C.P. No.

‘146
(15,462)
A&C. Technical Report

MINISTRY OF SUPPLY

AERONAUTICAL RESEARCH COUNCIL

CURRENT PAPERS

Vibration and Flutter

of Aircraft Aerials

W. H. Johnson, Grad.l.Mech.E., Grad.R.Ae.S.

LONDON: HER MAJESTY’S STATIONERY OFFICE

1954
Price Is. 6d. net
 C.P. Nc.ll&

Report NC. Structures 126

December, 1953

ADDENDUM

Since writing this report the author has carried cut brief wind
tunnel tests on a blade aerial to establish the change in its lift
direction resulting from ice accretion on its leading edge.

The tests on the unmodified aerial showed that with the aerial
stationary positive-lift is present for all angles of incidence up to a
value well in excess of the stalling angle, angles of up to 20' being
checked. With simulated ice on the leading edge however, a similar
test showed that negative lift occurs at angles of incidence in excess
of 20. The cross-sectional shape tested in the latter case w^rs that
given in Fig,5(a) and the negative lift continued to occur up to an
angle of IO , which vas the maximum angle tested in this case. At an
angle of incidence of less than 2' the lift force in the "iced up" case
was so small that its direction could not be determinedwith the crude
apparatus used.

It is considered that these tests confirm the original hypothesis

that the oscillatory instability of the blade aerials when "iced up"
is in fact stalling flutter of the type described in paras.6.
 C.P. No.f46

Report No. Stmotures 126

July, 1952.

ROYAL AIRCRhFT ESTABLISKkmT

Vibration and Flutter of Aircraft Aerials

W. ii. Johnson, Grad. I. Nech. E.,

Grad. R. Ae. S.

Fatigue failures of blade end tiip aircraft aerials have been

investigated and it is shown that stalling flutter and mechanically
excited vibration have both oontributed in large measure to the failures.
All the aerial types involved possess considerable flexibility and very
low internal damping. It is shown that the introduction of damping into
the mountirq of the aerials has a very beneficial effect on their behaviour
as regards both flutter and mechanically excited vibrattin. Methods are
described for preventing failure from either 03*1se.

-l-
 LIST OF CONTmTS
??%E
1 Introduction 3

,2 General Description of the Blade Aerials

:3 Information obtained from Blade Aerial Failures

,4 Possible Sources of Exoitation of Blade Aerials

PART1 Meohezical Vibration of Blade Aerials
:5
6 Stalling Flutter of Blade Aerials

7 Prevention of Metianical Vibration and Stalling

Flutter Failures 6

a General Description of Whip Aerials 7

PART II
9 Whip Aerial Failures 7

IO Conolusions Reached in the Investigation of

Blade Aerial and Whip Aerial Failures 0

LIST OF ZJJJSTRATIONS
2%.
Typical Examples of Blade Aerials I

The 27 ins V.H.F. and the 36 ins S.B.A. Whip Aerials 2

Typical Examples of Blade Aerial Failures 3

Mechanical Excitation of a Blade Aerial on a Vibration Table
(Root amplitude 2 0.010 ins) 4
Cross-sections of Plasticine Coated Blade Aerials tested for
Flutter 5
Diagram of Flexible Mounting used to Prevent Meohanioal Vibration
and Stalling Flutter of Blade Aerials 6
Diagram Illustrating the cause of Stalling Flutter 7
Diagram Illustrating ooinoidenoe of B1od.e Aerial Natural
Frequencies vnth Engine/Propeller Frequencies a

-2-
1 In+mduction
Numerous failures of aircraft aerials have occurred on various types
of service airoraft during flight. Several aerial types were involved,
in&ding blade aerials and. whip aerials in use with identification, direc-
t ion finding and communications equipments. Loss of any one of the aerials
associated with a given equipment usually resulted in complete unservice-
ability of that equipment, thoreby bringing about 8. potentially dangerous
situation. The development of suppressed aerials to replace external
aerials is still a long term project, snd it is therefore necessary to
establish the cause of the failures snd to find a practicable oure.

It has been asoertaincd that the cause of most of the failures onboth
whip and blade aerials is stalling flutter brought about by the ohange of
cross section of the aerials through ice accretion ot their leading edges.
The few other failures occurred on blade aerials only and were oaused by
meohanioally exoited vibration.

All the aerial types involved possess considerable flexibility and

very low internal damping. It has been found that introduction of damping
in the mounting of the aerials has a very benefioial effeot on their
behaviour fmm both flutter and mechanical vibration points of view.
SucoessfMmountings have been developed which prevent stalling flutter of
blade aerials and whip aerials and als3 reduce the amplitude of meohanically
excited vibration of blade ncrinls to n negligible value.

In the case of blade aerials d.th n stresmlined section the simple

expedient of mounting the aerial with its trailing edge facing fozwards has
been found to prevent stalling flutter. This expedient, however, does not
influence the mechanical vibration oharacteristics of the nerinl and is
therefore not a complete curt in itself.
Although failures occurred on rnav different aerial types, as for as
mechanical vibration and flutter are concorned they can broadly be olassed
as either blade aerials or whip aerials. It has therefore been oonvenient
to divide this note into two parts, Part I dcding with blade aerials snd
Part II dealing with whip aerials. In eaoh ease an explsnation of the
causes of failure is given together w-ith a description of the curative
measures which can be adopted.

-3-
 PART I - Blade keria>Feilures

2 General Description of the Blade Aerials

These are, with one exception, tapered streamlined section aerials

forged from high quality light alloy. The exception is the Type 90 aerial
which is a parallel streamlined section steel aerial. The mot chord of
these aerials is 1.2 ins and the thiokness/chord ratio is approximately 1:4.
The blade aerials are cut off from the same basic forging arYi are used in
lengths of from 10 ins to 18 ins. The attaohment to the aircraf't is aocom-
plished in some cases by mculding into a plastic bollard and in others by
screwing and pinning to a circular mounting plate. Exsmples of these
aerials are sholvn in Fig.1. The lateral fundamental flexural natural fre-
quenoies of the blade aerials varies from 70 cycles per second for the
II inch long Type 347 Aerial, to 37 oyoles per second for the 17.5 inoh
long Type 346 Aerial. The damping coefficient of the aerials In their
fundamental flexural modes is &out 0.003 times the value for critical
amnping. The blade serials are used with I.F.F. Identification and Rebeoca
direction finding equipments, for whioh whip aerials are unsuitable beoause
of their greater flexibility and smaller surface area.

3 Information obtained from Xade Aerial Failures

These failures took the form of either breakage of the aerialblaae

close to the root, or bredcage aoross the mounting plate along a fore and
aft line with consewent damage to the aircraft skin. Examples of typical
failures are show in Fig.3.
Idetallurgical examination of' the fractures indicated that they were
due to rapid fatipe of the material brought about by lateral be&in@; of
the aerial. The number of stress reversals was estimated from the fraotures
to be of the order of 100,000, which implied high peak stresses resulting
from oonsidorable aerial lateral bending. The fact that failure invariably
occurred close to the aer1a.l root suggested that the oscillation involved
the fundamental lateral flexuralmode.
ServiceDefect Reports showed that most of the failures oocurred duting
icing conditions and in some cases the pilots observed the aerials oscilla-
ting with large amplitude for some minutes before breakzing off.

4 Possible Sources of Excitation of Blade Aerials

Severe continuous oscillation 01' external aerials can, in general, be

excited from DJO possible souroes. These we:-

(i) Mochaniojl kibration of the airframe transmitted direct through

the aerial mot.

(ii) Sane form of aemdywnic excitation, e.g. flutter, om.pressibility

effects, or buffeting arising from airflolr turbulence.

For blade aerials many of the failures took place on low speed aim,.&,
High Maoh number airflow ocourring in the vicinity of the aerials was there-
fore unlikely. Turbulent airflow round the aerials was also improbable, as
in many cases the aerials were well out on the aircraft tine; fairly =lose to
the leading edge.

TWO possibilities therefore reznained to be investigated, mechanically

exoited vibration and flutter.

-4-
5 Mechanical Vibration of Blade Aerials

To investigate the likelihood of severe mechanically excited vibra-

tion of blade aerials, a Type 93 I.F.F. aerial was fixed rigidly to a
vibration exciter. Fig.& shows this aerial being subJected to a lateral
root amplitude of t 0.010 ins at its natural frequency (41.5 cycles per
second). The resulting tip amplitude was + 1.75 ins and fatigue failure
at the aerial root ooourrod after less than 200,000 cycles. It is signi-
ficant to observe that an amplitude of + 0.010 ins at 41.5 cycles per
second is within the acoeptsble limits of airfrsme vibration as laid down
in A.P.970, Vol.1, Chap.701.
Within the range of natural frequencies of the blade aerials several
engine and propeller order frequencies are normally found on sny reoipro-
eating engined aircraft. It is probable therefore, that a blade aerial
mounted on such an aircraft would be excited on resonance to fairly large
amplitudes at one or more particular engine speeds within the normal run-
ning range. This fact is illustrated by the interference diagram inFig.8.
The engine and propeller order frequencies in this diagram are those which
would be produced by a Bristol Centaurus engine driving a four-blade3 pro-
peller. The constant frequency lines are the fundamental flexural fro-
quencies of four representative blade norial types.

6 Stalling Flutter of Blade Aerials

Much of the obtainable evidence on blade aerial failure suggested

that ice formation on the aerials was an important factor. One of the
effects of icing on a blade aerial is to increase its mass and thus bring
about a small reduction in its natural frequencies. Such small changes
are not likely to produce a large inorease in the rnunber of mechanical
vibration failures, and the aerodynamic effect of ice accretion was there-
fore investigated.

The leading edge of a Type 93 I.F.F. aerial was coated with plastioine
to simulate ioe formation. The section of the coating is shown in Fig.5A.
This aerial was mounted on an aircraft in the normal manner and was observed
to oscillate in its rfundsment,al lateral bending mode at all airspeeds above
130 knots I.A.S. 1 -ith an estimated tip amplitude of + 4 ins. The smplitude
of osoillntion remained fairly constant with variation of airspeed from
130 knots up to 310 knots (the msximum speed obtainable on the testing air
craft). Yawing the aircraft to either side produced a marked increase in
amplitv.de. Variation of engine speeds did not alter the amplitude
appreciably.

The fundamental torsional frequency of the Type 93 aerial was measured

snd found to be 1600 cycles per second. The considerable difference
between this frequency and the fundamental lateral bending frequency of
41.5 cycles per second indicated that flexure-torsion flutter at current
flying speeds was not possible, even when allowance is made for the fre-
quency changes resulting from considerable icing on the leading edge of
the aerial. It seemed most likely that the phenomenon was a type of
stalling flutter in the lateral bending mode.* Under lateral motion of
the aerial the relative airflow (see Fig.7a) is at an angle to the blade
and produces a sideways force, which with a normal aerofoil section would
oppose the motion. With the type of section resulting from ice accretion -
on the leading edge, however, a sufficiently high velocity of lateral

* The type of flutter envissgcd here is different from the type usudlly
referred to as stalling flutter, in which an aerofoil of oonventionsl seo-
tion oscillates in a twisting motion about a mean position of high
(stalling) incidence to the airflow.

-5-
 motion could produce the necessary incidence to cause stalling, which wculd
create a sideways force in the reverse direction (negative lift) to assist
the motion (see Fig.7b). Under these conditions a sustained oscillation
becomes possible due to the existence of the negative lift, representing
negative aerodynamic damping, over part of the cycle.

7 The Prevention of Mechanical Vibration and Stalling Flutter Failures

The simplest methods of preventing large mechani&dly foroed empli-
tudes are either to intmduoe sufficient dsmping into the system to reduce
the amplitudes to a low level, or to design a flexible mounting which would
give the system a natural fundamental flexural frequency below the lowest
engine or propeller order frequency present, in an attanpt to avoid
resonance. The latter soheme would require a natural frequency below
10 cyoles per second. A linear systan with such a low natural frequency
would inevitably be very "soft" end the aerial would therefore be subject
to large lateral deflections due to normal aemdynsmic side loads. Ir. the
ease of the directional equipments s&h lateral deflections oould not be
permitted snd. the use of a ncrmalflex5.ble mounting was therefore precluded.
( It was also necessary to avoid reducing the torsional stiffness of the
system as this would increase the possibility of flexure-torsion flutter.
A mounting was devised which was successful in preventing both stalling
flutter and excessive mechanical vibration of the blade aerials. This
mounting is shown disgrsnunaticslly in Fig.6. The aerial is hinged at its
root about an axis AB parallel to the longitudinal axis of the aircraft
an? two spring loaded friction damping pads supplying a total sliding
friction torque of 7 lbs ins are applifl to the front and back of the aerial
bollard at points below the axis of rotation. Rotation of the aerial about
the E&S is limited to " 3 degrees by rigid stops.
The only elasticity in the systan is therefore that of the aerial
itself and for small amplitudes of vibration (i.e. those producing torwes
of less than 7 lbs ins at the aerial root) the aerial will behave as though
it were fixed. However, for larger amplitudes the aerial till rotate about
the axis AB against the friction damping, The system thus possess non-
linear ohzcacteristios and. for large smplitudes the damping i,s in excess of
the critical. value. The possibility of severe vibration on resonsnce due to
mechsnicsl excitation is thus ranoved. For smsllvalues of friction torque,
stalling flutter involving a motion of rebounding on the limiting stops still
occurred with the plasticine coated aerial, end it was found by experimat
that the friction torque of 7 lbs ins was necessary to prevent the flutter
oompletely. The action of the mounting in preventing the stalling flutter
is that it restricts the lateral motion of the aerial s.nd thus prevents the
cccurrence of stall conditions sufficient to maintain an oscillation.
It has been found in practice that the expedient of mounting the blade
aerials back to front (i.e. trailing edge facirg forwards) has eliminated
most of the failures. The effect of this reversal is to dter considerably
the shape of the ice formed on the aerial unCier icing conditions. The oon-
sequent change in the overall truss sectional. shape of ice and aerial appears
to have a profound influence on the stalling fpdtter characteristics. Brief
icing wind tunnel tests indicated that ice forms on the reversed aerial in a
manner similar to that shown in Fig.5B. An aerial coated vsith plasticine
with this cross section showed no tendency to flutter over the 0 - 310 knots
indicated airspeed range. Reversal of blade aeri,ds has been carried cut on
service aircroft on account of its simplicity. The mechsnicel vibration
characteristics of the aerials sze not altered by reversal and it is pmbsble
therefore that mechanically excite3 vibration will still occur on these
aerials.

-6-
 PART II - Whip Aerial Failures

8 General Description of the Yhip Aerials

whip aerials are manufactured basically from circular section drawn

steel. The diameter decreases in several steps from the root along the
length of the aerial. The root is 0.25 ins diameter and is threaded to
sorew into a plastic bollard which is fitted to the aircraft. Whip aerials
of various lengths up to 60 ins are used, but most of the failures occurred
on the 27 ins V.H.F. cormrmnioaticns and the 36 ins Stsndard Beam Approach
aerials shown in Fig.2. The fundamental flexural natural frequencies of
the 27 ins V.H.F. and the 36 ins S.B.A. aerials are II cycles per second
and 6 cycles per secod respectively. The damping coefficient of the whip
aerials in their fundamental bending modes is about 0.004 times the value
for critical damping.

9 whip Aerial Failures

whip aerial failures are mentioned in this report for the s&e of oom-
pleteness although the cs.use of failures has previously been ascertained
and a cure established in wind tunnel tests at the R.A.E.

The failures were identified by metallurgicsl exsmination to be due

to rapid fatigue of the material resulting from a relatively small number
of high stress reversals. Failure occurred almost invariably close to the
aerial root In a later,d direction, indicating lateral bending of the
aerial in its fundmentd mode. Fatigue of the material was usually
accelerated by stress concentrations ocourring aoross the aerial root
threads end at sudden changes in aerial alameter, many failures occurring
at both places.

The fundsments.l flexural natural frequencies ofthe 27 ins V.H.F. and

the 36 ins S.B.A. aerials are below the lowest engine and propeller ander
frequencies found cn piston engined aircraft in the normal engine speed
ranges.
Failure of these aerials, therefore, was unlikely to be caused by
mechanical excitation on resonance in the fundamental flexural mode.
Furthermore, many of the failures had been seen to occur in icing condi-
tions, preceded by continuous lateral oscillation to angles in excess of
2 30 degrees.
The wind tunnel tests showed that the cause of the failure was stalling
flutter which ocourrsd. during the early stages of icing when the original
ck%d.ar section of the aerial had become elliptical due to ice formation
on its leading edge. The ellipse behaves as an aerofoil and the flutter
is caused in the ssme way as that of the blade aerials. The flutter fre-
quency is again the fundamental natural floral frequency of the iced
aerial.

The principle of the prevention of this flutter is the same as that of

the blade aerials. The damping required is however very much less in the
case of the whip aerials. The successful flexible mounting developed
Turin@; the wind tunnel tests allows the aerinl a range of rotation of
+ 5 degrees about an axis through its root ana parallel to the longitudinsl
axis of the aircraft. Over this range damping and stiffness are supplied
by a sponge robber pad in compression.

-7-
10 Conclusions reached in the 1nvestip;ation of Blade Aerial and Whip
Aerial Failures

Vibration and stalling flutter occurring in the fundamental lateral

flexural mode have been responsible for large numbers of fatigue failures
of blade aerials an3 whip aerials, In many cases fatigue of the material
has been accelerated by some form of stress concentration.

A very &nportant contributory cawe of severe vibration and flutter

of both blade and whip aerials is the extremely low internal damping of
the materials from which they are manufactured. As a result of this
absence of damping very little energy input 1s required to maintain an
osoxllation of large amplitude and consequent high peak stress.
It has been found possible to prevent vibration and stalling flutter
of blade aerials and whip aerials by installing a suitable form of
flexible mounting in each case. The principle of both types of mxnting
is that of providing a limited range of lateral motion over whxh the
stiffness is low and damping very high.

-a-
CP.145. 63. - Prmted rn Great Brstam.
w
 AIRFLOW

PLASTtClNE COAT.

AIRFLOW

\
PLASTICINE COAT.

FIG. 5 (a 8 b) CROSS SECTIONS OF PLASTICINE

COATED BLADE AERIALS TESTED FOR FLUTTER.
FIG. 6. DIAGRAM OF EXPERIMENTAL FLEXIBLE
MOUNTING USED TO PREVENT MECHANICAL
VIBRATION AND STALLING FLUTTER OF BLADE AERIALS.
 FlG7(a u b)

VELOCITY “F y’u “R COMBINED

OF AIRFLOW L$ RELATIVE
(u”$ VELOCITY.
.k .?. /

b2-
v, VELOCITY OF LATERAL MOTION.

SXERIAL V E L O C I T Y

- L

A E R I A L Vf LOCITY

FIG.7 (a s b) DIAGRAMS ILLUSTRATING THE

CAUSE OF STALLING FLUTTER.
FIG.8
100
0 AT THESE POINTS RESONANCE OF THE AERIAL
WOULD OCCUR AT THE APPROPRIATE ENGINE R.PY.
!E

- - TYPE93
- - 1 -

EJ 4o
2
30

20

-
IO’

0
1600 1800 20000 2200 2400 2600 2800
ENGINE R.f?tvj.

FIG. 8:DIAGRAM ILLUSTRATING COINCIDENCE OF

BLADE AERIAL NATURAL FREQUENCES WITH
ENGINE/PROPELLER FREQUENCES.
 C.P. No. 146
(15.662)
A.R.C. Technlcal Report

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1954

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5.0. Code No. 23-9007-46