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Investigation on improving longitudinal static stability of a blended wing body aircraft

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Abstract

The blended wing body (BWB) aircraft as a novel aircraft configuration has a poor longitudinal static stability. A V-tail is installed on the BWB to improve the longitudinal static stability, which achieves the limited improvements. Therefore, the BWB is investigated to further improve the longitudinal static stability with experimental tests and numerical simulations in this paper. The variation with angle of attack (AOA) α of the pitching moment coefficient (Cm) is divided into three regions, i.e., the first AOA region with static stability, the AOA region with static instability, and the second AOA region with static stability. It is found that the position of the forebody vortex acting on the V-tail surface is closely related to the longitudinal static stability of the BWB aircraft. Through increasing the spanwise distance of the V-tail to change the position of the forebody vortex acting on the V-tail surface, the AOA region with static instability is decreased. The longitudinal static stability of the BWB aircraft is improved. The evolution of associated pressure distributions, flow separations and vortical structures is presented in detail.

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Availability of data

The data that support the findings of this study are available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request.

Abbreviations

α :

Angle of attack (AOA)

C m :

Pitching moment coefficient

ω x*:

Dimensionless vorticity

ρ ∞ :

Mass density of air

S :

Cross-sectional area of the aircraft

D :

Distance between the tail end of the aircraft and the moment center of the balance

C p :

Pressure coefficient

M :

Pitching moment of the BWB aircraft

b a :

Mean aerodynamic chord (MAC)

V ∞ :

Freestream velocity

Re :

Reynolds number based on ba and V∞

b :

Spanwise distance of the V-tail

L :

Spanwise size of the test model

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Acknowledgements

The study is supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (12002022 & 11972060); Ningbo National Science Foundation (202003N4177) and the Research Fund of Key Laboratory of Unsteady Aerodynamics and Flow Control (KLUAFC-E-201902).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Aircraft and Propulsion Laboratory, Ningbo Institute of Technology, Beihang University, Ningbo, 315800, China

    Zhongyang Qi

  2. Ministry-of-Education Key Laboratory of Fluid Mechanics, Beihang University, Beijing, 100191, China

    Siyu Zong & Yankui Wang

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  1. Zhongyang Qi
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  2. Siyu Zong
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  3. Yankui Wang
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Correspondence to Zhongyang Qi.

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Qi, Z., Zong, S. & Wang, Y. Investigation on improving longitudinal static stability of a blended wing body aircraft. CEAS Aeronaut J 12, 755–766 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s13272-021-00538-2

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s13272-021-00538-2

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