Nonlinear modeling and transition corridor calculation of a tiltrotor without cyclic pitch

¹ College of Automation Engineering, Nanhang University, Nanjing, China
² China Ship Development and Design Center, Wuhan, China

^* Corresponding author: fanyourong@nuaa.edu.cn

Abstract

In order to solve the problem of rotor airflow interference to the wing of tiltrotor UAV, the lift and drag in the slipstream area and the free flow area were calculated respectively according to the hydrodynamics theory and CFD simulation. The longitudinal nonlinear dynamics model of tiltrotor UAV is established by Newton-Euler method. In order to solve the problem that the lift and thrust are difficult to balance the body gravity in the transition flight mode, a method for calculating the transition corridor of a tiltrotor UAV without cyclic pitch is proposed. The boundary of the transition corridor is restricted by the Angle of attack of the wing and the thrust of the rotor. Considering the requirements of UAV cruise speed, flight safety and minimum energy consumption, the optimal transition curve is selected. The result show that the designed transition curve can ensure that the lift and the rotor thrust can balance the gravity completely and the Angle of attack is in a reasonable range, and the rotor force has enough margin of safety.