Developing Response Surface Based Wing Weight Equations for Conceptual Morphing Air craft Sizing

Accurate weight equations developed for morphing aircraft components have the potential to better substantiate the sizing results for various types of mo rphing aircraft. This paper will discuss a general strategy to develop parametric morphing wing weight equations usi ng response surface methods. A simple morphing wing concept will be used to demonstrate the se strategies . A design of experiments (DOE) b ased on the wing’s geometric parameters will be used to define a range of planforms that will be structurally optimized; the designs considered here include the face -centered central composite design and a D optimal set of experiments. Two finite element -based structural optimization methods will be described and implemented to obtain the empirical structural weight for the various wing geometries. The acquired data will be used to approximate the weight equation using a conventional weight equation form and a full quadratic polynomial; both equations will be shown to provide adequate wing weight prediction.