MEMS 411: RC Plane Mount for CFD Validation

Washington University in St. Louis’ Design/Build/Fly team (WashU DBF) participates in an annual international competition with over 100 teams where they create a Remote Control (RC) plane that can perform various missions. One of the difficulties in developing a plane each year is testing the forces on the plane. Currently, Ansys and XFLR5 are used to create computational fluid dynamics (CFD) models for the plane. CFD modeling simulates air flow over the plane’s wings to analyze how to optimize the aircraft’s aerodynamics. While this is a useful strategy to predict the plane’s theoretical performance, WashU DBF Technical President, Eleni Kambouris, has expressed the need for a validation device that collects experimental data without requiring an official test flight. This is extremely valuable because it allows the plane to be tested without the risk of the plane crashing. One idea that previous WashU DBF members had was holding a plane or another object out of a car window to sample the lift, drag, and torque on a plane.