Lightweight design for an aircraft reinforcing frame based on structural bionics

Abstract

Lightweight design is urgently required in many fields, especially in aeronautics and astronautics, but conventional design methods cannot always meet the requirement. However, natural organisms have developed many types of structures with excellent properties, and they can provide many new design ideas. To improve the design of an aircraft reinforcing frame, structural characteristics of peltate venation and root architecture were investigated first, and several distribution rules were obtained. Then, relevant models for design of the frame were developed and analyzed in order to extract mechanical rules for their application in the design. Finally, based on these mechanical rules, lightweight design for the frame was accomplished. Comparison between the bionic and conventional frames shows that the total weight is reduced by about 6.0%, under the same requirement of stiffness and strength in both two load conditions.