Prediction of Fluid - Surface Interactions and Aerothermal Environments using CBAERO

The fast, but approximate, flexible membrane solver FLEX was previously integrated into the engineering level aerothermodynamics solver CBAERO. Previous work showed the accuracy and efficiency of the approach to solving coupled, fluid-structures problems. The previous work focused on steady state problems, where a final deformed, fixed shape resulted from the fluid surface interaction. The present work focuses two very important capabilities: 1) evaluating the time accuracy of the coupled approach, specifically examining the deflation and post buckling phenomena exhibited by the NASA PAIDAE tension cone inflation/deflation tests, and 2) investigating the application of the method to predicting both transient and steady state aerothermal environments on the deformed, flexible, surfaces.