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The purpose of this paper presents the effects of actively morphing root chord and taper on the energy of the flight control system (i.e. FCS).

Via regarding previously mentioned purposes, sophisticated and realistic helicopter models are benefitted to examine the energy of the FCS.

Helicopters having actively morphing blade root chord length and blade taper consume less control energy than the ones having one of or any of passively morphing blade root chord length and blade taper.

Actively morphing blade root chord length and blade taper can be used for cheaper helicopter operations.

The main originality of this paper is applying active morphing strategy on helicopter blade root chord and blade taper. In this paper, it is also found that using active morphing strategy on helicopter blade root chord and blade taper reasons less energy consumption than using either passively morphing blade root chord length plus blade taper or not any. This causes also less fuel consumption and green environment.

The purpose of this paper is to present a simulation method applied for investigation of helicopter ground resonance phenomenon.

The considered physical model of helicopter standing on ground with rotating rotor consists of fuselage and main transmission gear treated as stiff bodies connected by elastic elements. The fuselage is supported on landing gear modeled by spring-damper units. The main rotor blades are treated as set of elastic axes with lumped masses distributed along blade radius. Due to Galerkin method, parameters of blades motion are assumed as a combination of bending and torsion eigen modes. A Runge–Kutta method is applied to solve equations of motions of rotor blades and helicopter fuselage.

The presented simulation method may be applied in preliminary stage of helicopter design to avoid ground resonance by proper selection of landing gear units and blade damper characteristics.

Ground resonance may occur in form of violently increasing mutual oscillations of helicopter fuselage and lead-lag motion of rotor blades. According to changes of stiffness and damping characteristics, simulations show stable behavior or arising oscillations of helicopter. The effects of different blade balance or defect of blade damper are predicted.

The simulation method may help to determine the envelope of safe operation of helicopter in phase of take-off or landing. The effects of additional disturbances as results of blades pitch control as swashplate deflection are introduced.

The purpose of this paper is to determine dependencies between a rotor-blade shape and a rotor performance as well as to search for optimal shapes of blades dedicated for helicopter main and tail rotors.

The research is conducted based on computational methodology, using the parametric-design approach. The developed parametric model takes into account several typical blade-shape parameters. The rotor aerodynamic characteristics are evaluated using the unsteady Reynolds-averaged Navier–Stokes solver. Flow effects caused by rotating blades are modelled based on both simplified approach and truly 3D simulations.

The computational studies have shown that the helicopter-rotor performance may be significantly improved even through relatively simple aerodynamic redesigning of its blades. The research results confirm high potential of the developed methodology of rotor-blade optimisation. Developed families of helicopter-rotor-blade airfoils are competitive compared to the best airfoils cited in literature. The finally designed rotors, compared to the baselines, for the same driving power, are characterised by 5 and 32% higher thrust, in case of main and tail rotor, respectively.

The developed and implemented methodology of parametric design and optimisation of helicopter-rotor blades may be used in future studies on performance improvement of rotorcraft rotors. Some of presented results concern the redesigning of main and tail rotors of existing helicopters. These results may be used directly in modernisation processes of these helicopters.

The presented study is original in relation to the developed methodology of optimisation of helicopter-rotor blades, families of modern helicopter airfoils and innovative solutions in rotor-blade-design area.

THE present paper gives, in abbreviated form, the theory of blade motion and of static and dynamic stability of single‐rotor helicopters. Limitations of space do not permit of full discussion and the article should be taken as only an introduction to the somewhat complex problems of helicopter stability and control.

This paper aims to offer a simultaneous design approach for helicopter having swept anhedral blade tip shape and helicopter flight control system (HFCS) to minimize controller cost.

By considering previously stated offer, control-oriented models and a stochastic optimization method are applied to minimize controller cost of the HFCS.

Using simultaneous design approach for helicopters having blade tip swept and blade tip anhedral causes considerably less control effort than the helicopters not benefiting this related design approach.

Simultaneous design approach for helicopters having blade tip swept and blade tip anhedral is applicable to consider fuel economy.

One important novelty of this paper is using simultaneous approach for determining optimum shape of blade tip swept and anhedral. Another considerable novelty of this paper is also using a stochastic optimization method called simultaneous perturbation stochastic approximation for previously mentioned purpose. In this paper, it is also reached that using simultaneous design approach for swept anhedral helicopter blade tip shape and HFCS causes less control effort than the helicopters not using this approach. This leads to less fuel consumption and green environment.

The purpose of this study is to examine the effect of passive and active morphing of blade root chord length and blade taper on the control effort of the flight control system (FCS) of a helicopter.

Physics-based helicopter models, which are functions of passive and active morphing, are created and applied in helicopter FCS design to determine the control effort.

Helicopters, having both passively and actively morphing blade root chord length and blade taper, experience less control effort than the ones having either only passively morphing blade root chord length or only blade taper or only actively morphing blade root chord length and blade taper.

Both passively and actively morphing blade root chord length and blade taper can be implemented for more economical autonomous helicopter flights.

Main novelty of our article is simultaneous application of passive and active morphing ideas on helicopter root chord length and blade taper. It is also proved in this study that using both passive and active morphing ideas on helicopter blade root chord and blade taper causes much less energy consumption than using either only passive morphing idea on helicopter blade root chord and blade taper or only active morphing idea on helicopter blade root chord and blade taper. This also reduces fuel consumption and also makes environment cleaner.

ACCORDING to historical records the earliest known drawings for an aerial machine that can be classified under the heading of helicopter were made in the fifteenth century by the world renowned Italian scientist and artist Leonardo da Vinci (1452–1519). Probably the Chinese had been making their helicopter toy for some considerable time before da Vinci commenced his experiments. This toy consisted of two feathers, joined together by means of a cork or soft wood boss, to form a crude type of propeller which was pushed up a threaded stick so that upon leaving the stick the propeller rotated at high speed and continued to screw itself up in the air. When the speed of rotation decreased the propeller slowly windmilled down to the ground. A similar toy is still being sold today.

The purpose of this paper is to use an ABC algorithm to improve the thrust–torque ratio of a rotating-wing unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) model.

The design of UAVs, such as aircraft, drones, helicopters, has become one of the popular engineering areas with the development of technology. This study aims to improve the value of thrust–torque ratio of an unmanned helicopter. For this purpose, an unmanned helicopter was built at the Faculty of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Erciyes University. The maximum thrust–torque ratio was calculated considering the blade length, blade chord width, blade mass density and blade twist angle. For calculation, artificial bee colony (ABC) algorithm was used. By using ABC algorithm, the maximum thrust–torque ratio was obtained against the optimum input values. For this purpose, a model with four inputs and a single output is formed. In the generated system model, optimum thrust–torque ratio was calculated by changing the input values used in the ±5% range. As a result of this study, approximately 31% improvement was achieved. According to these results, the proposed approach will provide convenience to the designers in the design of the rotating-wing UAV.

According to these results, approximately 31% improvement was achieved, and the proposed approach will provide convenience to the designers in the design of the rotating-wing UAV.

It takes a long time to obtain the optimum thrust–torque ratio value through the ABC algorithm method.

Using ABC algorithm provides to improve the value of thrust–torque ratio of an unmanned helicopter. With this algorithm, unmanned helicopter flies more than ever. Thus, the presented method based on the ABC algorithm is more efficient.

The application of the ABC algorithm method can be used effectively to calculate the thrust–torque ratio in UAV.

Providing an original and penetrating a method that saves time and reduces the cost to improve the value of thrust–torque ratio of an unmanned helicopter.

THE continual development of helicopter rotor systems has so far resulted in the use of about six main types, and it will be of value briefly to recapitulate their advantages and disadvantages in order to obtain a balanced picture against which the stiff‐hinged rotor can be judged.

To investigate the use of centre of gravity location on reducing cyclic pitch control for helicopter UAV's (unmanned air vehicles) and MAV's (micro air vehicles). Low cyclic pitch is a necessity to implement the swashplateless rotor concept using trailing edge flaps or active twist using current generation low authority piezoceramic actuators.

An aeroelastic analysis of the helicopter rotor with elastic blades is used to perform parametric and sensitivity studies of the effects of longitudinal and lateral center of gravity (cg) movements on the main rotor cyclic pitch. An optimization approach is then used to find cg locations which reduce the cyclic pitch at a given forward speed.

It is found that the longitudinal cyclic pitch and lateral cyclic pitch can be driven to zero at a given forward speed by shifting the cg forward and to the port side, respectively. There also exist pairs of numbers for the longitudinal and lateral cg locations which drive both the cyclic pitch components to zero at a given forward speed. Based on these results, a compromise optimal cg location is obtained such that the cyclic pitch is bounded within ±5° for a BO105 helicopter rotor.

The reduction in the cyclic pitch due to helicopter cg location is found to significantly reduce the maximum magnitudes of the control angles in flight, facilitating the swashplateless rotor concept. In addition, the existence of cg locations which drive the cyclic pitches to zero allows for the use of active cg movement as a way to replace the cyclic pitch control for helicopter MAV's.