Light weight optimization of stratospheric airship envelope based on reliability analysis

A stratospheric airship is an essential flight vehicle in the aviation field. In this paper, optimal design approach of stratospheric airships is developed to optimize envelope shape considering three failure modes and multidisciplinary analysis models, and could also reduce the mass of a stratospheric airship to be deployed at a specific location. Based on a theoretical analysis, three failure modes of airships including bending wrinkling failure, hoop tearing failure and bending kink failure, are given to describe and illustrate the failure mechanism of stratospheric airships. The results show that the location, length and size of the local uniform load and the large fineness ratio are easier to lead to bending wrinkling failure and bending kink failure. The small fineness ratio and the increasing differential pressure are more prone to cause hoop tearing failure for an airship hull. The failure probability is sensitive to the wind field. From an optimization design, the reliability analysis is essential to be carried out based on the safety of the airship. The solution in this study can provide economical design recommendations.