arrow_back_ios

Main Menu

See All Acoustic End-of-Line Test Systems See All DAQ and instruments See All Electroacoustics See All Software See All Transducers See All Vibration Testing Equipment See All Academy See All Resource Center See All Applications See All Industries See All Insights See All Services See All Support See All Our Business See All Our History See All Our Sustainability Commitment See All Global Presence
arrow_back_ios

Main Menu

See All Actuators See All Combustion Engines See All Durability See All eDrive See All Transmission & Gearboxes See All Turbo Charger See All DAQ Systems See All High Precision and Calibration Systems See All Industrial electronics See All Power Analyser See All S&V Hand-held devices See All S&V Signal conditioner See All Accessories See All DAQ Software See All Drivers & API See All nCode - Durability and Fatigue Analysis See All ReliaSoft - Reliability Analysis and Management See All Test Data Management See All Utility See All Vibration Control See All Acoustic See All Current / voltage See All Displacement See All Load Cells See All Pressure See All Strain Gauges See All Torque See All Vibration See All LDS Shaker Systems See All Power Amplifiers See All Vibration Controllers See All Accessories for Vibration Testing Equipment See All Training Courses See All Whitepapers See All Acoustics See All Asset & Process Monitoring See All Custom Sensors See All Data Acquisition & Analysis See All Durability & Fatigue See All Electric Power Testing See All NVH See All Reliability See All Smart Sensors See All Vibration See All Weighing See All Automotive & Ground Transportation See All Calibration See All Installation, Maintenance & Repair See All Support Brüel & Kjær See All Release Notes See All Compliance See All Our People
arrow_back_ios

Main Menu

See All CANHEAD See All GenHS See All LAN-XI See All MGCplus See All Optical Interrogators See All QuantumX See All SomatXR See All Fusion-LN See All Accessories See All Hand-held Software See All Accessories See All BK Connect / Pulse See All API See All Microphone Sets See All Microphone Cartridges See All Acoustic Calibrators See All Special Microphones See All Microphone Pre-amplifiers See All Sound Sources See All Accessories for acoustic transducers See All Experimental testing See All Transducer Manufacturing (OEM) See All Accessories See All Non-rotating (calibration) See All Rotating See All CCLD (IEPE) accelerometers See All Charge Accelerometers See All Impulse hammers / impedance heads See All Cables See All Accessories See All Electroacoustics See All Noise Source Identification See All Environmental Noise See All Sound Power and Sound Pressure See All Noise Certification See All Industrial Process Control See All Structural Health Monitoring See All Electrical Devices Testing See All Electrical Systems Testing See All Grid Testing See All High-Voltage Testing See All Vibration Testing with Electrodynamic Shakers See All Structural Dynamics See All Machine Analysis and Diagnostics See All Process Weighing See All Calibration Services for Transducers See All Calibration Services for Handheld Instruments See All Calibration Services for Instruments & DAQ See All On-Site Calibration See All Resources See All Software License Management

RUAG relies on HBK solutions in wind tunnel testing

Ruag ag, switzerland

Introduction

RUAG has been relying on HBK solutions for more than 10 years.

Experimental tests in a wind tunnel provide the aerodynamics engineer with the necessary data to design and assess the aerodynamic properties of a test object. The tests are performed either with a scaled-down but extremely realistic model of an aircraft, building, and vehicle or with a full-size object (athletes and cars/vehicles).

RUAG Schweiz in Emmen operates several wind tunnels in which measurement data are recorded, processed and evaluated with the highest precision.

chevron_left
chevron_right

Despite high investment and operating costs, aircraft and vehicle manufacturers continue to rely heavily on wind tunnel testing. The complexity and requirements of the tests are increasing. High-quality measurement data - both static and increasingly transient - must be delivered reliably and efficiently. Also, the productivity from installation to delivery of the results is essential.

MGCplus amplifier systems were selected and integrated into a compact and mobile overall system. This results in a fast and flexible connection of measuring chains with standardized connection cables, various measuring sensors, as required for aerodynamic tests, and the configuration via an open interface to the wind tunnel software. Further criteria for the solution are efficient calibration with traceability to national standards and long-term delivery reliability by the manufacturer.

Thanks to the modularity, flexibility, high precision, and excellent long-term stability of the MGCplus/DMP DAQ systems, a wide variety of tests is carried out. Together with the RUAG multi-component balances, a measurement chain is available for determining loads such as lift and drag forces. The chain can be optimally configured to provide the aerodynamics engineer with the necessary data for the improvement/validation of his product.

RUAG AG is a leading supplier, service provider, and integrator of systems and components for civil and military aviation. The company's core competencies include repair and maintenance work, as well as upgrades, development, manufacture, and integration of subsystems for aircraft and helicopters - and this throughout their entire service life. 

Just over 70 years ago, the aerodynamics research department of RUAG's predecessor company, Eidgenössisches Flugzeugwerk F+W, began measuring forces and moments on aircraft. Although the technical possibilities have since been considerably refined, the fundamental questions that engineers ask themselves about understanding physical processes are as relevant today as they were then.

Further Information

The scope of wind tunnel testing performed at RUAG is very large and the requirements with respect to measurements and data acquisition are thus diverse. In the simplest case, the customer is only interested in observing the test object as it is exposed to wind, for instance, an umbrella. In this case, only wind speed needs to be known.

Generally, tests are more complex and the wind tunnel models are equipped with a number of sensors used to obtain quantitative data for loads and pressures acting on the object. The LOSITA wind tunnel model, built and tested in the frame of the European Clean Sky 2 Initiative, is an example of a complex wind tunnel test with high demands on data acquisition. LOSITA has received funding from the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation program under grant agreements CS-GA-2013-01-LOSITA-620108.

The model is equipped with a RUAG six-component balance to obtain the global forces and moments acting on the aircraft. The aircraft is driven by two powerful wing mounted propeller turbines. The propellers will have a significant effect on the airflow around the wing and must thus be incorporated in the wind tunnel model. The forces acting on the propellers are measured with additional 6-component balances installed in the hub of the propellers (Rotating Shaft Balances). From these global force values, the aerodynamicist extracts information about the performance of the aircraft but also its stability and controllability. 

Structural engineers may be more interested to obtain the aerodynamic loads on certain components of the aircraft. Such data is derived from pressure measurements at different locations on the model. For this purpose, the LOSITA model was equipped with more than 700 pressure taps. An alternative or complementary approach is the use of strain gauge component balances designed specifically to measure, for example, the forces on a single control surface.

In addition to these “customer” measurements, several sensors are used to control and monitor the test and the model such as accelerometers, rpm-, position- and temperature sensors. The differing goals of each wind tunnel test campaign and the resulting diversity of deployed sensors put very high demands on the flexibility of the data acquisition system. The instrumentation and specifically the multicomponent balances need to fulfill very stringent customer requirements when it comes to accuracy and repeatability.

A six-component balance has the task of measuring three orthogonally aligned forces and moments simultaneously with as little mutual interference as possible. In aviation, these are lift/normal force (Z), drag/axial force (X) and side force (Y), and the moments around the roll (L), pitch (M) and yaw (N) axes.

 

knowledge, resource center, case studies, wind tunnel testing at ruag

The RUAG balance consists of two halves: the earth-fixed or non-metric and the metric half.

  • Non-Metric Half: It is attached to a solid structure, e.g. the ground or a support, which determines the position of the model in the wind tunnel.
  • Metric Half: It is fixed to the object to be measured, i.e. the car or aircraft model.

Via connecting rods and measuring elements with high-precision strain gauges, mechanical strains are recorded electrically and converted into physical units via a preceding calibration.

RUAG’s 7xx Balance Series

Since the customer requirements on the test object and the forces to be measured are directly dependent on the size of the wind tunnel model, the RUAG balance family offers the possibility of selecting an optimally suited balance for the test in terms of volume and load range.

Annual calibrations, traceable to a national standard, are required for ISO 9001 quality assurance. This applies to the MGCplus systems used as well as to the RUAG multi-component balances.

A calibration system has been developed for this purpose, with which all MGCplus channels can be checked and calibrated. A DMP40 from HBK is used for the calibration of the balances, which meets the very highest requirements.

Technology Used

Related Case Studies