fatigue life estimate of landing gear's leg using modal analysis

Abstract

The present work concerns solving Noise, Vibration and Harshness (NVH) and fatigue based on Power Spectrum Density (PSD) analysis of a landing gear's leg for an Un-Manned Aerial Vehicle (UAV). This analysis includes random vibration and high-cycle fatigue analysis in a random vibration environment. In this analysis, the cumulative damage ratio is computed using material S-N (Stress-Number of cycles) fatigue curve. Dirlik method is used for the analysis of lifetime as it is proven to provide accurate results for large number of applications, both in automotive and aerospace industry. It is also compared to other methods that have been developed in LS-DYNA® as well. The input acceleration PSD data are provided through measurements. The obtained analysis results shows that although the landing gear design is safe according to dynamic and static load, its service life is about 3037 hours due to random vibration effect.