NESC REQUIREMENT FOR MODIFICATION TO BASS CODE SOFTWARE. . THE NASA ENGINEERING AND SAFETY CENTERS (NESC) H…

Public award description

NESC REQUIREMENT FOR MODIFICATION TO BASS CODE SOFTWARE. . THE NASA ENGINEERING AND SAFETY CENTERS (NESC) HAS APPROVED THE EXTENSION OF NASA BROADBAND AERONAUTICS STATOR SIMULATION (BASS) CODE FOR THE ACCURATE PREDICTION OF NONLINEAR FLUID-STRUCTURES INTERACTIONS AS A DISCIPLINE ENHANCING INITIATIVE. THIS DISCIPLINE ENHANCING INITIATIVE WAS PROPOSED BY THE FLIGHT SCIENCES SUPER PROBLEM RESOLUTION TEAM (SPRT). THE SCOPE OF THE INVESTIGATION OF THE EXTENSION OF NASA BROADBAND AERONAUTICS STATOR SIMULATION (BASS) CODE FOR THE ACCURATE PREDICTION OF NONLINEAR FLUID-STRUCTURES INTERACTIONS PRO-ACTIVE PROPOSAL IS FOCUSED ON THE DEVELOPMENT AND VALIDATION OF A HIGH-ACCURACY COUPLED FLUID-STRUCTURES INTERACTION SOLVER. THE INVESTIGATION COVERS THE INITIAL DEVELOPMENT OF THE COUPLED SOLUTION METHOD AND ACQUISITION OF EXPERIMENTAL DATA FOR VALIDATION. THE BASS CODE ACCOUNTS FOR THE FLUID RESPONSE TO A KNOWN EXCITATION, SUCH AS MOVING BOUNDARY. STRUCTURAL DYNAMIC FINITE ELEMENT CODES PREDICT THE VIBRATORY RESPONSE FOR A KNOWN SET OF LOADS. THE PROPOSED WORK WILL COUPLE THE TWO TYPES OF ANALYTICAL TOOLS TO PREDICT THE RESPONSE OF BOTH MEDIA TO A VARIETY OF EXCITATIONS. AN IMPORTANT ASPECT OF SUCH A MERGER IS ACCOUNTING FOR THE FACT THAT VIBRATION OF THE STRUCTURE REPRESENTS A MOVING BOUNDARY FOR THE FLUID FLOW, AND THAT THE FLUID LOADING ON THE STRUCTURE DRIVES THIS MOVEMENT. IN OTHER WORDS, IT IS NECESSARY TO DEVELOP A FULLY COUPLED ANALYTICAL CAPABILITY. AT THE END OF THE FIRST PHASE OF THIS WORK, A DECISION POINT IS REACHED WHERE THE TEAM CAN EITHER DISENGAGE OR CONTINUE TO IMPROVE THE SPEED AND APPLICABILITY OF THE FLUID-STRUCTURES INTERACTION SOLVER. FLUID-STRUCTURES INTERACTIONS CAUSE PERSISTENT TECHNICAL ISSUES WITH AEROSPACE VEHICLES. REDESIGNING THESE STRUCTURAL COMPONENTS FOR SAFETY IS PROBLEMATIC DUE TO THE LACK OF ACCURATE COMPUTATIONAL PREDICTION TOOLS. EXISTING LINEARIZED FLOW ACOUSTIC PREDICTION TOOLS ARE NOT ACCURATE WHEN APPLIED TO THE HIGH-AMPLITUDE NONLINEAR ACOUSTIC WAVES PRESENT IN THE COMPLEX LAUNCH OR RE-ENTRY ENVIRONMENT. THE SCOPE OF THE PROPOSED WORK IS TO DEVELOP AND VALIDATE A COMPUTATIONAL TOOL TO DIRECTLY PREDICT NONLINEAR FLUID-STRUCTURES INTERACTION. EXPERIMENTS WILL BE PERFORMED IN PARALLEL TO PROVIDE ACCURATE VALIDATION DATA FOR THE COMPUTATIONAL CODE.