Optimization Tools Revolutionize Rotorcraft Design at Boeing

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Boeing's Integrated Defense Systems (IDS) business unit, the world's largest military aircraft manufacturer, was faced with the challenge of refining rotorcraft designs to reduce weight and enhance affordability, reliability, and manufacturing efficiency. The design of rotorcraft, aircraft kept airborne by rotating airfoils, is a complex balance of form and function. The primary goal is to provide maximum functionality at the lowest overall weight. Weight affects the rotor's capacity for vertical lift, which in turn affects the aircraft's range and ability to fly at safe altitudes. However, reducing weight can also make the aircraft a more survivable target for ground fire. Additionally, the stiffness of the airframe needs to be tuned to reduce vibration, which affects passenger stamina, weapons use, airframe durability, and onboard electronics operation. This is also a weight-related issue. Every pound saved is an opportunity for additional improvements in efficiency, performance, ballistic tolerance, soldier survivability, maintenance, and repairability.

The Boeing Company is a century-old aerospace organization that is the world's largest military aircraft manufacturer. It is known for its understanding and application of current and emerging technologies to improve the capabilities of existing products and deliver new solutions to meet changing customer needs. Boeing's Integrated Defense Systems (IDS) business unit is responsible for the design and manufacture of rotorcraft, aircraft that are kept airborne by airfoils that rotate around a vertical axis. The IDS unit is continuously working to refine these designs to reduce weight and enhance affordability, reliability, and manufacturing efficiency.

Boeing turned to design optimization technology to meet these challenges. They used Altair OptiStruct, a software that designs and optimizes the performance of mechanical structures by defining the best material distribution for a given design space, target mass, and method of manufacture for a given set of objectives and constraints. This software enabled engineers to develop robust, efficient designs that have a higher probability of success in a shorter period of time, compared to the time-consuming trial-and-error approach. For example, using OptiStruct topology optimization technology, the engineers produced a new open truss structure for the ramp of the Boeing CH-47 Chinook heavy-lift transport helicopter. The new design was stiffer than the original while realizing a 17 percent weight savings. The open truss structure also increased the ramp's ballistic tolerance because the reduced volume of the new design presents a sparser target than more dense webs and stiffeners.

• The use of optimization technology has had a significant impact on Boeing's rotorcraft design process. It has allowed for the development of efficient aircraft structures that weigh less, are less expensive to develop, and reach the market faster. The weight savings have also lowered operating costs for Boeing customers and increased the planes' passenger and cargo capacity. The technology has also enabled Boeing engineers to propose and analyze sophisticated design concepts that would otherwise be impractical and costly to investigate. The success of the Chinook ramp project has led to plans to use optimization tools in the design of two new helicopters in the near future. Furthermore, the optimization-driven design process is expected to assist Boeing in developing efficient aircraft structures that weigh less, are less expensive to develop, and reach the market faster.

• 17 percent weight savings in the new design of the Boeing CH-47 Chinook heavy-lift transport helicopter ramp.
• Optimization tools cut the overall development time in half, reducing a total design time from 12-18 months to just 6-9 months.
• Optimization tools did not compromise an aggressive six- to eight-week analysis window.