Aerodynamics of a hybrid airship.

The objective of this paper is to present the results of a numerical study of the aerodynamic parameters of a wingless and a winged-hull airship. The total forces and moment coefficients of the airships have been computed over a range of angles. The results obtained show that addition of a wing to a conventional airship increases the lift has three times the lifting force at positive angle of attack as compared to a wingless airship whereas the drag increases in the range of 19% to 58%. The longitudinal and directional stabilities were found to be statically stable, however, both the conventional airship and the hybrid or winged airships were found to have poor rolling stability. Wingless airship has slightly higher longitudinal stability than a winged airship. The winged airship has better directional stability than the wingless airship. The wingless airship only possesses static rolling stability in the range of yaw angles of -5° to 5°. On the contrary, the winged airship initially tested does not possess rolling stability at all. Computational fluid dynamics (CFD) simulations show that modifications to the wing placement and its dihedral have strong positive effect on the rolling stability. Raising the wings to the center of gravity and introducing a dihedral angle of 5° stabilizes the rolling motion of the winged airship. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]