- Award ID(s):
- 1931122
- PAR ID:
- 10463489
- Date Published:
- Journal Name:
- ASME Letters in Dynamic Systems and Control
- Volume:
- 2
- Issue:
- 4
- ISSN:
- 2689-6117
- Format(s):
- Medium: X
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
More Like this
-
This paper presents a design procedure to achieve a flapping wing mechanism for a micro air vehicle that drives both the swing and pitch movement of the wing with one actuator. The mechanism combines a planar four bar linkage with a spatial RSSR attached to the input and output links forming a spatial Stephenson six-bar linkage. Function generation synthesis yields a planar four-bar that controls the wing swing profile. The pitch control is synthesized by inverting the movement of the combined system to isolate and compute the SS chain. In order to ensure the design achieves the specified task precision points, the SS chain was randomized within a prescribed tolerance zone. The result was 29 designs, one of which is presented in detail.more » « less
-
null (Ed.)Centimetre-scale fliers must contend with the high power requirements of flapping flight. Insects have elastic elements in their thoraxes which may reduce the inertial costs of their flapping wings. Matching wingbeat frequency to a mechanical resonance can be energetically favourable, but also poses control challenges. Many insects use frequency modulation on long timescales, but wingstroke-to-wingstroke modulation of wingbeat frequencies in a resonant spring-wing system is potentially costly because muscles must work against the elastic flight system. Nonetheless, rapid frequency and amplitude modulation may be a useful control modality. The hawkmoth Manduca sexta has an elastic thorax capable of storing and returning significant energy. However, its nervous system also has the potential to modulate the driving frequency of flapping because its flight muscles are synchronous. We tested whether hovering hawkmoths rapidly alter frequency during perturbations with vortex rings. We observed both frequency modulation (32% around mean) and amplitude modulation (37%) occurring over several wingstrokes. Instantaneous phase analysis of wing kinematics revealed that more than 85% of perturbation responses required active changes in neurogenic driving frequency. Unlike their robotic counterparts that abdicate frequency modulation for energy efficiency, synchronous insects use wingstroke-to-wingstroke frequency modulation despite the power demands required for deviating from resonance.more » « less
-
Abstract Bio-inspired flying robots (BIFRs) which fly by flapping their wings experience continuously oscillating aerodynamic forces. These oscillations in the driving force cause vibrations in the motion of the body around the mean trajectory. In other words, a hovering BIFR does not remain fixed in space; instead, it undergoes oscillatory motion in almost all directions around the stationary point. These oscillations affect the aerodynamic performance of the flier. Assessing the effect of these oscillations, particularly on thrust generation in two-winged and four-winged BIFRs, is the main objective of this work. To achieve such a goal, two experimental setups were considered to measure the average thrust for the two BIFRs. The average thrust is measured over the flapping cycle of the BIFRs. In the first experimental setup, the BIFR is installed at the end of a pendulum rod, in place of the pendulum mass. While flapping, the model creates a thrust force that raises the model along the circular trajectory of the pendulum mass to a certain angular position, which is an equilibrium point and is also stable. Measuring the weight of the BIFR and the equilibrium angle it obtains, it is straightforward to estimate the average thrust, by moment balance about the pendulum hinge. This pendulum setup allows the BIFR model to freely oscillate back and forth along the circular trajectory about the equilibrium position. As such, the estimated average thrust includes the effects of these self-induced vibrations. In contrast, we use another setup with a load cell to measure thrust where the model is completely fixed. The thrust measurement revealed that the load cell or the fixed test leads to a higher thrust than the pendulum or the oscillatory test for the two-winged model, showing the opposite behavior for the four-winged model. That is, self-induced vibrations have different effects on the two BIFR models. We felt that this observation is worth further investigation. It is important to mention that aerodynamic mechanisms for thrust generation in the two and four-winged models are different. A two-winged BIFR generates thrust through traditional flapping mechanisms whereas a four-winged model enjoys a clapping effect, which results from wing-wing interaction. In the present work, we use a motion capture system, aerodynamic modeling, and flow visualization to study the underlying physics of the observed different behaviors of the two flapping models. The study revealed that the interaction of the vortices with the flapping wing robots may play a role in the observed aerodynamic behavior of the two BIFRs.
-
Abstract Flapping flight of animals has captured the interest of researchers due to their impressive flight capabilities across diverse environments including mountains, oceans, forests, and urban areas. Despite the significant progress made in understanding flapping flight, high-altitude flight as showcased by many migrating animals remains underexplored. At high-altitudes, air density is low, and it is challenging to produce lift. Here we demonstrate a first lift-off of a flapping wing robot in a low-density environment through wing size and motion scaling. Force measurements showed that the lift remained high at 0.14 N despite a 66% reduction of air density from the sea-level condition. The flapping amplitude increased from 148 to 233 degrees, while the pitch amplitude remained nearly constant at 38.2 degrees. The combined effect is that the flapping-wing robot benefited from the angle of attack that is characteristic of flying animals. Our results suggest that it is not a simple increase in the flapping frequency, but a coordinated increase in the wing size and reduction in flapping frequency enables the flight in lower density condition. The key mechanism is to preserve the passive rotations due to wing deformation, confirmed by a bioinspired scaling relationship. Our results highlight the feasibility of flight under a low-density, high-altitude environment due to leveraging unsteady aerodynamic mechanisms unique to flapping wings. We anticipate our experimental demonstration to be a starting point for more sophisticated flapping wing models and robots for autonomous multi-altitude sensing. Furthermore, it is a preliminary step towards flapping wing flight in the ultra-low density Martian atmosphere.more » « less
-
Aeromechanics of highly flexible flapping wings is a complex nonlinear fluid–structure interaction problem and, therefore, cannot be analyzed using conventional linear aeroelasticity methods. This paper presents a standalone coupled aeroelastic framework for highly flexible flapping wings in hover for micro air vehicle (MAV) applications. The MAV-scale flapping wing structure is modeled using fully nonlinear beam and shell finite elements. A potential-flow-based unsteady aerodynamic model is then coupled with the structural model to generate the coupled aeroelastic framework. Both the structural and aerodynamic models are validated independently before coupling. Instantaneous lift force and wing deflection predictions from the coupled aeroelastic simulations are compared with the force and deflection measurements (using digital image correlation) obtained from in-house flapping wing experiments at both moderate (13 Hz) and high (20 Hz) flapping frequencies. Coupled trim analysis is then performed by simultaneously solving wing response equations and vehicle trim equations until trim controls, wing elastic response, inflow and circulation converge all together. The dependence of control inputs on weight and center of gravity (cg) location of the vehicle is studied for the hovering flight case.more » « less