Aerodynamic characteristics and flow field of delta wings with the canard

Abstract

Now, many kinds of explorations for outer planets have been proposed around the world. Among them Mars attracts much attention for future exploration. Orbiters and landers have been used for Mars exploration. Recently as a new exploration method, the usage of an airplane has been seriously considered and there are some development projects for Mars airplane. However, the airplane flying on the Earth atmosphere cannot fly on the Mars atmosphere, because atmospheric conditions are much different each other. Therefore, we focused on the usage of the airplane with unfolding wings for Mars exploration. These unfolding wings are designed as delta wings. However, delta wings do not have enough aerodynamics characteristics in a low speed region. In this study, to improve the aerodynamic characteristics of delta wings, we have proposed the usage of canard wings. The purpose of this study is to examine the effectiveness of canard wings to improve aerodynamic characteristics in a low speed region. CFD analysis is performed using four wing models with different canard shapes. The result shows that the usage of canards is effective to improve aerodynamic characteristics of delta wings in a low speed region. In addition, increasing lift coefficient is possible by changing the shape of canards.