Gust Response of Elastic Sailplanes –

the revised CS-22 Gust Alleviation Formula

Jan Schwochow
janschwochow@web.de

XXXV OSTIV Congress, 19 - 23 July 2021

Abstract: For the design of a new sailplane, the load analysis plays a decisive role in dimensioning the lightweight
structure and thus also in optimizing the operating weight. The loads comprise maneuver, gust, ground and further
special loads. Since in general no structural dynamic model of the sailplane is available, it is difficult to incorporate
the structural flexibility of the high aspect ratio wings, which might alleviate gust loads in most cases. In order to keep
the compliance procedure simple for the sailplane designer, the assumptions of the relevant paragraph of the CS-22
are based on a rigid model which flies through a unitary gust with one-minus-cosine shape. The analysis of the gust
load factor is related to the well-known Pratt-Walker formula, where the gust length is fixed at 25 mean wing chords.
For light sailplanes with high aspect ratio wings and microlight glider this criteria might overestimate the gust loads.
A new more adaptive simple formula for the gust alleviation factor is suggested by OSTIV Sailplane Development
Panel (Organisation Scientifique et Technique Internationale du Vol a Voile) to be introduced in the next amendment
of the CS-22. In the following the validity is checked with a more rational gust analysis employing an aeroelastic
model consisting of a Finite-Element beam model coupled to unsteady aerodynamic loads formulated in frequency
domain.

Keywords: Aeroelasticity, discrete gust analysis, load factor, transient response.

Introduction
The atmospheric gust is formed by random fluctuations in the wind speed and direction caused by a swirling motion
of the air. Gust-induced loads can significantly impact the structural integrity. The term dynamic loads is used to
represent gust loads that include the inertia forces associated with elastic-mode (free vibration) accelerations. Events
with steep gradients of air speed in horizontal or vertical directions are called discrete gusts, which may occur at the
edges of thermals and downdrafts, wave streams or at temperature inversions. When an airplane penetrates any of these
gradients rapidly, an impulsive change of aerodynamic loads and attitude is generated. The current certification regu-
lations utilize theoretical work undertaken by the NACA where the concept of one-minus-cosine gust was reported by
Pratt-Walker in 1954 [1], which was discussed for sailplane configurations in [2]. The simplification of the gust shape
is shown in Figure 1. An assumption from measurements on large transport aircrafts estimates a representative fixed
gust length H of 25 times the mean wing chord.

Figure 1. One-minus-cosine gust

The certification specifications for sailplanes and powered sailplanes EASA CS-22 [1] implies this discrete gust profile
to estimate the loads caused by atmospheric turbulence. The application of the Pratt-Walker formula determines the
maximum gust load factors according to flight speed and the gust alleviation factor, which is related to the mass ratio
and lift slope. This factor takes into account the lag of the motion-induced aerodynamic forces on the aircraft by
evaluating the Wagner function. The contents of the gust load factors paragraph §22.341 reads:

(a) In the absence of a more rational analysis, the gust load factors n must be computed as follows:

n = 1 ( k

2
 UVa
0 )( )
mg

S
(1)

where:
 ρ0 = density of air at sea-level (kg/m3) U= gust velocity (m/s)
V= equivalent air speed (m/s) a= slope of wing lift curve per radian
m= mass of the sailplane (kg) g= acceleration due to gravity (m/s2)
S= design wing area (m2)
k = 0.88µ ( 5.3 + µ ) gust alleviation factor calculated from the following formula:

 = 2 ( )
m

S
  lm a is the non-dimensional sailplane mass ratio, with   is the density of air (kg/m3) at

the altitude considered and lm is the mean geometric chord of the wing (m)
(b) The value of n calculated from the expression given above need not exceed: n = 1.25 (V V )
2

S1

The validity of this underlying assumption for light-weight gliders is being discussed currently in the OSTIV Sailplane
Development Panel. A new formula was derived for the gust alleviation factor k by Boermans and Lasauskas [3],
which conservatively reproduces the gust loads from the simulations as a function of the gust length H:
0.96 µ (H lm ) H
k = =12.17 + 0.191
with (2)
0.475 + µ (H lm )
lm
The new formula containes the relation between the occuring gust length H and the mean wing chord lm as input. So
far no comprehensive statement about an appropriate gust length covering all relevant meteorological conditions could
be found. As a go around the equation on the right is suggested to be introduced in the new CS-22 amendment to
provide the same value for the alleviation factor as the 25 times mean wing chord gust length. The validity of the
current specification really rests on accumulated experience. Sailplanes with structures designed to the specified load
factors have been found to be strong enough in the past, and may therefore be expected to be satisfactory in the future
as well. In order to check the validity of the new formula the transient gust response time simulation of a flexible
generic open-class sailplane is presented, which follows the methodology in [5] as a more rational analysis.

Methodology
The Finite-Element model of the complete aircraft structure is set up in global coordinates and represents the structural
dynamics of the airframe. Typically, up to several thousand grid points will be used, with three displacement and three
rotation coordinates at each. The type of elements used in the finite element analysis (FEA) will depend upon the type
of structure. Due to highly slender wings and empennage of the sailplane Euler-Bernoulli beam elements are appro-
priate to represent the vibration characteristics of the airframe (see Figure 2). The global stiffness K and mass matrix
M are calculated from span-wise bending and torsional properties. Instead of using the full problem, solving the dy-
namic response problem employs a reduced set of normal vibration modes and natural frequencies, which result from
solving the eigenvalue problem:
K − i M  i = 0
2
(3)
where i is the natural frequency. The columns in the modal matrix Φ r contain the normal modes i , i = 1, , r , which
ˆ = ΦT MΦ = I . The modal stiffness matrix is K
are M -orthonormal, such that M r r r
ˆ = ΦTr KΦr = diag (r2 ) . Note, that
natural frequencies and normal modes can be experimentally determined in the ground vibration test GVT. The fol-
lowing description of the modal transient response analysis reduces the system by a small set of low-frequency normal
modes up to the wing torsional mode shape.
The unsteady aerodynamic force matrices are calculated from the whole-aircraft normal mode displacements, using
the Doublet Lattice Method DLM [6], which is essentially the conversion to an aerodynamic finite element method.
Each element is a portion of the wing surface (quadrilateral box) in which two of its sides are aligned with the incoming
flow. The pressure difference C p and the normal downwash w( x, y ) are assumed constant at each box and their
value is assigned to the respective control point. Such relation is written in terms of the aerodynamic influence coeffi-
cient matrix AIC, with as many rows and columns as the number of boxes in the wing surfaces:
w ( kr ) −1 l
= AIC( kr ) Cp ( kr ) with kr = m (4)
V 2V
Due to the oscillating downwash, the aerodynamic influence coefficient matrix is a complex nonlinear function of the
reduced frequency kr, where  is the oscillation frequency and lm is the reference mean chord. The corner points of
the quadrilateral boxes will be different from those used for the structural model, and spline fits are extensively used
to interpolate from one to the other (see Figure 2). The modal aerodynamic load matrix resulting from mode shape
oscillation is written as
A(kr ) = Φr T S AIC(kr )TΦr ,
T T
(5)
where T is the load and displacement transfer interpolation matrix and S is the integration matrix to convert pressure
in forces. For spanwise uniform gust excitation, the vertical gust velocity acting on a certain aerodynamic box can be
obtained by the time delay of the gust velocity at a specific gust reference point x0, which is expressed as
(( )
− i x j − x0 V ) ((
− ikr x j − x0 ) lm )
u gj = u g e = ug e , (6)
in which, ug0 and ugj respectively represent the gust velocity at the reference point and the control point of the j-th
aerodynamic box. The resulting complex gust mode vector contains the time delay for all the aerodynamic boxes. The
aerodynamic pressures induced by the gust downwashes are obtained by multiplication with the AIC matrix. Again,
the aerodynamic pressures can be converted to the structural equivalent forces via spline interpolation:
ug ug
with q = 1 2  V .
−1
f g = q T S AIC ( k )Φ g ( kr ) = q A g ( kr )
T 2
(7)
V V
To obtain the time-domain model of the aeroelastic system, the transient response is obtained by exploiting the fact,
that a convolution in the time domain corresponds to a multiplication in the frequency domain. Both aerodynamic force
matrices are functions of the reduced frequency, which means that the aeroelastic equations in frequency-domain es-
tablish a transfer function of the structural response due to the gust input in frequency-domain.
U ( )
Mq (
ˆ (t ) + K
 )
ˆ − q A ( t ) q ( t ) = q A ( t ) u ( t )   − 2 M
V

g g 
ˆ +K
ˆ − q A (kr )  Q( ) = q A (kr ) g
   g
V
(8)


The aeroelastic transfer function reads

−1
H g ( ) = 1 2  ˆ +K
− 2 M Vˆ − q A ( kr ) A (kr ) . (9)
    g

The resulting response q ( t ) in time domain can be calculated by Fourier- and inverse Fourier-transformation:

1. Evaluate the Fourier transform of u g ( t ) : U g ( ) = FFT ( u g ( t ) ) =  u (t ) e
g
− i t
dt (10)
−

2. Generate the frequency response by multiplication: Q ( ) = H g ( )U g ( ) (11)


q ( t ) = FFT −1 ( Q ( ) ) =
1
 Q ( ) e d 
i t
3. Calculate the inverse Fourier transform: (12)
2 −
4. The overall vertical acceleration in terms of the incremental load factor results from
1
n(t ) = −  n z ,i  fi ( t ), f ( t ) = KΦq(t )
mg i
(13)

where gust loads in physical coordinates are calculated from the modal response q(t ) , the matrix of normal modes
Φ and the global stiffness matrix K. The vector nz contains the vertical direction vector at each grid point.
 Figure 2. Deformed FE beam model and DLM mesh for two natural modes

Results
The transient incremental gust load factor n from Eq. 13 represents the sum of the total loads with contribution of
aerodynamic, inertial and flexible forces. It is assumed that the sailplane is in trimmed equilibrium at 1g-level before
and after the discrete gust encounter. Depending on the gust length and the flight speed the gust gradient will vary and
the additional gust energy introduced into the structure will result in the deformation. The task is to find the gust length
which produces the maximum and minimum incremental loads, whi h is alled “the tuned-gust”
The structural dynamic beam model of a representative open class glider with 25m span is used as an example for the
modal transient gust response analysis, which has a total mass of m=650kg, a wing area of S=16.3m² and a mean chord
of lm=0.83m (see Figure 2). According to CS-22 the maximum positive and negative gust velocity is Ug=15m/s at the
assumed design gust speed VB=50m/s. To find worst-case gust, the length is varied between 1-200 mean chords. In the
upper part of Figure 3 the gust upwind is plotted over time, while in the lower part the transient response of the load
factor n(t ) at the center of gravity is depicted. The resulting incremental gust load factor n in Eq. 15 can be directly
compared to the right term in Eq. 1 of the simplified CS-22 estimation based on the Pratt-Walker formula and the new
expanded formula with variable gust length in Eq. 2. In
Figure 4 the envelope of the maximum and minimum load factors is plotted. While the Pratt-Walker formula assumes
constant gust length, which results in constant load factor of n =4.42 according to Eq.1, the new proposal for §22.341
provides larger values at very short gusts, but converges against zero with longer gust length. The envelope of the
transient responses is plotted for two cases: 1) the rigid sailplane with very high stiffness, 2) the flexible sailplane with
reasonable stiffness based on GVT-data tuning. As a final conclusion the new gust load factor proposal for §22.341
according to Eq.2 covers the structural dynamics of the flexible sailplane configuration for full range of gust length
variation.
 Figure 3. Gust input and load factor response in time and frequency domain

Figure 4. Comparison of loadfactor envelopes for varying gust length

References
[1] K. Pratt, W. Walker, A revised gust-load formula and a reevaluation of v-g data taken on civil transport airplanes from
1933 to 1950, NACA Report No.1206, 1954.
[2] de Jonge, J.B., Gust alleviation factors for sailplanes, 10th OSTIV Congress, South Cemey (England), 1965.
[3] EASA, Certification Specifications for Sailplanes, CS-22, EASA, 2009.
[4] Boermans, L.M.M., Lasauskas, E., On the gust loads of sailplanes, OSTIV Congress 2019 Abstracts – 2019.
[5] Vink, W.J., de Jonge, J.B., A MATLAB program to study gust loading on a simple aircraft model, National Aerospace
Laboratory NLR, 1997-07-29, NLR Technical Publication TP 97379 U, 1997.
[6] Albano, E., Rodden, W. P., A Doublet-Lattice Method for calculating Lift Distributions on oscillating Surfaces in Sub-
sonic Flows, AIAA journal, Vol. 7, No. 2, 1969.