Application of gyroscopes for stability monitoring in flutter tests

Abstract

Accelerations are in most cases used to track modal parameters of vehicles in operation. In flutter flight tests, these modal parameters are used to ensure safety during flight. Recently, low cost MEMS sensors became popular for application in drones, where apart from acceleration also rotation rates are measured. This work investigates whether this quantity is also able to track the modal parameters. Data from the P-Flex model is utilized to study the rotation rate responses. First, data is analyzed from ground tests. In a second step, flight tests are analyzed. To improve results, virtual references are introduced to reduce complexity of the responses and modes are separated into symmetric and anti-symmetric. Results from ground tests show the applicability and also during flight, modes are tracked successfully. Nevertheless, due to significant noise and limited measurement time for noise reduction through averaging, there is room for improvement regarding the damping estimates.