Browsing by Author "Kipouros, Timoleon"
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Item Open Access ADOPT: An augmented set-based design framework with optimisation(Cambridge University Press, 2019-03-07) Georgiades, Alexandros; Sharma, Sanjiv; Kipouros, Timoleon; Savill, MarkDuring the early stages of any system design, a thorough exploration of the design space can prove to be challenging and computationally expensive. The challenges are further exacerbated when dealing with complex systems, such as an aircraft, due to the high dimensionality of their design space. Arising from the Toyota Product Development System, Set-Based Design allows parallel evaluation of multiple alternative configurations in the early design stages. At the same time, optimisation methods can be employed at later stages to fine-tune the engineering characteristics of design variants. Presented in this paper, is the Augmented set-based Design and OPTimisation (ADOPT) Framework that introduces a novel methodology for integrating the two areas. This allows for a thorough design space exploration while ensuring the optimality of the selected designs. The framework has been developed using a process-independent and tool-agnostic approach so that it can be applied to the design process of varying kinds of systems. To demonstrate the implementation and potential benefits, the framework has been applied to the design of a generic aircraft fuel system. The results from the case study and the framework itself are discussed, with a number of areas for further development and future work being identified and presented.Item Open Access Aerodynamic and cost modelling for aircraft in a multi-disciplinary design context.(Cranfield University, 2015-12) Di Pasquale, Davide; Savill, Mark A.; Kipouros, Timoleon; Holden, CarrenA challenge for the scientific community is to adapt to and exploit the trend towards greater multidisciplinary focus in research and technology. This work is concerned with multi-disciplinary design for whole aircraft configuration, including aero performance and financial considerations jointly for an aircraft program. A Multi-Disciplinary (MD) approach is required to increase the robustness of the preliminary design data and to realise the overall aircraft performance objectives within the required timescales. A pre-requisite for such an approach is the existence of efficient and fully integrated processes. For this purpose an automatic aero high-speed analysis framework has been developed and integrated using a commercial integration/building environment. Starting from the geometry input, it automatically generates aero data for loads in a timescale consistent with level requirement, which can afterwards be integrated into the overall multi-disciplinary process. A 3D Aero-solution chain has been implemented as a high-speed aerodynamic evaluation capability, and although there is not yet a complementary fully automated Aerodynamic design process, two integrated systems to perform multi-objective optimisation have been developed using different optimisation approaches. In addition to achieving good aircraft performance, reducing cost may be essential for manufacturer survival in today's competitive market. There is thus a strong need to understand the cost associated with different competing concepts and this could be addressed by incorporating cost estimation in the design process along with other analyses to achieve economic and efficient aircraft. For this reason a pre-existing cost model has been examined, tested, improved, and new features added. Afterwards, the cost suite has been integrated using an integration framework and automatically linked with external domains, providing a capability to take input from other domain tool sets. In this way the cost model could be implemented in a multi-disciplinary process allowing a trade-off between weight, aero performance and cost. Additionally, studies have been performed that link aerodynamic characteristics with cost figures and reinforce the importance of considering aerodynamic, structural and cost disciplines simultaneously. The proposed work therefore offers a strong basis for further development. The modularity of the aero optimisation framework already allows the application of such techniques to real engineering test cases, and, in future, could be combined with the 3D aero solution chain developed. In order to further reduce design wall-clock time the present multi- level parallelisation could also be deployed within a more rapid multi-fidelity approach. Finally the 3D aero-solution chain could be improved by directly incorporating a module to generate aero data for performance, and linking this to the cost suite informed by the same geometrical variables.Item Open Access Aircraft cost modelling, integrated in a multidisciplinary design context(Science Publishing Group, 2019-12-17) Di Pasquale, Davide; Gore, David; Savill, Mark A.; Kipouros, Timoleon; Holden, CarrenMost of the current cost models focus on a particular manufacturing process or a specific maintenance aspect, therefore not providing the whole picture. The main challenge in modelling the manufacturing cost, associated to a new aircraft at the initial design stage, is to examine all the cost features and the way to link them into the decision making process. It is important to understand the cost related to different competing designs, and this can be tackled by including cost estimation in the design process. Estimating the cost at the early design stage is paramount to reduce the life cycle cost of the aircraft. This paper presents the development of a new methodology for the generation of a cost estimation approach for preliminary aircraft design in a multidisciplinary environment. The framework is able to capture the design attributes that drive the cost allowing a designer to assess cost changes with respect to different design configurations. The cost model is built in Excel using a Visual Basic interface and it is integrated within Model Centre platform, where it can be treated as a component of a computational design process. The paper concludes by presenting the results from a real wing trade-off study that includes all the components of a complete design system.Item Open Access Application of an efficient gradient-based optimization strategy for aircraft wing structures(MDPI, 2018-01-04) Dababneh, Odeh; Kipouros, Timoleon; Whidborne, James F.In this paper, a practical optimization framework and enhanced strategy within an industrial setting are proposed for solving large-scale structural optimization problems in aerospace. The goal is to eliminate the difficulties associated with optimization problems, which are mostly nonlinear with numerous mixed continuous-discrete design variables. Particular emphasis is placed on generating good initial starting points for the search process and in finding a feasible optimum solution or improving the chances of finding a better optimum solution when traditional techniques and methods have failed. The efficiency and reliability of the proposed strategy were demonstrated through the weight optimization of different metallic and composite laminated wingbox structures. The results show the effectiveness of the proposed procedures in finding an optimized solution for high-dimensional search space cases with a given level of accuracy and reasonable computational resources and user efforts. Conclusions are also inferred with regards to the sensitivity of the optimization results obtained with respect to the choice of different starting values for the design variables, as well as different optimization algorithms in the optimization process.Item Open Access Application of model-based systems engineering for the integration of electric engines in electrified aircraft(IOP Publishing, 2023-06-28) Kiran, Abhishek; Zaghari, Bahareh; Kipouros, Timoleon; Nunes Dos Reis, Ricardo JoseThe objective of green, carbon-neutral flights is propelling the innovation of newer propulsion systems. With this increased development of an interdisciplinary form of propulsion for aircraft, the integration burdens and efforts intensify. In literature, it is estimated that it takes 10-15 years to design and develop an aircraft. The expected date of entry for any hybrid electric aircraft is 2035-2040. Any innovation and effort to cut this time by any degree should be explored and analysed. One of the techniques that have the potential to help fast-track the research and development of interdisciplinary systems is Model-based System Engineering (MBSE). Various studies have shown the benefit of employing a model-based design strategy. The focus case study relates to the integration of the electric machine and the propeller, along with related sub-systems. For Hybrid Electric Propulsion (HEP), the electric machine and propeller need to be integrated and their interaction to be analysed. MBSE is proposed as a methodology that would help streamline the process of design and integration of the two systems. This study documents the exploration of connecting MBSE with current simulation and modelling of sub-systems in order to ensure the fulfilment of stakeholder needs and full system effectiveness. This paper establishes the research problem, and the approach to be pursued, and gives notice of first developments and expected follow-up work.Item Open Access Application of probabilistic principles to set-based design for the optimisation of a hybrid-electric propulsion system(IOP, 2022-02-15) Spinelli, Andrea; Anderson, Luchien; Balaghi Enalou, Hossein; Zaghari, Bahareh; Kipouros, Timoleon; Laskaridis, PanagiotisCurrent research in hybrid-electric aircraft propulsion has outlined the increased complexity in design when compared with traditional propulsion. However, current design methodologies rely on aircraft-level analysis and do not include the consideration of the impact of new technologies and their uncertainty. This can be a key factor for the development of future hybrid-electric propulsion systems. In this paper, we present a methodology for exploring the design space using the principles of Set-Based Design, which incorporates probabilistic assessment of requirements and multidisciplinary optimisation with uncertainty. The framework can explore every design parameter combination using a provided performance model of the system under design and evaluate the probability of satisfying a minimum required figure of merit. This process allows to quickly discard configurations incapable of meeting the goals of the optimiser. A multidisciplinary optimiser then is used to obtain the best points in each surviving configuration, together with their uncertainty. This information is used to discard undesirable configurations and build a set of Pareto optimal solutions. We demonstrate an early implementation of the framework for the design of a parallel hybrid-electric propulsion system for a regional aircraft of 50 seats. We achieve a considerable reduction to the required function evaluations and optimisation run time by avoiding the ineffective areas of the design space but at the same time maintaining the optimality potential of the selected sets of design solutions.Item Open Access Application of probabilistic set-based design exploration on the energy management of a hybrid-electric aircraft(MDPI, 2022-03-08) Spinelli, Andrea; Balaghi Enalou, Hossein; Zaghari, Bahareh; Kipouros, Timoleon; Laskaridis, PanagiotisThe energy management strategy of a hybrid-electric aircraft is coupled with the design of the propulsion system itself. A new design space exploration methodology based on Set-Based Design is introduced to analyse the effects of different strategies on the fuel consumption, NOx and take-off mass. Probabilities are used to evaluate and discard areas of the design space not capable of satisfying the constraints and requirements, saving computational time corresponding to an average of 75%. The study is carried on a 50-seater regional turboprop with a parallel hybrid-electric architecture. The strategies are modelled as piecewise linear functions of the degree of hybridisation and are applied to different mission phases to explore how the strategy complexity and the number of hybridised segments can influence the behaviour of the system. The results indicate that the complexity of the parametrisation does not affect the trade-off between fuel consumption and NOx emissions. On the contrary, a significant trade-off is identified on which phases are hybridised. That is, the least fuel consumption is obtained only by hybridising the longest mission phase, while less NOx emissions are generated if more phases are hybridised. Finally, the maximum take-off mass was investigated as a parameter, and the impact to the trade-off between the objectives was analysed. Three energy management strategies were suggested from these findings, which achieved a reduction to the fuel consumption of up to 10% and a reduction to NOx emissions of up to 15%.Item Open Access Artificial intelligence to enhance aerodynamic shape optimisation of the Aegis UAV(MDPI, 2019-04-04) Azabi, Yousef; Savvaris, Al; Kipouros, TimoleonThis article presents an optimisation framework that uses stochastic multi-objective optimisation, combined with an Artificial Neural Network (ANN), and describes its application to the aerodynamic design of aircraft shapes. The framework uses the Multi-Objective Particle Swarm Optimisation (MOPSO) algorithm and the obtained results confirm that the proposed technique provides highly optimal solutions in less computational time than other approaches to the same design problem. The main idea was to focus computational effort on worthwhile design solutions rather than exploring and evaluating all possible solutions in the design space. It is shown that the number of valid solutions obtained using ANN-MOPSO compared to MOPSO for 3000 evaluations grew from 529 to 1006 (90% improvement) with a penalty of only 8.3% (11 min) in computational time. It is demonstrated that including an ANN, the ANN-MOPSO with 3000 evaluations produced a larger number of valid solutions than the MOPSO with 5500 evaluations, and in 33% less computational time (64 min). This is taken as confirmation of the potential power of ANNs when applied to this type of design problem.Item Open Access A comparison study of two multifidelity methods for aerodynamic optimization(Elsevier, 2019-11-29) Kontogiannis, Spyridon G.; Demange, Jean; Savill, Mark A.; Kipouros, TimoleonIndustrial aerodynamic design applications require multiobjective optimization tools able to provide design feedback to the engineers. This is true especially when optimization studies are carried out during the conceptual design stage. The need for fast optimization methods has led to the development of multifidelity methods in a surrogate based optimization environment. Multifidelity tools have the potential to accelerate the design process, primarily due to the lower cost associated with the low fidelity tool. In addition to this, the design stage is shortened as mature and reliable high fidelity design information is provided earlier in the design cycle. Despite this high potential of these methods, there is no explicit comparison available in the literature between multifidelity surrogate based optimization tools for industrial aerodynamic problems. This paper aims at providing a direct comparison between two multiobjective multifidelity surrogate based optimization methods developed by our group. The first approach uses a trust region formulation for efficient multiobjective that does not require gradients. The second is using the concept of expected improvement to perform fast design space exploration based on a novel Kriging modification for multifidelity data. The tools are applied in two aerodynamic design problems: optimization of a high lift configuration in respect to maximum lift maximization and an airfoil design for transonic cruising conditions. These problems feature characteristics of industrial interest. They involve difficult physical analyses in the case of the high lift configuration and a more complex optimization formulation due to the increased dimensionality in the case of the transonic airfoil. Our presented methods are compared against a CFD-based optimization, a surrogate based optimization using only high fidelity data and a multifidelity surrogate based optimization based on Co-Kriging. Early results suggest that the trust region method can quickly provide improved designs leading to an efficient Pareto front. The expected improvement based method shows fast exploration attributes and a wide Pareto front.Item Open Access Computational design optimization for S-ducts(MDPI, 2018-10-12) D’Ambros, Alessio; Kipouros, Timoleon; Zachos, Pavlos; Savill, Mark; Benini, ErnestoIn this work, we investigate the computational design of a typical S-Duct that is found in the literature. We model the design problem as a shape optimization study. The design parameters describe the 3D geometrical changes to the shape of the S-Duct and we assess the improvements to the aerodynamic behavior by considering two objective functions: the pressure losses and the swirl. The geometry management is controlled with the Free-Form Deformation (FFD) technique, the analysis of the flow is performed using steady-state computational fluid dynamics (CFD), and the exploration of the design space is achieved using the heuristic optimization algorithm Tabu Search (MOTS). The results reveal potential improvements by 14% with respect to the pressure losses and by 71% with respect to the swirl of the flow. These findings exceed by a large margin the optimality level that was achieved by other approaches in the literature. Further investigation of a range of optimum geometries is performed and reported with a detailed discussion.Item Open Access Conceptual multidisciplinary design via a multi-objective multi-fidelity optimisation method.(2018-05) Kontogianis, Spyridon G.; Savill, Mark A.; Kipouros, TimoleonAir travel demand and the associated fuel emissions are expected to keep increasing in the following decades, forcing the aerospace industry to find ways to revolutionise the design process to achieve step-like performance improvements and emission reduction goals. A promising approach towards that goal is multidisciplinary design. To maximise the benefits, interdisciplinary synergies have to be investigated early in the design process. Efficient multidisciplinary optimisation tools are required to reliably identify a set of promising design directions to support engineering decision making towards the new generation of aircraft. To support these needs, a novel optimisation methodology is proposed aiming in exploiting multidisciplinary trends in the conceptual stage, exploring the design space and providing a pareto set of optimum configurations in the minimum cost possible. This is achieved by a combination of the expected improvement surrogate based optimisation plan, a novel Kriging modification to allow the use of multi-fidelity tools and a multi-objective sub-optimisation process infill formulation implemented within an multidisciplinary design optimisation architecture. A series of analytical test cases were initially used to develop the methodology and examine its performance under a set of criteria like global optimality, computational efficiency and dimensionality scaling. These were followed by two industrially relevant aerodynamic design cases, the RAE2822 transonic airfoil and the GARTEUR high lift configuration, investigating the effect of the constraint handling methods and the low fidelity tool. The cost reductions and exploration characteristics achieved by the method were quantified in realistic unconstrained, constrained and multi-objective problems. Finally, an aerostructural optimisation study of the NASA Common Research Model was used as a representative of a complex multidisciplinary design problem. The results demonstrate the framework’s capabilities in industrial problems, showing improved results and design space exploration but with lower costs than similarly oriented methods. The effect of the multidisciplinary architecture was also examined.Item Open Access The design of high lift aircraft configurations through multi-objective optimisation(Cranfield University, 2014-03) Trapani, Giuseppe; Savill, Mark A.; Kipouros, Timoleon; Soorosh, Saghiri; Tursi, StefanoAn approach is proposed in this work to support the preliminary design of High-Lift aircraft configurations through the use of Multi-Objective optimisation tech¬niques. For this purpose a framework is developed which collates a Free-Form De¬formation parametrisation technique, a number of Computational Fluid Dynamics suites of different fidelity levels, a rapid aero-structure coupling procedure and two multi-objective optimisation techniques, namely Multi-Objective Tabu Search and Non-dominated Sorting Genetic Algorithm-II. The proposed optimisation framework is used for the execution of several design studies. Firstly, the deployment settings and elements' shape of the 2D multi-element GARTEUR A310 test case are optimised for take-off conditions. Consider¬able performance improvements are achieved using both the optimisation algorithms, though the sensitivity of the optimum designs to changes in operating conditions is highlighted. Therefore, a new optimisation set-up is proposed which successfully identifies operational robust designs. Secondly, the framework is extended to the optimisation of 3D geometries, using a Quasi-three-dimensional approach for the evaluation of the aerodynamic performance. The application to the deployment settings optimisation of the (DLF F11) KH3Y configuration illustrates that the method can be applied to more complicated real-world design cases. In particular, the deployment settings of slat and flaps (inboard and outboard segments) are suc¬cessfully optimised for landing conditions. Finally, a rapid aero-structure coupling procedure is implemented, in order to perform static aero-elastic analysis within the optimisation process. The KH3Y optimisation study is repeated including, this time, the effects of structural deformations. Different optima deployment settings are identified compared to the rigid case, illustrating that, despite being of reduced magnitude, wing deformations influence the optimum high-lift system settings. Furthermore, an industrial development and application of multi-objective opti-misation techniques is also presented. In the proposed approach, a reduced order model based on Proper Orthogonal Decomposition methods is used in an offline-online optimisation strategy. The results of the optimisation process for the RAE2822 single-element aerofoil and for the GARTEUR A310 multi-element aerofoil illustrate the potential of the method, as well as its limitations. The technical analysis is com-pleted with a description of the Agile project management approach used to run the project. Finally, future work directions have been identified and recommended.Item Open Access Development of the initial certification and technology roadmap for the FUTPRINT50 framework(IOP Publishing, 2023-06-28) Moebs, N.; Reis, R.; Windels, E.; Ertman, K.; van Woensel, C.; Kipouros, Timoleon; Westin, M.; Strohmayer, A.The main goal of the research project FUTPRINT50 is the acceleration of the introduction of a hybrid-electric regional aircraft. One essential part of this project is to develop a roadmap which couples the technological development with its associated research infrastructure and regulatory aspects. This aims at maximizing the likelihood of a successful hybrid-electric 50-seat regional aircraft with a projected entry-into-service by 2035/2040. This article presents the roadmap framework and methodology worked out by FUTPRINT50. Additionally, it shows the findings of the consortium about key enabling technologies and testing infrastructures necessary to achieve the final integrated demonstrators that provide evidence for lowering the risk of adoption and for bridging mapped regulatory gaps in regard to hybrid-electric propulsion. Furthermore, links to other complementary roadmaps are highlighted. Detail is given on the status of work and follow-up actions towards its completion.Item Open Access Effects of biofuels properties on aircraft engine performance(Emerald Group Publishing Ltd., 2015-05-31) Mazlan, Nurul Musfirah; Savill, Mark A.; Kipouros, TimoleonPurpose-The purpose of this paper is to examine the effects of heat capacity and density of biofuels on aircraft engine performance indicated by thrust and fuel consumption. Design/methodology/approach-The influence of heat capacity and density was examined by simulating biofuels in a two-spool high-bypass turbofan engine running at cruise condition using a Cranfield in-house engine performance computer tool (PYTHIA). The effect of heat capacity and density on engine performance was evaluated through a comparison between kerosene and biofuels. Two types of biofuels were considered: Jatropha Bio-synthetic Paraffinic Kerosene (JSPK) and Camelina Bio-synthetic Paraffinic Kerosene (CSPK). Findings-Results show an increase in engine thrust and a reduction in fuel consumption as the percentage of biofuel in the kerosene/biofuel mixture increases. Besides a low heating value, an effect of heat capacity on increasing engine thrust and an effect of density on reducing engine fuel consumption are observed. Practical implications-The utilisation of biofuel in aircraft engines may result in reducing over-dependency on crude oil. Originality/value-This paper observes secondary factors (heat capacity and density) that may influence aircraft engine performance which should be taken into consideration when selecting new fuel for new engine designs.Item Open Access Effects of turbulence modelling on the analysis and optimisation of high-lift configurations(Cranfield University, 2011-09) Guo, Chuanliang.; Shapiro, Evgeniy; Kipouros, TimoleonDue to the significant effects on the performance and competitiveness of aircraft, high lift devices are of extreme importance in aircraft design. The flow physics of high lift devices is so complex, that traditional one pass and multi-pass design approaches can’t reach the most optimised concept and multi-objective design optimisation (MDO) methods are increasingly explored in relation to this design task. The accuracy of the optimisation, however, depends on the accuracy of the underlying Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) solver. The complexity of the flow around high-lift configuration, namely transition and separation effects leads to a substantial uncertainty associated with CFD results. Particularly, the uncertainty related to the turbulence modelling aspect of the CFD becomes important. Furthermore, employing full viscous flow solvers within MDO puts severe limitations on the density of computational meshes in order to achieve a computationally feasible solution, thereby adding to the uncertainty of the outcome. This thesis explores the effect of uncertainties in CFD modelling when detailed aerodynamic analysis is required in computational design of aircraft configurations. For the purposes of this work, we select the benchmark NLR7301 multi-element airfoil (main wing and flap). This flow around this airfoil features all challenges typical for the high-lift configurations, while at the same time there is a wealth of experimental and computational data available in the literature for this case. A benchmark shape bi-objective optimization problem is formed, by trying to reveal the trade-off between lift and drag coefficients at near stall conditions. Following a detailed validation and grid convergence study, three widely used turbulence models are applied within Reynolds-Averaged Navier-Stokes (RANS) approach. K- Realizable, K- SST and Spalart-Allmaras. The results show that different turbulent models behave differently in the optimisation environment, and yield substantially different optimised shapes, while maintaining the overall optimisation trends (e.g. tendency to maximise camber for the increased lift). The differences between the models however exhibit systemic trends irrespective of the criteria for the selection of the target configuration in the Pareto front. A-posteriori error analysis is also conducted for a wide range of configurations of interest resulting from the optimisation process. Whereas Spalart-Allmaras exhibits best accuracy for the datum airfoil, the overall arrangement of the results obtained with different models in the (Lift, Drag) plane is consistent for all optimisation scenarios leading to increased confidence in the MDO/RANS CFD coupling.Item Open Access Electrical power grid network optimisation by evolutionary computing(Elsevier, 2014-06-06) Oliver, John M.; Kipouros, Timoleon; Savill, Mark A.A major factor in the consideration of an electrical power network of the scale of a national grid is the calculation of power flow and in particular, optimal power flow. This paper considers such a network, in which distributed generation is used, and examines how the network can be optimized, in terms of transmission line capacity, in order to obtain optimal or at least high-performing configurations, using multi-objective optimisation by evolutionary computing methods.Item Open Access Extending highly loaded axial fan operability range through novel blade design(American Society of Mechanical Engineers, 2022-09-19) Lopez, Diego I.; Ghisu, Tiziano; Kipouros, Timoleon; Shahpar, Shahrokh; Wilson, MarkThe tip clearance size has historically been considered to be the main factor affecting stability range in axial fan and compressors. This paper reveals that the stall characteristics are defined by the axial momentum flux of the tip leakage flow and that tip clearance is primarily a strong driver for this metric. A bespoke methodology for carefully tailoring the axial momentum via three-dimensional design is presented, which enables a higher degree of control over the stability range for cases where the tip clearance responds to other considerations and cannot be defined for this purpose. The effect of the axial momentum on efficiency is also addressed and the trade-off between operability range and design point performance is derived. The results show that the conditions for optimal stability differ from those for optimal efficiency and that control over the axial momentum enables tuning the design for a desired exchange. Numerical simulations have been employed to drive the analysis through a high-fidelity computational model whose behavior is supported by rich set of experimental data. Contrary to current belief, results further indicate that an accurate characterization of stall, including onset mechanism, can be achieved through steady-state simulations, minimizing the need for expensive time-accurate computations during the design phase.Item Open Access Generating minimal Pareto sets in multi-objective topology optimisation: an application to the wing box structural layout(Springer, 2020-10-26) Crescenti, Fabio; Kipouros, Timoleon; Munk, David J.; Savill, Mark A.Multi-objective topology optimisation problems are often tackled by compromising the cost functions according to the designer’s knowledge. Such an approach however has clear limitations and usually requires information which especially at the preliminary design stage could be unavailable. This paper proposes an alternative multi-objective approach for the generation of minimal Pareto sets in combination with density-based topology optimisation. Optimised solutions are generated integrating a recently revised method for a posteriori articulation of preferences with the Method of Moving Asymptotes. The methodology is first tested on an academic two-dimensional structure and eventually employed to optimise a full-scale aerospace structure with the support of the commercial software Altair OptiStructⓇ. For the academic benchmark, the optimised layouts with respect to static and dynamic objectives are visualised on the Pareto frontier and reported with the corresponding density distribution. Results show a progressive and consistent transition between the two extreme single-objective layouts and confirm that the minimum number of evaluations was required to fill the smart Pareto front. The multi-objective strategy is then coupled with Altair OptiStruct and used to optimise a full-scale wing box, with the clear purpose to fill a gap in multi-objective topology optimisation applied to the wing primary structure. The proposed methodology proved that it can generate efficiently non-dominated optimised configurations, at a computational cost that is mainly driven by the model complexity. This strategy is particularly indicated for the preliminary design phase, as it releases the designer from the burden to assign preferences. Furthermore, the ease of integration into a commercial design tool makes it available for industrial applications.Item Open Access The impact of electric machine and propeller coupling design on electrified aircraft noise and performance(AIAA, 2023-01-19) Zaghari, Bahareh; Kiran, Abhishek; Sinnige, Tomas; Pontika, Evangelia; Enalou, Hossein B.; Kipouros, Timoleon; Laskaridis, PanagiotisNovel propulsion systems have been studied in literature to reduce aircraft emissions with hydrogen or other electrical energy sources. Hybrid Electric Propulsion (HEP) system consists of electric machines as an alternative way to provide power for propulsion resulting in the reduction of aircraft fuel consumption. While reduction of emission is the main driver of new HEP designs, aircraft noise reduction and performance improvement will also need to be investigated. Much quieter electrified aircraft than conventional aircraft is explored with considering the benefits of coupled design between the propeller and electric machines. In this study, several electric machine designs have been explored and coupled with the propeller design to study the trade-off between the aerodynamic and acoustic performance of the propeller. Aerodynamic optimization is used as a baseline to minimize the energy consumption to find the aerodynamics optimum subject to constraints on the thrust levels during the mission. The propeller aerodynamic optimizer considers the electric machine efficiency map, which is a function of propeller torque and rotational speed, to find the optimum combination of propeller and electric machine designs. The objective function of the acoustic optimizations is to reduce the cumulative noise level over the entire mission. It is shown that a wider envelope of peak motor efficiency in the efficiency map provides acoustics and aerodynamic performance benefits. The trade-offs between reducing noise or increasing aerodynamic efficiency to reduce energy consumption are demonstrated.Item Open Access Impact of fluid substitution on the performance of an axial compressor blade cascade working with supercritical carbon dioxide(ASME, 2019-12-11) Tello, Carlos; Muñoz, Alejandro; Sánchez, David; Kipouros, Timoleon; Savill, MarkRecent research on turbomachinery design and analysis for supercritical Carbon Dioxide (sCO2) power cycles has relied on Computational Fluid Dynamics. This has produced a large number of works whose approach is mostly case-specific, rather than of general application to sCO2 turbomachinery design. As opposed to such approach, this work explores the aerodynamic performance of compressor blade cascades operating on air and supercritical CO2 with the main objective to evaluate the usual aerodynamic parameters of the cascade for variable boundary conditions and geometries, enabling 'full' or 'partial' similarity. The results present both the global performance of the cascades and certain features of the local flow (trailing edge and wake). The discussion also highlights the mechanical limitations of the analysis (forces exerted on the blades), which is the main restriction to applying similarity laws to extrapolate the experi- ence gained through decades of work on air turbomachinery to the new working fluid. This approach is a step towards the understanding and appropriate formulation of a multi-objective optimisation problem for the design of such turbomachinery components where sCO2 is used as the operating fluid. With this objective, the paper aims to identify and analyse what would be expected if a common description of such computational design problems similar to those where air is the working fluid were used.
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