Method for Estimating Inertial Properties of Rotorcraft in Conceptual Design

The conceptual design of aircraft is a continuously evolving and expanding discipline where the primary task is to perform a trade-space analysis to meet a set of operational and performance requirements. One of the major aspects of conceptual design is mass properties analysis, which involves analyzing the mass distribution of an aircraft layout. The results of this analysis can be used in other aspects of the design process: handling qualities analysis, packaging layout, control surface sizing, and inertial loading for structural design. Traditionally, and when not performed using parametric databases, mass properties is a time consuming process. The analysis requires an initial layout of both the aircraft outer mold-line (OML) shaping and internal component placement. At which point, handbook methods or Computer Aided Design (CAD) software are leveraged to analyze the distribution of mass in the aircraft layout. Presented herein is a method for automating the mass properties analysis of a conceptual aircraft design by leveraging light-weight scriptable CAD software capability, outputs from aircraft conceptual performance and sizing software, methods for geometrically representing rotor systems, and parametric scaling rules for internal component placement. This method quickly and accurately returns inertial estimates for a variety of rotorcraft configurations allowing for trade-space exploration.