MATRIX ANALYSIS METHOD FOR COMPOSITE FLEXBEAM

A helicopter rotor composite flexbeam is discussed and a method of analysis is presented. The flexbeam is modelled into a number of beam elements. The analysis has two major divisions, - overall beam load-displacement analysis and ply analysis in the individual beam elements for the computed loadings. The methodology presented for beam analysis is a direct method which is derived from the basic techniques of structural analysis. Since a composite flexbeam may be represented by an assemblage of one-dimensional elements only, the direct method is as powerful as the variational method of finite element analysis.