An investigation of an active landing gear system to reduce aircraft vibrations caused by landing impacts and runway excitations

A mathematical model is developed to control aircraft vibrations caused by runway excitation using an active landing gear system. Equations are derived to describe the integrated aircraft-active system. The nonlinear characteristics of the system are modelled and it is actively controlled using a Proportional Integral Derivative (PID) strategy. The performance of this system and its corresponding passive system are compared using numerical simulations. It is demonstrated that the impact loads and the vertical displacement of the aircraft's centre of gravity caused by landing and runway excitations are greatly reduced using the active system, which result in improvements to the performance of the landing gear system, benefits the aircraft's fatigue life, taxiing performance, crew/passenger comfort and reduces requirements on the unevenness of runways. (c) 2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.