Numerical Analysis of Mav'S Flapping Wings in Unsteady Conditions

Today, flapping micro aerial vehicles (mav) are used in many different applications. reynolds number for this kind of aerial vehicle is about 10*4 ~ 10*5, which shows dominancy of inertial effects in comparison to viscous effects in the flow field in areas except adjacent to the solid boundaries. because of the periodic flapping stroke, fluid flow is unsteady. in addition, these creatures have some complexities in kinematic modeling. although numerical methods are widely used for unsteady aerodynamic problems, it is highly difficult to solve the full 3d navier-stokes equations for complex flows like the ones for the flapping insect wings. actually, the numerical simulation of flapping wings for different conditions of flapping frequencies and wing shapes has not been done yet. thus, the present study is a pioneer. in this work, a computer code based on the unsteady panel method has been developed for the flow analysis. the prepared algorithm and the computer code are capable of modeling mav's flapping wings in different unsteady conditions. the results of the aerodynamic design coefficients have been drawn. at the end the optimum wing shape and flapping frequency are discussed as other findings of this study.