ALBERT

Description: This program represents a subsonic aerodynamic method for determining the mean camber surface of trimmed noncoplaner planforms with minimum vortex drag. With this program, multiple surfaces can be designed together to yield a trimmed configuration with minimum induced drag at some specified lift coefficient. The method uses a vortex-lattice and overcomes previous difficulties with chord loading specification. A Trefftz plane analysis is used to determine the optimum span loading for minimum drag. The program then solves for the mean camber surface of the wing associated with this loading. Pitching-moment or root-bending-moment constraints can be employed at the design lift coefficient. Sensitivity studies of vortex-lattice arrangements have been made with this program and comparisons with other theories show generally good agreement. The program is very versatile and has been applied to isolated wings, wing-canard configurations, a tandem wing, and a wing-winglet configuration. The design problem solved with this code is essentially an optimization one. A subsonic vortex-lattice is used to determine the span load distribution(s) on bent lifting line(s) in the Trefftz plane. A Lagrange multiplier technique determines the required loading which is used to calculate the mean camber slopes, which are then integrated to yield the local elevation surface. The problem of determining the necessary circulation matrix is simplified by having the chordwise shape of the bound circulation remain unchanged across each span, though the chordwise shape may vary from one planform to another. The circulation matrix is obtained by calculating the spanwise scaling of the chordwise shapes. A chordwise summation of the lift and pitching-moment is utilized in the Trefftz plane solution on the assumption that the trailing wake does not roll up and that the general configuration has specifiable chord loading shapes. VLMD is written in FORTRAN for IBM PC series and compatible computers running MS-DOS. This program requires 360K of RAM for execution. The Ryan McFarland FORTRAN compiler and PLINK86 are required to recompile the source code; however, a sample executable is provided on the diskette. The standard distribution medium for VLMD is a 5.25 inch 360K MS-DOS format diskette. VLMD was originally developed for use on CDC 6000 series computers in 1976. It was originally ported to the IBM PC in 1986, and, after minor modifications, the IBM PC port was released in 1993.