Abstract
In transient flight, rotor wakes and tip vortex generated by unsteady blade air-loads and blade motions are fully unsteady and 3-dimensionally-aperiodic, giving rise to significant complicity in accurate analysis compared to steady flight. We propose a hybrid approach by splitting the motions of a maneuvering helicopter into translation and rotation. Translation is simulated using a non-inertial moving (translating) coordinate for which new governing equations are derived, and rotations are simulated by moving each grid in the frame. A flow simulation (CFD) code is constructed by using the hybrid approach, then two simple cases (accelerating/decelerating flight and right-turn flight) for maneuvering helicopter are calculated using the moving overlapped grid method, which is now one of the most advanced techniques for tip-vortex capture. The vortex bundling phenomena, which is a main characteristic of right-turn flight, is well captured by the simulation code. The results of the present study provide better understanding of the characteristics for maneuvering rotorcraft, which can be valuable in full helicopter design.
