ICNPAA 2010: Mathematical Problems in
Engineering, Aerospace and Sciences

The panel flutter phenomenon is a self-excited oscillation of a thin shell exposed to high speed flow. From an engineering point of view, the panel flutter analysis is performed using frequency and/or time domain computational techniques. This paper is concerned with the evaluation of three different approaches for the numerical analysis of the panel flutter phenomenon. The structural model is based on the finite element discretization and is assumed to be linear, while the aerodynamic model can be linear or non-linear.
A large number of numerical results are presented for supersonic flows over a rectangular metallic shell. The predictions provided by the three methods are used for the analysis of the influence of the simplified piston theory, coupling algorithms and time steps in the panel flutter analysis.