Cad/cae modelling of mechanical behavior of composite outlet guide vane for aircraft jet engine

Today the world trend in aircraft engine industry is the replacement of metal alloys to composite materials which allows a significant weight reduction and increase of product performance. The use of composites not only for lightly loaded elements, but for the critical parts such as the fan blades and outlet guide vanes (OGV) is already researched and implemented. Outlet guide vanes (OGV) also called flow straightening vanes, are radially disposed behind the fan to straighten out the airflow to reduce losses in the outer contour of the engine. Design and manufacturing techniques development for composite outlet guide vane is a complex scientific and engineering problem including modeling, simulation and design of composite structure, specifying its design features and reinforcement schemes, choosing materials and optimal manufacturing techniques. Such giants of aviation industry as GeneralElectric, Rolls-Royce, SNECMA are seriously engaged in this problem. Therefore, manufacturing composite outlet guide vane for new domestic PD-14 aviation propulsion, scheduled for installation on the short-range and mid-range jet aircraft MS-21 is a very important problem. It’s easy to show that the use of polymeric composite materials (PCM) instead of metal in OGV can lead to decrease of engine weight for up to 8-10 kg. The goal of this work is the implementation of CAD/CAE technologies for engineering analysis of composite outlet guide vanes of PD-14 engine. The three-dimensional model of OGV for stress-strain analysis was developed in Siemens NX CAD-system. The numerical simulation of mechanical behavior of OGV made of balanced textile CFRP under the static pressure was carried out with ANSYS Workbench software. The technique of static strength prediction was examined. The developed numerical model allows analyzing the effective stress-strain fields in whole volume and its components in each layer separately. The four reinforcement schemes were reviewed. It was shown that the quasi-isotropic reinforcement scheme also called “black aluminum” is an optimal choice for obtaining the high strength and stiffness properties of OGV. The results of numerical simulation confirm the preliminary estimations of the effectiveness of composite materials application in the design of OGV obtained by the authors earlier.