Development and Verification of Coupled Fluid–Structure Interaction Solver

Recent trends in aeroelastic analysis have shown a great interest in understanding the role of shock boundary layer interaction in predicting the dynamic instability of aircraft structural components at supersonic and hypersonic flows. The analysis of such complex dynamics requires a time-accurate fluid-structure interaction solver. This study focuses on the development of such a solver by coupling a finite-volume Navier-Stokes solver for fluid flow with a finite-element solver for structural dynamics. The coupled solver is then verified for the prediction of several panel instability cases in 2D and 3D uniform flows and in the presence of an impinging shock for a range of subsonic and supersonic Mach numbers, dynamic pressures, and shock strengths. The panel deflections and limit cycle oscillation amplitudes, frequencies, and bifurcation point predictions were compared within 10% of the benchmark results; thus, the solver was deemed verified. Future studies will focus on extending the solver to 3D turbulent flows and applying the solver to study the effect of turbulent load fluctuations and shock boundary layer interactions on the fluid-structure coupling and structural dynamics of 2D panels.