CHARACTERIZATION OF BIO-INSPIRED COVERT FLAPS FOR STABILITY CONTROL IN AIRBORNE WIND ENERGY HARVESTING KITE

The Toyota Mothership project explores a cutting-edge high-altitude aerial platform inspired by a large-scale, advanced kite. This innovative concept aims to utilize exceptional endurance and station-keeping abilities for diverse missions, including communication relay, atmospheric data collection, and airborne wind energy generation. The Mothership kite is a multifunctional, flexible, and inflatable kite with an unconventional platform shape and cross-section profile. This study aims to use wind tunnel experiments to characterize the aerodynamics of the kite and investigate the efficacy of covert feather-inspired flight control effectors to ensure that the kite maintains stability for an extended flight duration and can perform the maneuver required for energy harvesting. By investigating the aerodynamics of the kite cross section as well as the effects of covert-inspired flaps on the upper and lower sides of the wing section, we: (1) characterize the aerodynamic forces and moments on the baseline configuration of an unconventional airfoil, (2) quantify the aerodynamic effects of covert-inspired flaps on an unconventional airfoil, and (3) determine the efficacy of covert-inspired flaps in enabling stability augmentation and the required energy harvesting maneuver. Results show that covert-inspired flaps can effectively modulate lift and drag, producing rolling and yawing moments for in-flight control, validating their use as viable flight control effectors and supporting their implementation on airborne wind energy systems.