Response Surface Models Combining Linear and Euler Aerodynamics for Supersonic Transport Design

A method has been developed to efficiently implement supersonic aerodynamic predictions from Euler solutions into a highly constrained, muItidisciplinary design optimization of a High-Speed Civil Transport. The method alleviates the large computational burden associated with performing computational fluid dynamics analyses through the use of variable-complexity modeling techniques, response surface (RS) methodologies, and coarse-grained parallel computing. Using information gained from lower-fidelity aerodynamic models, reduced-term RS models representing a correction to the linear theory RS model predictions are constructed using Euler solutions. Studies into 5-, 10-, 15-, and 20-variable design problems show that accurate results can be obtained with the reduced-term models at a fraction of the cost of creating the full-term quadratic RS models. Specifically, a savings of 255 CPU hours out of 392 CPU hours required to create the full-term RS model is obtained for the 20-variable problem on a single 75MHz IP21 processor of a Silicon Graphics, Inc. Power Challenge.