Structural Optimization Subjected To Thermal And Mechanical Loads

With the rapid development of science and technology, high speed vehicles has become a hotspot in the field of aeronautics and astronautics. With the promotion of flying velocity, high speed vehicles will suffer more aerothermal loads. The temperature reaches a critical level on the surface of high speed vehicles. One of the most challenging and difficult parts in high speed vehicle design is structural optimization under both mechanical loads and thermal loads at the same time.Taking a two-dimensional plate for example, methods of optimization for structure under mechanical loads and thermal loads are studied in this paper. Firstly, research on topology optimization has been done. In this part, exsiting methods for single objective topology optimization are analyzed. In general, compliance is chosen as the objective of topology optimization when the structure is subjected to mechanical loads, thermal compliance is chosen as the objective of topology optimization when the structure is subjected to thermal loads. Secondly, by using weight factor, compliance and thermal compliance are combined together, the objective function of topology optimization under mechanical loads and thermal loads is proposed in a new method. Corresponding software is written by Matlab. Thirdly, Genetic algorithm is applied in sizing optimization by interaction between Abaqus and ModeFRONTIER. Finally, both topology optimization and sizing optimization is applied in the design of a two-dimensional plate. Under the guidance of topology optimization, a much lighter structure is obtained in sizing optimization. The feasibility and efficiency of the method in the paper is validated by this numerial example.