Effect of coupling with internal and external fluids on the mechanical behavior of aerostats

In the context of aerostat flight simulation, we are interested in the coupling between a deformable structure, the fluid contained inside and the fluid flow outside. To study the dynamic stability of such systems, the fluid-structure coupled equations are linearized around an equilibrium position and, by assuming that the fluid flow perturbations are potential, the loads exerted by the fluids on the moving structure can be decomposed in terms proportional, respectively, to the displacement, velocity and acceleration fields of the structure, representing what are generally called the added stiffness, damping and mass effects of the fluid on the structure. In this work, a focus is made on the added mass because, for such lightweight structures, its effect is of prime importance. A Boundary Element Method (BEM) is proposed to compute the added mass operators for external and internal fluids, and for any structure deformation field. Numerical and experimental validations are conducted on an axisymmetric ellipsoid mockup immerged in water and subject to rigid motions. Variations of the imposed movement amplitude and velocity have also helped to evaluate the validity domain of this model.