become negligi-
ble. Only the sectional airloads using the parallel scheme can be observed to oscillate at
111
5. APPLICATIONS
Figure 5.27: Integrated work at the uid structure interface using the serial collocated
scheme.
Figure 5.28: Integrated work at the uid structure interface using the parallel collocated
scheme.
112
Figure 5.29: Integrated work at the uid structure interface using the serial non-collocated
scheme.
higher frequency during the rst revolution. This is shown in Figure 5.30, where the pitch-
ing moment obtained with the parallel collocated and serial non-collocated schemes are
compared. Figure 5.30(a) shows the greater oscillations in pitching moment produced by
the parallel scheme, although only during the rst revolution. The second and third revo-
lutions are indistinguishable to those of the serial non-collocated scheme (Figure 5.30(b)).
The normal force, not plotted, was also observed to oscillate with the parallel scheme,
but not as much as the pitching moment.
The serial collocated and non-collocated schemes gave equal airloads evolutions.
A second series of algorithm comparisons was performed by including the active trim.
The objective was to observe the eects, if any, of the inclusion of varying rotor controls
in the comparison of the staggered schemes. The rest of the simulation conditions were
the same than in the previous exercise: = 3.6deg. The serial collocated scheme, being
less accurate than the non-collocated but equally computationally costly, was left out of
the comparisons.
The rotor controls variations in the two simulations are very similar and are shown in
Figure 5.31.
The evolution of the sectional airloads at r/R=0.975 with the parallel scheme is shown
in Figure 5.32. The evolution of the sectional airloads at r/R=0.975 with the serial non-
collocated scheme results is shown in Figure 5.33. It can be readily observed that the
113
5. APPLICATIONS
(a) Pitching moment using parallel scheme. (b) Pitching moment using serial non-collocated
scheme.
Figure 5.30: Comparison of the pitching moments at r/R=0.975 using parallel and serial
schemes.
Figure 5.31: Rotor controls evolution with the parallel collocated and serial non-collocated
schemes.
114
parallel scheme leads to non-physical oscillating airloads, even more markedly for the
pitching moment, see Figure 5.32(a). On the other hand, the serial non-collocated scheme,
all other things equal, yields a smooth evolution of the airloads.
These results illustrate again the inferior accuracy of the parallel scheme as compared
to the serial non-collocated scheme. However, it seems likely that the airloads oscillations
observed with the parallel scheme would disappear if the simulation ran for a few more
revolutions and rotor controls began to stabilize.
5.3.1 Remarks on the comparison of staggered schemes
In view of the obtained results and in agreement with theory, there are two optimal
staggered algorithms. If accuracy is to be maximized, the serial non-collocated scheme
preserves best the energy at the uid/structure interface for the same computational
cost than the serial collocated. However, for those applications where both the uid and
structure subsystems have equal computation times, the parallel scheme also proves to be
a very interesting choice.
In the applications of this work no signicant dierences were observed between the
dierent schemes, probably because of too small time-steps. In such case the parallel
scheme becomes the best option because it minimises the overall simulation time.
115
5. APPLICATIONS
Figure 5.32: Parallel collocated scheme, with active trim.
Figure 5.33: Serial non-collocated scheme, with active trim.
116
Conclusions and Perspectives
This research has introduced for the rst time three-dimensional nite element models of
the rotor blades in the aeroelastic analysis of a helicopter rotor. A nite element solver
has been successfully coupled to a three-dimensional unsteady uid solver and to a rotor-
craft comprehensive analysis. The coupled procedure involves dynamic simulations using
a time-accurate coupling procedure, where solutions are exchanged at each time-step.
The basis of a general coupling framework open to any CFD or CSM solver compliant
with the CGNS public data model has been developed. This framework is noteworthy for
its modularity, which permits to plug a variable number of applications. In addition, the
new framework allows to combine uid and structure models of varying complexity, thus
providing a means to tailor the numerical modeling to the specic problem under study.
This study has solved a long criticized drawback of time-accurate couplings in rotor-
craft aeroelasticity: their incapacity to yield trimmed solutions of steady ight conditions
while respecting a set of target aerodynamic forces necessary for in-ight equilibrium. The
solution consisted in implementing a continuous rotor control modication in proportion
to the oset of the actual rotor generated aerodynamic forces with respect to the target
values. This new method has been successfully applied to both autonomous HOST sim-
ulations and to the coupled analyses of 3D unsteady CFD with 3D nite element based
dynamics. Rotor controls become reasonably stabilized after 6 rotor revolutions.
The capabilities of the new coupling are demonstrated by applying it to investigate
the aeroelastic response of two dierent isolated rotors: the 7A rotor and the ERATO
rotor. The numerical results are compared to measurements.
The 7A rotor has been used to validate the HOST/MSC.Marc/elsA simulation by
successfully reproducing the airloads predicted by an equivalent HOST/elsA coupling,
yet at a lower computational cost because less CFD rotor revolutions were performed and
trim convergence was performed automatically.
The ERATO rotor has been used as a demonstrator for the rst ever application of
3D nite element based models of the blades in the aeroelastic analysis of an isolated
rotor. Simple yet eective and conservative methods to transfer structure motion and
loads between spatially non-matching meshes have been implemented. The conservation
of the energy at the uid/structure interface has been used to validate the accuracy of
117
Conclusions and Perspectives
the transfers. The early results are in fair agreement to experiment; sectional airloads
and blade tip torsion reproduce the experimental trends, but the frequency contents and
the amplitude of the experiment are underpredicted. It is not possible yet to compare
the prediction of the dynamic response of the blades by HOST with that of the 3D FE
model because dierent aerodynamics models were used. Further investigation is required.
Three dierent iteration-free staggered schemes for time-accurate couplings have been
tested: the serial collocated, the parallel collocated and the serial non-collocated. The con-
servation of the energy at the uid/structure interface has been used to ascertain that the
most accurate method is the serial non-collocated, in agreement with literature. However,
the three staggered schemes did not yield signicantly dierent solutions. Consequently,
the best choice is the parallel collocated scheme because it minimises the computation
time.
This work has contributed to the initial phase of an international collaboration involv-
ing the research centers ONERA and DLR and a helicopter manufacturer. The develop-
ments here undertaken will be pursued until the end of the project in 2011.
Future axes of research will include:
To continue the analyses of the isolated rotors here undertaken. New simulations
with the Coriolis forces taken into account properly and a more rened uid grid.
To assess the beam model in HOST by comparing HOST/CFD aeroelastic predic-
tions with HOST/MSC.Marc/CFD ones.
To implement to a full extent the CGNS data model to describe structure data once
it is approved by the international CGNS Steering Committee.
To perform simulations in which the uid grid surface is deformed following the
surface deformation of the 3D FE model and the structural loads are prescribed as a
distribution of pressure and shear. More generally, to develop a general interpolation
toolbox that can handle all combinations of geometries.
To apply the new 3D nite element capability to model non-beam like structures,
such as bearingless rotor hubs.
To enable coupled simulations in which the structure is modeled in HOST and only a
critical component of the structure is modeled by external 3D CSM methods. This
option is very appealling because it limits the use of computationally expensive
3D models to a minimum, yet at the same time the partition of a single structure
between two structural solvers is challenging and requires investigation.
118
The work to come will stand on the bases here settled. As the rotorcraft coupling
becomes more mature, both research and industry are to exploit the versatility and high-
accuracy potential of the coupled analysis to gain better understanding of rotorcraft
aeroelastic phenomena and eventually, design the rotorcraft of tomorrow.
119
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[56] Khiem Van Truong. Structural dynamics of non-straight blades. Technical Report
RT 2/12327 DDSS, ONERA, December 2007. 19
124
Appendix A
Frames of reference
The frames of reference given in this appendix were extracted from the document CHANCE
- Denition of Output Quantities, Revision 1.2, October 16 2001.
Figure A.1: Helicopter frame and xed rotor frame. Side view.
The rotating rotor frame, shown in Figure A.3, is a rotor-xed frame, as opposed to
the xed rotor frame, which does not rotate with the rotor angular speed .
125
A. FRAMES OF REFERENCE
Figure A.2: Helicopter frame and xed rotor frame. Top View.
Figure A.3: Fixed rotor frame and rotating rotor frame.
126
Figure A.4: Pitch, ap and lag angles of the blade.
Figure A.5: Section frame.
127

CSM/CFD Coupling for the Dynamic Analysis of Helicopter Rotors
This work has developed a method to perform aeroelastic simulations of helicopter rotors by coupling a
three-dimensional finite element structural (CSM) solver to a computational fluid dynamics (CFD) solver and to a
flight mechanics code. The objective is to develop a numerical analysis tool able to predict accurately the
aeroelastic behaviour of arbitrary rotorcraft configurations and geometries. This is not possible with todays
analyses for rotorcraft aeroelasticity because they are all constrained by the use of beam theory in their structural
models.
The basic idea is to use a partitioned approach in which existing specialized software for fluid, structure and flight
mechanics are coupled in a time-accurate fashion. The solvers exchange their solutions at each time-step with an
iteration-free staggered scheme. For this purpose, a software environment for coupling codes distributed over a
network was developed, together with a new method to control the rotor and obtain aeroelastic predictions
respecting in-flight equilibrium. The new coupling was applied to the simulation of isolated rotors in level
high-speed flight and results were compared to wind tunnel measurements.
The coupling can solve both steady and transient flight conditions, including nonlinear phenomena. It can be used
for the analysis of complex, non slender, structures such as bearingless rotor hubs. The partitioned approach
enables the exploitation of state-of-the-art methods in each subdiscipline while conserving the energy at the
fluid/structure interface, and the iteration-free staggered schemes can yield second-order time-accuracy. The
aeroelastic predictions match the flight mechanics targets. The coupling is successfully applied to the aeroelastic
simulation of a rotor with 3D finite element modelled blades. Future work will pursue the developments here
engaged in view of an industrial deployment.
Mots-cls : AEROELASTICITY ; ROTORCRAFT ; FLUID-STRUCTURE INTERACTION ; PARTITIONED PROCEDURE ;
CFD/CSM COUPLING ; TIME-ACCURACY
Couplage CSM/CFD pour lAnalyse Dynamique des Rotors dHlicoptre
Cette thse a dvelopp une mthode pour raliser des simulations arolastiques de rotors dhlicoptre en
couplant un code tridimensionnel dlments finis (CSM) avec un code de mcanique de fluides (CFD) et un code
de mcanique de vol. Lobjectif a t de dvelopper un outil danalyse numrique capable de prdire avec
prcision le comportement arolastique dune configuration a voilure tournante de gomtrie arbitraire. Ceci
nest pas possible avec les outils actuels darolasticit hlicoptre car ils sont tous limits par lutilisation de
modles structuraux de type poutre.
Lide principale est dutiliser une approche partitionne qui permet de coupler les logiciels spcialiss existants
pour la structure, le fluide et la mcanique de vol. Ces codes changent leurs solutions chaque pas de temps
avec une mthode alterne sans sous itrations. Pour cela, un environnement logiciel pour le couplage de codes
distribus sur le rseau a t dvelopp, ainsi quune mthode pour contrler le rotor et obtenir des prdictions
arolastiques respectant lquilibre en vol. Le nouveau couplage a t appliqu la simulation de rotors isols
en vol horizontal davancement grande vitesse et les rsultats ont t compars aux mesures en soufflerie.
Le couplage peut galement calculer des rponses en vol de manuvre et prendre en compte des effets non
linaires, ainsi que les moyeux complexes modernes de type bearingless. Lapproche partitionne permet
lexploitation de ltat de lart dans chacune des disciplines tout en conservant lnergie linterface
fluide/structure, et le schma de couplage sans sous itrations peut tre prcis au deuxime ordre dans le temps.
Les prdictions arolastiques respectent les objectifs de la mcanique de vol. Le couplage a t appliqu avec
succs la simulation arolastique dun rotor isol dont les pales ont t modlises par lments finis 3D. Les
dveloppements ici entams seront poursuivis et inscrits au sein de la gamme doutils utiliss dans lindustrie.
Keywords : AEROELASTICITE ; HELICOPTERE ; INTERACTION FLUIDE-STRUCTURE ; METHODE PARTITIONNEE ;
COUPLAGE CFD/CSM ; PRECISION TEMPORELLE
Office National d'tudes et de Recherches Arospatiales
BP 72 - 29 avenue de la Division Leclerc
92322 CHATILLON CEDEX
Tl. : +33 1 46 73 40 40 - Fax : +33 1 46 73 41 41
http://www.onera.fr

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Numerical Simulations of Fluid-Structure Interaction

azimuth, which increases the local angle of attack. An

) xed to the cross-section -the so called section

, which is in turn cross multiplied with the

to obtain a span-wise vector normal to the cross-section, x

can be written as the direction cosine matrix T, which

, the free-ow speed. Note that the

Etude dun Rotor Acoustiquement Optimise) rotor is the outcome of a

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