Instability zones for isotropic and anisotropic multibladed rotor configurations.

Abstract

Helicopter ground resonance is an unstable dynamic phenomenon which can lead to the total destruction of the aircraft during take-off or landing phases. The earliest research in this domain was carried out by Coleman and Feingold during the decade of 60s. The instability was predicted by using classical procedures once the rotor was considered as isotropic, consequently, the periodic equations of motion could be simplified to a system with constant coefficients by introducing a change of variables, known as the Coleman Variable Transformation. The goal of the present work is to further comprehend the phenomenon and the influence of the anisotropic properties of rotors by analyzing the periodic set of equations of motion. For this, Floquet's Theory (Floquet's Method — FM) is used. The analysis for predicting the ground resonance phenomenon in isotropic and anisotropic rotor configurations is explored. The conclusions lead to verify the appearance of bifurcation points depending on the anisotropic characteristic present in the rotor. The temporal response analysis in the motion of helicopter with one asymmetric blade at unstable regions highlighted the presence of non symmetric rotor deformation shapes.