The cause for several rotorcraft and aircraft accidents are pilot induced oscillations (PIO) [1], [2]. Although this phenomenon has been extensively investigated over the last decades for different types of aircraft, there are few results of pilot-rotorcraft coupling phenomena, even if their analysis is very important particularly in some maneuvers like hover flight or forward flight. The paper presents an analysis of the rotorcraft-pilot couplings (RPC) by combining the helicopter dynamics models with different pilot models in a closed loop. A rotorcraft pilot-coupling is defined as: “unintentional (inadvertent) sustained or uncontrollable vehicle oscillations characterized by a mismatch between the pilot’s mental model of the vehicle dynamics and the actual vehicle dynamics. The result is that the pilot’s control input is out-of-phase with the response of the vehicle, possibly causing a diverging motion” [3]. The rotorcraft oscillatory or divergent behavior from adverse pilot-vehicle couplings (PVC) represents the basis for the aviation development to increase the efficiency and safety of flight [4]. Prominent features of the human pilot dynamics and high gain flight control systems (FCS) have been an important target in the designing of the helicopter control system in order to get better handling qualities (HQs) [5]. By providing state feedback control laws to the helicopter’s control system the stability improves, so the FCS will recognize the pilot inputs and will also provide acceptable response. Because the HQs specifications define what is desirable, meeting the handling qualities which comply with the ADS-33 requirements [6] provides a first level of protection against RPCs. In the present paper the attention is focused on stability analysis in order to predict pilot-induced oscillation rating (PIOR) and handling qualities (HQSF) levels based on different pilot models [7, 8, 9]. The paper is structured as follows: the first section presents a short description of the RPC and pilot-induced oscillations phenomenon, the second section describes the helicopter mathematical model, the third section contains the pilot models design that would be included in the case study presented in the fourth section, and the paper will end with some concluding remarks.
Closed loop rotorcraft pilot couplings analysis by combining different pilot models with the helicopter dynamics models
ICNPAA 2018 WORLD CONGRESS: 12th International Conference on Mathematical Problems in Engineering, Aerospace and Sciences ; 2018 ; Yerevan, Armenia
AIP Conference Proceedings ; 2046 , 1
2018-12-04
10 pages
Conference paper
Electronic Resource
English
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