Fluid-structure Interactions Based Numerical Simulations On The Aerodynamic Heating Effect At The Front Edge Of Hypersonic Aircraft

When flying at hypersonic speed in the atmosphere, hypersonic aircraft severely compresses air in the front side and causes strong friction with the air flow,leading to aerodynamic heating. This heating effect results in great thermal stress, jeopardizing the rigidity and strength of the aircraft structure. Therefore, the structural stability and material heat-resistance are of great importance. The aerodynamic heating issues are closely related to the thermal protection system design of the hypersonic aircraft.Fluid-structure interaction analysis combines the advantages of fluid analysis and solid state analysis. Namely, it investigates the interaction between fluid field and the deformable structure in the fluid field. It has been applied in many fields, including aeronautics and astronautics, medical research, and hydraulic engineering. In these practical applications,energy transfer problems are difficult to solve. Sometimes neither structural deformation nor change of fluid field can be neglected. Hence the fluid-structure interaction analysis is of critical importance in these cases.This thesis solved the problem of using ANSYS-Workbench14.0 to perform one-way fluid-structure interaction analysis in aerodynamic heating environment. Fluid-structure numerical simulation was conducted at the front edge of a hypersonic aircraft. Interfaces between Steady-State Thermal (ANSYS), Static Structural (ANSYS) and FLUENT are developed based on ANSYS-Workbench14.0. First, a two dimension thin-wall tube was simulated to analyze the structural change in both unstable and stable conditions. Second,a spherical cylinder is used to analyze the structural change under only fluid field pressure and under fluid field pressure coupled with thermal force. Aluminum alloy was used in the analysis. The analysis results help further understand the coupling effect between aerodynamic heating and aircraft structure, and have implications in the designing and testing of the thermal protecting system of hypersonic aircraft.