A parametric study on supersonic/hypersonic flutter behavior of aero-thermo-elastic geometrically imperfect curved skin panel

In this paper, the effect of the system parameters on the flutter of a curved skin panel forced by a supersonic/hypersonic unsteady flow is numerically investigated. The aeroelastic model investigated includes the third-order piston theory aerodynamics for modeling the flow-induced forces and the Von Kármán non-linear strain-displacement relation in conjunction with the Kirchhoff plate hypothesis for the panel structural modeling. Structural non-linearities are considered and are due to the non-linear coupling between out-of-plane bending and in-plane stretching. The effects of thermal degradation and Kelvin’s model of structural damping independent on time and temperature are also considered. The aero-thermo-elastic governing equations are developed from the geometrically imperfect non-linear theory of infinitely long two-dimensional curved panels. Computational analysis and discussion of the finding along with pertinent conclusions are presented.