The Study of Fluid Structure Interactions of an Electroactive Membrane Wing

Active materials, due to their intrinsic multi-functional material characteristics, have shown great promise for the improvement of agility and the mitigation of adverse turbulence effects for micro-air-vehicles (MAVs). One such subsection of active materials known as dielectric elastomers have demonstrated this multifunctional role by functioning as the wing surface and a boundary layer control device. In the past this material has shown that an increase in overall lift of 20% is possible and has the ability to delay stall by up to 5 degrees for an elliptical wing at a chord based Reynolds number of 63000. In order to better understand the effect of these fluid structure interactions, simultaneous time dependent structural deformation, aerodynamic loads, and flow velocities were measured and compared. These responses showed direct correlation between the applied electric field on the membrane wing and the aerodynamic loads and flow responses.