This study pursues designs for a medium-range, transonic transport aircraft using a multidisciplinary optimization approach which uses the flutter speed as a constraint in addition to the other constraints. The aim is to use the flutter constraint for the study of truss-braced wing aircraft configurations having a cruise Mach of 0.7 and a flight mission that is similar to that of a Boeing 737-800NG. The basic multidisciplinary tools presented here have been used previously to obtain designs for aircraft with a cruise Mach of 0.78 and 0.85; however these designs were not obtained with the current flutter constraint. The objective function considered here is to minimize the take-off gross weight. Results obtained in this study show that the flutter constraint is active for the truss-braced wing configurations, and these aircraft configurations undergo 1% penalty on their takeoff weight to satisfy the flutter constraint. This work is important since it documents the weight penalties associated with satisfying the flutter constraint when the objective is to minimize the take-off gross weight of the aircraft. Thus, the designer can decide if active flutter suppression can be implemented to obtain a lighter aircraft.
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