Gust mitigation of micro air vehicles using passive articulated wings

Birds and insects naturally use passive flexing of their wings to augment their stability in uncertain aerodynamic environments. In a similar manner, micro air vehicle designers have been investigating using wing articulation to take advantage of this phenomenon. The result is a class of articulated micro air vehicles where artificial passive joints are designed into the lifting surfaces. In order to analyze how passive articulation affects performance of micro air vehicles in gusty environments, an efficient 8 degree-of-freedom model is developed. Experimental validation of the proposed mathematical model was accomplished using flight test data of an articulated micro air vehicle obtained from a high resolution indoor tracking facility. Analytical investigation of the gust alleviation properties of the articulated micro air vehicle model was carried out using simulations with varying crosswind gust magnitudes. Simulations show that passive articulation in micro air vehicles can increase their robustness to gusts within a range of joint compliance. It is also shown that if articulation joints are made too compliant that gust mitigation performance is degraded when compared to a rigid system.