Wing twisting has been shown to improve aircraft flight performance. The potential benefits of a twisting wing are often outweighed by the mass of the system required to twist the wing. Shape memory alloy (SMA) actuators repeatedly demonstrate abilities and properties that are ideal for aerospace actuation systems. Recent advances have shown an SMA torsional actuator that can be manufactured and trained with the ability to generate large twisting deformations under substantial loading. The primary disadvantage of implementing large SMA actuators has been their slow actuation time compared to conventional actuators. However, inductive heating of an SMA actuator allows it to generate a full actuation cycle in just seconds rather than minutes while still . The aim of this work is to demonstrate an experimental wing being twisted to approximately 10 degrees by using an inductively heated SMA torsional actuator. This study also considers a 3-D electromagnetic thermo-mechanical model of the SMA-wing system and compare these results to experiments to demonstrate modeling capabilities.

Date Published: 2 April 2015
PDF: 8 pages
Proc. SPIE 9431, Active and Passive Smart Structures and Integrated Systems 2015, 94310U (2 April 2015); doi: 10.1117/12.2175692

Published in SPIE Proceedings Vol. 9431:
Active and Passive Smart Structures and Integrated Systems 2015
Wei-Hsin Liao, Editor(s)