Distributed actuation concepts for a morphing aileron device

The actuation mechanism is a crucial aspect in the design of morphing structures due to the very stringent requirements involving actuation torque, consumed power, and allowable size and weight. In the framework of the CRIAQ MD0-505 project, novel design strategies are investigated to enable morphing of aeronautical structures. This paper deals with the design of a morphing aileron with the main focus on the actuation technology. The morphing aileron consists of segmented ’finger-like’ ribs capable of changing the airfoil camber in order to match target aerodynamic shapes. In this work, lightweight and compact actuation kinematics driven by electromechanical actuators are investigated to actuate the morphing device. An unshafted distributed servo-electromechanical actuation arrangement is employed to realise the transition from the baseline configuration to a set of target aerodynamic shapes by also withstanding the aerodynamics loads. Numerical investigations are detailed to identify the optimal actuation architecture matching as well as the system integrability and structural compactness