Effectiveness of Trailing Edge Active Flow Control on Pitch Control of an Unmanned Aerial Vehicle

A low-speed wind-tunnel study has made to explore the possibility of Gurney flap and Jet Flap as proposed pitch control effectors of an unmanned aerial vehicle at 20 m/s, yielding a Reynolds number of 375,000. Conventional control surface on the elevator of a one-third scale Extra 330 airplane has been replaced with a 3% Gurney flap at the trailing edge. The measurement results from a 6-component force balance suggest that the jet flap is capable of generating significant lift and rolling moments with realistic jet momentum coefficients. The comparison of coefficients of lift, drag and pitching moments for different configurations of active and conventional elevators have been made.

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