Hypersonic vehicles operate in a high-energy flight environment characterized by extreme dynamic pressures, thermal loads, and non-equilibrium flow dynamics. This environment induces uniquely strong fluid, thermal, and structural dynamics interactions. To operate in this regime, robust and intuitive understandings of each of these disciplines must be developed not only in isolation, but also when coupled. Limitations on scaling and the availability of adequate test facilities mean that physical investigation is infeasible. Thus, numerical simulation is the main course of investigation. But the state-of-the-art is either to create ever higher-fidelity models that do not couple well and require excessive processing power, or to use low-fidelity analytical models that can be tightly coupled and processed quickly, but do not represent realistic systems. Reduced-order models offer a middle ground by distilling the dominant trends of high-fidelity training solutions into a form that can be quickly processed and more tightly coupled. This dissertation presents a variable-coupling, variable-fidelity, aerothermoelastic framework for the simulation of high-speed vehicle systems using analytical, reduced-order, and surrogate modeling techniques. Full launch to landing flights of complete vehicle systems are considered and used to define flight envelopes with aeroelastic, aerothermal, and thermoelastic limits, develop flight controllers, and inform future design considerations.

Doctoral Committee:

Chair: Prof. Carlos Cesnik
Cognate Member: Prof. Bogdan Epureanu
Members: Prof. Iain Boyd
Dr. Crystal Pasiliao, AFRL
Prof. Veera Sundararaghavan


Publications:

Ryan J. Klock and Carlos E. S. Cesnik. "Nonlinear Thermal Reduced-Order Modeling for Hypersonic Vehicles", AIAA Journal, Vol. 55, No. 7 (2017), pp. 2358-2368.

Ryan Klock and Carlos E. Cesnik. "Rapid Simulation of a Hypersonic Vehicle through Singular Value Decomposition", 58th AIAA/ASCE/AHS/ASC Structures, Structural Dynamics, and Materials Conference, AIAA SciTech Forum, (AIAA 2017-0178)

Ryan Klock and Carlos E. Cesnik. "Aeroelastic Stability of High-Speed Cylindrical Vehicles", 58th AIAA/ASCE/AHS/ASC Structures, Structural Dynamics, and Materials Conference, AIAA SciTech Forum, (AIAA 2017-0406)

Emily Dreyer, Ryan Klock, Benjamin Grier, Jack J. McNamara, and Carlos E. Cesnik. "Multi-Discipline Modeling of Complete Hypersonic Vehicles Using CFD Surrogates", 58th AIAA/ASCE/AHS/ASC Structures, Structural Dynamics, and Materials Conference, AIAA SciTech Forum, (AIAA 2017-0182)

Ryan Klock and Carlos E. Cesnik. "Nonlinear Thermal Reduced Order Models for a Hypersonic Vehicle", 15th Dynamics Specialists Conference, AIAA SciTech Forum, (AIAA 2016-1322)

Ryan Klock and Carlos E. Cesnik. "Aerothermoelastic Reduced-Order Model of a Hypersonic Vehicle", AIAA Atmospheric Flight Mechanics Conference, AIAA AVIATION Forum, (AIAA 2015-2711)

Ryan Klock and Carlos E. Cesnik. "Aerothermoelastic Simulation of Air-Breathing Hypersonic Vehicles", 55th AIAA/ASME/ASCE/AHS/ASC Structures, Structural Dynamics, and Materials Conference, AIAA SciTech Forum, (AIAA 2014-0149)