Experimental Passive Flutter Mitigation Using a Linear Tuned Vibrations Absorber

The current drive for increased efficiency in aeronautic structures such as aircraft, wind turbine blades and helicopter blades often leads to weight reduction. A consequence of this tendency can be increased flexibility, which in turn can lead to unfavourable aeroelastic phenomena involving large amplitude oscillations and nonlinear effects such as geometric hardening and stall flutter. Vibration mitigation is one of the approaches currently under study for avoiding these phenomena.
In the present work, passive vibration mitigation is applied to an experimental aeroelastic system by means of a linear tuned vibration absorber. The aeroelastic apparatus is a pitch and flap wing that features a continuously hardening restoring torque in pitch and a linear one in flap. Extensive analysis of the system with and without absorber at subcritical and supercritical airspeeds showed an improvement in flutter speed around 34%, a suppression of a jump due to stall flutter, and a reduction in LCO amplitude.
Mathematical modelling of the experimental system showed that optimal flutter delay can be obtained when two of the system modes flutter simultaneously. However, the absorber quickly loses effectiveness as it is detuned. The wind tunnel measurements showed that the tested absorbers were much slower to lose effectiveness than those of the mathematical predictions.