Author(s)

M. Anghileri, L.M.L. Castelletti, L. Lanzi & F. Mentuccia

Abstract

The impact of a bird represents one of the most dangerous events for the safety of the modern aircraft. Statistics report that the consequences can be tragic, especially for the small airplanes. In this work, the impact of a bird against a nacelle inlet is analysed by the means of a proven Explicit Finite Element (FE) code, LSTC LS-Dyna. In particular, the dynamic characterisation of the composite materials used in manufacturing the external skin of the inlet was achieved by referring to the drop-tests carried out using thin walled tubes of the same material. The data collected were used to define and tune the damage law of the numerical model. Once the material constitutive model was validated, an actual bird impact test was numerically analysed. In particular, two d

Keywords