You're invited to attend
AE Seminar
Flutter Suppression through
Integrated Flight and Aeroelastic Controls
by
Dr. Brian Holm-Hansen
Office of Naval Research
Friday, September 29
11 a.m. - 12 p.m.
Weber SST II Classroom 2
About the Seminar:
Flutter is a destructive phenomenon caused by adverse interactions between inertial, elastic, and aerodynamic forces. Throughout history flutter has destroyed everything from bridges to aircraft. A team at Lockheed Martin Skunk Works developed a method for stabilizing multiple flutter modes in a highly flexible, unmanned flying wing. In a flying wing configuration, flutter margin requirements often force designers to use stiffness rather than load constraints, which can lead to heavier structures and reduced platform capabilities. The team used flight test experiments to demonstrate that they can accurately model flutter mechanisms and then use their models to design integrated flight and aeroelastic controls that expand an aircraft’s flight envelope by 66%. The first structural instability occurred when the wing bending and short period modes coupled to cause body freedom flutter (BFF). Both symmetric and anti-symmetric wing bending/torsion modes became unstable at higher speeds. Our controller successfully suppressed these three flutter modes and enabled flight at increased speeds that would have otherwise resulted in catastrophic destruction. Video evidence will be presented.
About the Speaker:
Dr. Brian Holm-Hansen brings over 20 years of engineering & research experience in controls, test and experimentation in fields ranging from rail transportation to advanced aircraft. Since 2016 he has held the position of
Flight Dynamics and Control Program Officer at the Office of Naval Research where he leads the development, award and execution of research projects to advance aviation capabilities for the United States Navy and Marine Corps. Dr. Holm-Hansen has built a portfolio of world-renowned investigators to conduct fundamental research in areas ranging from complex multi-body dynamics and control to undiscovered coupling mechanisms in human/machine systems. Driven by a forward-looking goal to transition basic research findings to broadly applicable Naval capabilities, Dr. Holm-Hansen formed a coalition of university investigators and government engineers to guide future investments in science and technology. As a Program Manager taking leadership of a $156M Navy project to radically advance capabilities for medium altitude, long-endurance surveillance and strike, Dr. Holm-Hansen restructured the program milestone definitions to simultaneously increase granularity, accountability and flexibility through full-up propulsion system testing. In the advanced development area, Dr. Holm-Hansen collaborated across agencies to build a stakeholder-driven team of government civilians, military, industry and academia who will shape future organic air
platform capabilities for the Marine Corps.
Prior to government service, Dr. Holm-Hansen’s industrial experience included over a decade developing and flight-testing unique air vehicles at Lockheed Martin Skunk Works. In the area of large, multi-engine vehicles, he managed the closed-loop flight controls upgrade and test of a hybrid aircraft demonstrator. In the Body Freedom Flutter program, he developed and demonstrated integrated structural controls to actively stabilize multiple aeroelastic instabilities, which enabled a scaled flying wing to exceed typical flutter limits by over 50%. As the flight controls lead for the X-56A Multi-Utility Aeroelastic Demonstrator (MAD) program, he led the design, development and test of the flight control system through 8 successful test fights at Edwards Air Force Base. Dr. Holm-Hansen’s contributions earned him a Rising Technical Talent designation by the Lockheed Martin Technical Fellows as well as a Best Technical Paper Award. The company and the corporation recognized his contributions by an Aero Star Leadership Team Award and a Nova Corporate Award, respectively. Professionally, the Engineer’s Council has honored Dr. Holm-Hansen with three Distinguished Engineering Project Achievement awards for his work on integrated flight and structural control as well as advanced experimental aircraft design and test. The American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA) inducted him as an Associate Fellow for his contributions and service to the field of aeronautics.
Navy leadership selected Dr. Holm-Hansen to serve as a Fellow in the White House Leadership Development Program (WHLDP). He teamed with the Office of Management and Budget’s Office of Federal Procurement Policy (OFPP) on the Hi Definition Acquisition Data initiative within the President’s Management Agenda. The OFPP team worked with multiple government agencies to develop a future acquisition infrastructure to keep pace with evolving developments in artificial intelligence and other emerging technologies to ensure that the federal government is an effective steward of taxpayer dollars. Dr. Holm-Hansen managed a pilot project to apply advanced data science and modelling methods to fraud mitigation, and he authored the Federal government’s concept-of-operations for a hi-definition acquisition data environment to reduce burden through better use and management of existing data. Dr. Holm-Hansen received his Bachelor and Master of Science degrees from the University of Connecticut and his Doctor of Philosophy from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, all in Mechanical Engineering.