Rotorcraft Integrated Electro-Optic/Infrared (EO/IR) Plumes and Effects Signature Modeling Navy SBIR FY2018.1 Sol No.: Navy SBIR FY2018.1 Topic No.: N181-010 Topic Title: Rotorcraft Integrated Electro-Optic/Infrared (EO/IR) Plumes and Effects Signature Modeling Proposal No.: N181-010-0088 Firm: Combustion Research and Flow Technology, Inc. 6210 Kellers Church Road Pipersville, Pennsylvania 18947 Contact: Michael DeMagistris Phone: (215) 766-1520 Web Site: http://www.craft-tech.com Abstract: Survivability of military rotorcraft is a critical mission objective requiring extensive testing and analysis for various hover and flight modes of transport. Typical analysis requires Electro-Optic/Infra-red (EO/IR) and Light Detection and Ranging (LIDAR) sensing at a wide variety of environments, flight configurations, and sensor types and orientations using high-fidelity EO/IR and LIDAR modeling. The principal difficulties associated with generating 3D rotorcraft plume signatures are two-fold: (1) the generation of 3D exhaust-plume flowfields in the presence of rotor blade downwash and complex vehicle geometries, and (2) the utilization of that data for composite signature predictions, which includes hot-parts emission, plume emission, and plume-shine reflection. The innovation described in this proposal is the development, verification, and demonstration of a computational framework that addresses currently observed deficiencies associated with rotorcraft-oriented EO/IR signature modeling by combining within a single focused effort validated CFD and EO/IR signature modeling capabilities to develop a streamlined rotorcraft signature prediction procedure that (1) minimizes multi-module data hand-off errors; (2) streamlines IR signature throughput via better data exchange synergy; and (3) establishes an effective baseline for supporting future advanced rotorcraft-focused signature physics modeling including the incorporation/demonstration of an accurate and robust LIDAR capability into the new framework. Benefits: The final product developed in this program will be a robust rotorcraft IR signature and LIDAR modeling tool that incorporates high-fidelity plume, downwash, and laser aero-optics modeling into an integrated framework. The rotorcraft signature modeling tool will provide the Navy with an ability to conduct in-depth analysis of military rotorcraft to support survivability assessment, target tracking and detection, scene generation, and overall mission planning as well as the extension to guidance and tracking to support warfighter needs (such as hardware-in-the-loop enhancements. With regards to general military applications, the proposed tool is wide-reaching such that it can be easily expanded from rotorcraft to fixed-wing and UAV signature modeling to support scene generation, HITL, and general analyses critical to mission planning for all divisions of the military. Commercial applications are far-reaching to include LIDAR and IR signature modeling of commercial aircraft to provide design support, thermal analysis of commercial systems, and remote aerial sensing applications. Return