Modeling
The critical decisions in lightweight design are made at the beginning of the product development process (PEP).
However, this phase is characterized by a variety of solution variants along with a simultaneous lack of information. Here, reduced structural models help to acquire this information. The SLA develops these reduced models for new designs and loads. We describe the models analytically and validate them experimentally. We integrate nonlinear geometry, material, and failure models into the reduced formulations, and we adapt them for numerical computations. As a result, the SLA has the unique ability to efficiently and quantifiably apply typical lightweight designs such as sandwich, shear webs, and lattice structures in preliminary designs, thus contributing to the dissemination of new lightweight designs.
Projects
On going
MoonFibre: Lunar production of fibers from lunar regolith
OUTREACH: Development, prototypical implementation, and evaluation of a new machine concept for the mechanization of felling and chopping of the center block at 40 m tramline spacing
SteelBlade: Sustainable wind energy by using steel rotor blades
ULAS-E-VAN: Ultralight body structure of electric transport vehicle
upBUS: Seamless, intermodal cable car-bus transportation system
Finished
ATLAS: Acoustic loads on launcher upper stages
BirdStrike: Bird strike on composite parts
BIMOD: Impact of dynamic flap movement on maximum lift taking into account aeroelastic effects
DAEDALOS: Design of aircraft structures with transient loads
DESICOS: New guidelines for specifying the stability behavior of geometrically imperfect and thin-walled shell structures.
E-SAT: Development and integration of an electro-hybrid powertrain for the Silent Air Taxi
LARC: PETW-Experiments on loads, aeroelasticity, and on robust active control of loads and aeroelastic properties.
MAAXIMUS: More affordable aircraft structure through extended, integrated & mature numerical sizing
RECOVERY AND RETURN TO BASE (RRTB): Recycling and return to the base system for the first stage of the launch vehicle
SFB-TR 40: Technological foundations for the design of thermally and mechanically highly loaded components of future space transportation systems
Silent Air Taxi: An on-demand air transport system for regional transport
VAeroWind: Improved aerodynamic and structural mechanics load prediction on wind turbine rotor blades and its application in an online load estimation.