Flight path reconstruction filter extension for tracking flexible aircraft modal amplitudes and velocities

Abstract

This paper proposes an extension to the traditional flight path reconstruction filter to simultaneously reconstruct the aircraft rigid body states together with modal amplitudes and velocities of the structure. To achieve this, the filter makes use of additional accelerometers, gyroscopes and strain gauges placed across the aircraft structure. These measurements are used in a Kalman filter together with kinematic equations of a flexible aircraft and structural mode shapes. First a simulation model is used to evaluate the filter performance on reference signals where the true state is known. Finally, flight test measurements obtained using an instrumented Diana 2 scaled glider are used to validate the filter.