Pilot-in-the-loop flight simulation of flexible aircraft in Matlab / Simulink: Implementation and coding peculiarities

Integration of flight dynamic models, developed in the MATLAB R ⃝ /Simulink R ⃝ environment, with an engineering flight simulation platform allows rapid pilot-in-the-loop evaluation of new aircraft concepts at early stages of design. This paper aims to provide an overview of the integration activities needed to develop an engineering flight simulator capable of providing means to assess future concept aircraft, such as high aspect ratio wing configurations, where aeroelastic effects have a significant impact on rigid body flight dynamics. Details of the approach used to integrate an aeroelastic simulation framework with an engineering flight simulator are presented. The challenges of obtaining a real-time simulation capability and coding peculiarities of this approach are discussed. The paper expands on the discussion of integration and coding, and provides an example that demonstrates capabilities of such a framework for handling qualities assessment of a high aspect ratio wing aircraft.