Analysis of Transition Stability for Morphing Aircraft

FOR rigid aircraft, there are standard techniques for evaluating flight stability, generally involving the application of linear system theory. The standard approach is to consider a particular flight mode of interest (e.g., steady-wings-level flight, steady turning, steady pull-up, etc.) and evaluate the stability of an equilibrium point in this regime. Because the aerodynamic forces and moments are difficult to express analytically over a large range of possible aircraft motions, most often, equilibrium point stability is evaluated based upon a set of small-perturbation linear equations.