Aeroelastic Modeling and Control of an Experimental Flexible Wing

Structural weight reduction and high aspect ratio wings play a key role in improving the performance of modern transport aircraft. This leads to a highly flexible aircraft structure which is sensitive to external disturbances like gusts. To counteract this undesired effect, active control is a promising technology. In this paper, a gust load alleviation controller is designed for a wind tunnel model of a flexible wing with various trailing edge flaps and acceleration sensors. For a sophisticated model-based controller design, a detailed aeroelastic model is derived describing the coupling of structural dynamics and aerodynamics. Additionally, actuator dynamics and structural modes are identified and used to improve model accuracy. Subsequently, the weakly damped first wing bending mode, which causes high structural loads, is isolated via H2-optimal blending of control inputs andmeasurement outputs. In this way, a gain-scheduled single-input single-output controller can be designed to control the desired aeroelastic mode. Eventually, the great potential of the proposed control approach is verified by a wind tunnel test including different gust excitations and varying airspeeds.