Aero elastic flutter may play an important role in the breakage of thin membrane-like structures (a.k.a. webs) found in paper-handling, textile, sheet-metal and magnetic tapes industry. In this article, we examine the aero elastic stability of a web modeled as a uni-axially tensioned (along the machine direction) low aspect ratio Kirchhoff plate, which is subject to a fluid flow in the cross machine direction. Panel methods based on the distribution of singularity solutions (sources and doublets) on the surface of the web are used to numerically solve the problem of 3D unsteady potential flow surrounding the web. The equation of motion of the plate coupled to a fluid flow is discretized by using Galerkin’s method. The discretization is performed in the configuration space formulation of the gyroscopic eigenvalue problem. The linear stability of this reduced order system is investigated. The onset of flutter instability as a function of base fluid flow in the cross machine direction is studied. The effects of fluid coupling on the frequencies and modes of oscillations of the web are also studied.

Volume Subject Area:
Applied Mechanics
Topics:
Flutter (Aerodynamics), Thin films, Fluid dynamics, Machinery, Stability, Eigenvalues, Equations of motion, Flow (Dynamics), Hydraulic couplings, Membranes, Oscillations, Reduced order systems, Sheet metal, Textiles
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