ACCURATE BIRD STRIKE SIMULATION METHODOLOGY FOR BA609 TILTROTOR

Cheng-Ho Tho
Michael R. Smith
ctho@bellhelicopter.textron.com
mrsmith@bellhelicopter.textron.com
Senior Engineering Specialist
Chief, Structural Dynamics
Bell Helicopter Textron Inc., Fort Worth, Texas
ABSTRACT
Bird strike incidents are not uncommon and cause significant flight safety threats to aircraft safety. An aircraft must show
compliance with continued safe flight and landing requirements following specified types of high-energy bird impact. The
higher impact velocities for bird strikes and attendant potential increased structural weight that tiltrotor aircraft must survive
underscores the need to develop more capable, validated analysis techniques. This paper presents the state-of-the-art bird
strike simulation methodology developed at Bell Helicopter Textron Inc., based on the multi-material Arbitrary LagrangianEulerian and Smooth Particle Hydrodynamics techniques. The constitutive parameters of the bird model are calibrated to
correlate the hydrodynamic pressure using a benchmark problem with available test data. The validated bird models are subsequently applied to simulate the bird impact with the BA609 tiltrotor structures for the most load-critical test conditions.
The analytical models are validated for multiple test cases with different design architectures, including the rotor spinner controls, cockpit nose, wing leading edge, and empennage. It is demonstrated that the developed analytical tool is capable of
accurately predicting structural failure modes and deformation for aircraft subjected to the high-energy bird strike impacts.
and military aircraft have killed more than 200 people and
destroyed 186 aircraft (Ref. 1) since 1988, globally. During
the 17-year period from 1990 to 2006, seven fatalities and
185 human injuries occurred in the U.S. due to bird impacts
on aircraft. As shown in Fig. 2, the annual number of bird
strikes quadrupled from 1,743 in 1990 to 7,089 in 2006.
With an assumed 20% reporting rate, the annual cost of
wildlife strikes to the U.S. civil aviation industry is
estimated to be $603 million and 577,725 hours of
downtime. The most common aircraft components struck by
birds were reported as nose/radome, windshield, engine,
wing/rotor, and fuselage.

NOMENCLATURE

&
&
'ij

0
nfail
ys
y
fail
C
C0 ~ C6
D
E
L
P
V

strain rate
deviatoric strain rate
dynamic viscosity
density
initial density
normal stress at failure
static yield stress
dynamic yield stress
shear stress at failure
reference effective strain rate
coefficients of polynomial EOS
diameter of the soft gelatin projectile
internal energy
length of the soft gelatin projectile
strain rate material parameter
impact velocity of the soft gelatin projectile

An aircraft must show compliance with continued safe

flight and landing requirements following specified types of
high-energy bird impact. Improving occupant safety by

INTRODUCTION
Aeronautical structures always fly with the risk of impacting
foreign objects such as birds, ice, runway debris, rubber, etc.
Bird strike incidents, like the one shown in Fig. 1, are not
uncommon and cause significant flight safety threats to
flying aircraft.
According to the Federal Aviation
Administrations (FAA) National Wildlife Strike Database,
threats to aviation safety due to wildlife impacts upon civil
Presented at the American Helicopter Society 64th Annual
Forum, Montral, Canada, April 29 May 1, 2008. Copyright 2008 by the American Helicopter Society International, Inc. All rights reserved.

U.S. DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE

Fig. 1.

Israeli Air Force UH-60 Blackhawk helicopter, bird strike at 800 ft.

Number of Bird Strikes to Civil Aircraft

8000

7000

7,089

6000

5000
Greg Ochocki/Lake City Nature photos

4000

3000

2000

1,743

BA609

2006

2005

2004

2003

2002

2001

2000

1999

1998

1997

1996

1995

1994

1993

1992

1991

1990

1000

Year

Fig. 2.

Fig. 3. BA609 tiltrotor.

Number of birds strikes to U.S. civil aircraft (1990 2006). Source: Ref. 1.

subsequently applied to simulate the bird impact with the

BA609 tiltrotor (Fig. 3) structure for the most load-critical
test conditions. The analytical models are validated for multiple test cases with different structural design approaches.

traditional means of hardening aircraft to withstand bird

strikes can result in significant weight increase and cost.
The higher impact velocities for bird strikes and attendant
potential increased structural weight that tiltrotor aircraft
must survive underscores the need to develop more capable,
validated structural analysis techniques.
In addition,
experimental tests for bird strike development and
certification are extremely expensive and time consuming.
In order to reduce the number of costly prototype tests, a
reliable analytical tool is necessary to accurately predict the
structural responses/failures and to provide design guidance
for aircraft subjected to the high-energy bird impact. The
use of simulation provides the opportunity to cost-effectively
evaluate numerous improved energy-absorbing structural
design approaches that minimize structural weight and
reduce the risk of not meeting civil or military rotorcraft bird
strike design requirements. However, analysis techniques
must be validated before they can be employed to accurately
guide the design process.

In early 2007, the BA609 tiltrotor flight test program was

temporarily halted in Italy, since the original design of the
spinner and rotor controls failed the bird strike tests. A
modified bird strike-resistant spinner design was needed
quickly, to avoid potential long-term program delay. The
bird strike simulation methodology developed at Bell was
successfully employed to guide the spinner interim design
that provided needed protection of critical internal control
components by satisfying the bird strike requirements.

The objective of research by Bell Helicopter Textron Inc.

has been to accurately predict the complex composite structural responses, failures, and impact performances subjected
to the bird strike dynamic loads to reduce development
costs, avoid design turnback, and shorten cycle time while
achieving a weight-efficient resistant design. Achieving this
objective holds the potential to minimize and ultimately to
eliminate costly bird strike testing by using simulation.

Using the test data from several bird strike tests, multiple
analytical correlation cases were performed. The correlation
cases showed excellent agreement between the measured
and predicted bird strike damage to the rotor spinner and
controls, cockpit nose, wing leading edge, and empennage.
The correlation study established a high degree of confidence in the analytical capability in predicting the dynamic
responses and structural failures subjected to high-energy
bird strike impacts. The analytical results of the modified
rotor spinner design, along with the multiple correlation
cases, were provided to the Italian airworthiness authority,
the National Agency for Civil Aviation (Ente Nazionale per
lAviazione Civile, or ENAC). As a direct result of this effort, the full envelope flight clearance was granted by ENAC
in 2007 without the need for costly and lengthy bird strike
tests.

Using both the Arbitrary Lagrangian-Eulerian (ALE) and

Smooth Particle Hydrodynamics (SPH) techniques within
the general-purpose nonlinear explicit finite element code,
LS-Dyna (Ref. 2), the hydrodynamic pressure of the bird
models is validated by first using a benchmark problem with
available test data.
The validated bird models are

This paper summarizes the bird strike simulation methodology developed at Bell based on the multi-material ALE and
SPH techniques within LS-Dyna. The multiple correlation
cases for the cockpit nose, wing leading edge, and empennage using similar techniques to establish a high-degree of
analytical confidence are also presented.

TECHNICAL APPROACH
Technical Challenges
Bird strike simulation is very complex and imposes a lot of
numerical challenges since it involves transient, highly
nonlinear dynamics (both geometry and material), contact/coupling, failure modes, and numerous other complexities. The technical challenges of bird strike simulation include, but are not limited to: 1) level of difficulty for bird
material characterization; 2) numerical instability due to
extremely high deformation and disintegration of the bird
during and after the impact; 3) complex composite failure
modes (such as delamination and debonding); and 4) postfailure material degradation characteristics.

Fig. 4. ALE bird modeling.

P = C0 + C1 + C2 2 + C3 3 + ( C4 + C5 + C6 2 ) E

Unlike the implicit technique, the explicit integration technique used in the impact analysis is conditionally stable,
requiring the critical time step to meet the Courant criterion,
which is ultimately determined by the smallest element size
in the finite element model. Using the traditional Lagrangian approach for bird modeling, the element size tends to
become very small and distorted. As a result, the element
quality (such as aspect ratio or warpage angle) deteriorates
due to the extremely high material deformation of the bird
model. This ultimately results in prohibited computational
time and often produces an unstable numerical solution.

=
where C0 ~ C6

=
E =
=
0 =

1
0

(1)

(2)

coefficients of polynomial equation

internal energy
density
initial density

The polynomial coefficients (cubic order) used for the bird

strike analysis are

Complicated states of stress are usually involved during the

high-energy bird strike impacts. Depending on the impact
conditions, the stress of the bird will likely exceed the yield
strength in the constitutive model, causing the bird model to
behave as an elastic-plastic hydrodynamic flow. Unlike the
elastic-plastic structure whose deformation is related to
strain in the stress calculations (displacement gradient), the
fluid-like bird model is modeled as a function of the strain
rate (velocity gradient). Two methods capable of analyzing
elasticplastic hydrodynamic flow are employed for the bird
modeling in this paper: (1) Arbitrary Lagrangian-Eulerian
(ALE) and (2) Smooth Particle Hydrodynamics (SPH).

C1 = 0V 2 = 302.98 ksi

(3)

C2 = (2k 1)C1 = 908.95 ksi

(4)

C3 = (k 1)(3k 1) = 1514.92 ksi

(5)

C0 = C4 = C5 = C6 = 0

(6)

Note that the initial bird density is assumed to be about 95%

of water density, i.e., 8.89 10-5 lbf/in3 (950 kg/m3). The
speed of sound in water, V, is 4,865 ft/s (1,483 m/s). The air
is modeled by using Gamma Law of equation-of-state as
follows:

Analytical Techniques
ALE Approach. In the ALE technique, the fluid-like
*MAT_NULL (*MAT_9) material model is employed to
model the bird and surrounding air shown in Fig. 4.
This type of material does not have yield strength. It calculates the pressure from a specified equation-of-state (EOS)
related to the density ratio and internal energy. The polynomial EOS entity (*EOS_LINEAR_POLYNOMIAL), which
defines the pressure P in the following, is used in modeling
the bird and surrounding air in this paper:

C4 = C5 = 0.4

(7)

C0 = C1 = C2 = C3 = C6 = 0

(8)

and

The viscous (deviatoric) stress is computed as

 ij = & 'ij

BIRD MODEL VALIDATION

(9)
In this paper, the bird is treated as a soft gelatin projectile
whose geometry is modeled as a cylinder with two hemispherical ends, as shown in Figs. 4 and 5. The ratio of the
length to the diameter of the bird is selected to be 2:1. The
weight of the bird is prescribed depending on the test conditions (4.0 lb for airplane mode and 2.2 lb for VTOL mode).
The length of the bird, L, can be determined readily based
upon the assumed density. Namely, L can be calculated as
4.438 inch (11.27 cm) and 2.43 inch (6.17 cm) for the airplane mode and VTOL mode, respectively.

where is the dynamic viscosity (fluid resistance to shear or

flow) and & 'ij is the deviatoric strain rate.
SPH Approach. Bird modeling using the Smooth Particle
Hydrodynamics (SPH) method in LS-Dyna is illustrated in
Fig. 5. SPH is one of the meshless methods first introduced
by Lucy in 1977 (Ref. 3). It is a Lagrangian numerical technique used to solve the fluid equations of motion. Specifically, it uses an interpolation kernel of compact support to
represent any field quantity in terms of its values as a set of
disordered particles. The material is discretized, and properties of these clouds of nodes are associated with the center of
the particles. A chosen interpolation kernel determines the
amount of effect that a known point value contributes to the
point of interest. The unique characteristic of SPH is that it
does not require element meshing and thus avoids mesh tangling. It is generally considered to be much more accurate
than the conventional Lagrangian finite element method in
solving problems with large material distortions such as
crash simulations, high velocity impacts, compressible fluid
dynamic problems, etc. Without the mesh grid, the required
derivatives of a problem can be numerically calculated without the attendant errors of element distortions.

To validate the constitutive parameters of the bird models, a

benchmark problem that simulates the soft gelatin bird impacting on a rigid steel plate is constructed in LS-Dyna.
Figure 6 shows the impact of a 4-lb bird with a rigid plate at
a velocity of 225.5 kn (116 m/s) using both ALE and SPH
techniques. Unlike the SPH bird, which produced spherical
deformation during the transient dynamic contact with the
rigid plate, it is observed that the ALE bird deformation
tends to be influenced by the mesh sensitivity of the cubic
surrounding air, which is discretized by one-point ALE solid
elements. Nevertheless, both ALE and SPH techniques produced comparable size of deformation at each of the time
steps. Figure 7 shows the test/analysis correlation for the
normalized pressure at the center of the rigid plate against
the normalized time history. The normalized pressure (Pn)
and time (tn) responses are expressed as

In this paper, the elastic-plastic hydrodynamic model

*MAT_ELASTIC_PLASTIC_HYDRO (*MAT_10) is employed for the SPH bird constitutive modeling. The EOS
formulation and parameters are the same as in the ALE
technique. In addition, a rectangular deactivation zone is
defined to release the bird particles which no longer interact
with the impacting structure. The dimensions of the rectangular deactivation zone are selected to be 8 8 22 inches
in this paper. The deactivation zone in the SPH technique
tends to effectively reduce the computational time in searching for the associated fluid particles.

Pn =

tn =

where 0
V
L = 2D

1
2

t
L

P
0V 2

tV
2D

(10)

(11)

= density of the soft gelatin projectile

= impact velocity of the soft gelatin projectile
= length of the soft gelatin projectile

Note that the pressure time response can be categorized into

three major stages: (1) shock wave stage; (2) pressure release stage; and (3) steady-state flow pressure stage. While
the steady-state flow pressure stage is considered to be more
critical for bird impact events, the pressure response using
the ALE technique correlates reasonably well with the test
conducted by Wilbeck (Ref. 4). The SPH technique tends to
over-predict the steady-state flow pressure, while both the
ALE and SPH techniques produce very similar shock wave
and release pressure. The pressure release and steady-state
flow pressure stages correlate favorably with test data in
both techniques. It is likely that there was an insufficient

Fig. 5. SPH bird modeling.

Fig. 6. Comparison for ALE and SPH birds impacting on a rigid plate.
Test

ALE

SPH

7.0

A: Shock wave stage

B: Pressure release stage
C: Steady-state flow pressure stage

Normalized Pressure

6.0
5.0
4.0

SPH

3.0

Test

ALE

2.0
1.0
0.0
-1.0
0.0

0.1

0.2

0.3

0.4

0.5

0.6

0.7

0.8

0.9

1.0

Normalized Time

Fig. 7. Pressure correlation for ALE and SPH techniques.

1. Rotor Spinner and Control

data sample rate to produce the desired fidelity for the shock
wave peak pressure in the test.

The rotor spinner assembly provides the swashplate drive

load and aerodynamic fairing for the rotor hub and controls.
Following a high-energy bird impact, the spinner assembly
must demonstrate that there is no substantial damage to the
rotor controls that would prevent continued safe flight and
landing (Ref. 5) of the aircraft.

MULTIPLE CASES FOR TEST CORRELATION

The bird models validated by the benchmark problem are
adopted to perform multiple analytical correlation cases on
the BA609 tiltrotor using LS-Dyna. The four test cases for
different design configurations include the rotor spinner,
cockpit nose, wing leading edge, and empennage.

Test Conditions. Table 1 depicts the bird strike test conditions according to the FAAs Issue Paper G-1 (Ref. 5) that

Table 1. FAA Bird Strike Test Conditions

Bird
Weight

Impact
Speed

14 CFR

Airplane

4.0 lb
(1.8 kg)

240 knot
(123.4 m/s)

TR.631

VTOL/conversion

2.2 lb
(1.0 kg)

144 knot
(74.1 m/s)

29.631

Test Condition

identifies the BA609 Certification Basis derived from applicable Parts 25 and 29 requirements of Title 14 Code of Federal Regulations (14 CFR). Specifically, the requirement
identified as TR.631 states:

Fig. 8.

(a) The aircraft must be capable of continued safe flight

and landing during which likely structural damage
or system failure occurs as a result of
(1) In airplane mode, impact with a 4-pound bird
when the velocity of the aircraft relative to the
bird along the aircrafts flight path is equal to
Vc at sea level or 0.85Vc at 8,000 ft, whichever
is more critical;
(2) In VTOL/conversion mode, impact with a 2.2pound bird at Vcon or VH (whichever is less) at
altitudes up to 8,000 ft.
(b) Compliance must be shown by tests or by analysis
based on tests carried out on sufficiently representative structures of similar design.

Test fixture for rotor and spinner controls

assembly.

control assembly, the spinner assembly, the de-ice distributors, and other supporting aircraft components, to provide
either geometric or structural representations of the aircraft.
In order to insure the bird impacted the desired target locations, the test article was held stationary, and the speed of
each bird impact was adjusted to account for the rotational
speed. Because the controls are loaded in compression in
most flight regimes, the test article had a steady collective
load applied to the controls. A high speed photography system was used to record the bird impact.
Finite Element Modeling. Figures 9 and 10 show the LSDyna bird strike finite element model of the rotor spinner
in airplane 0 pylon angle mode. The geometry of the bird is
represented as a cylinder with two hemispherical ends. Both
bird and surrounding air are represented by the 1-point ALE
multi-material solid element in LS-Dyna. Both the spinner
cone and side panels are made of the carbon/epoxy fabric
material represented by Belytschko-Tsay shell elements,
with user-defined integration rules to calculate the

For the BA609 tiltrotor in the airplane mode (i.e., 0 pylon

angle), the bird must be 4.0 lb (1.8 kg) with an impact velocity of 240 kn (123.4 m/s), oriented parallel to the airplanes
flight path. The most vulnerable components for impact in
airplane mode are the spinner cone and upper spinner spoke.
The impact in VTOL/conversion mode (i.e., 60 pylon angle
selected as critical) requires a 2.2 lb (1.0 kg) bird at 144 kn
(74.1 m/s) to achieve the maximum velocity component normal to the centerline of the proprotor mast, which is the most
critical loading direction for the rotor cyclic links and other
rotor controls components. Note that the total kinetic energy
of the airplane mode test condition is approximately five
times higher than the VTOL/conversion mode.
Bird Strike Test. Seven bird strike tests were conducted at
the Southwest Research Institute (SwRI) of San Antonio,
Texas. The tests included three airplane mode and four
VTOL/conversion mode shots. The bird strike testing was
conducted using a 5.5 inch barrel with compressed gas
which fired fresh chicken carcasses that were prepared in
accordance with procedures defined by ASTM F330-89, at
specific target locations on the spinner and rotor controls
assemblies (Fig. 8). The test article consisted of the rotor

Fig. 9.

LS-Dyna finite element model of rotor

spinner.

Chang-Chang criterion for matrix failure:

Tensile matrix: 22
Yt

12
+
1
S
2

(14)

Compressive matrix:
2
2
2

22 Yc

1 22 + 12 1

+
2S 2S
Yc S

The metallic components of the controls such as the upper

spokes, lower spokes, cyclic link, and collective head are all
represented by Belytschko-Tsay shell elements, using the
elastic-plastic (*MAT 24) material model with plastic strain
failure criterion, as shown in Fig. 10. In addition, the material strain rate effect is taken into account using the CowperSymonds formulation, which calculates a dynamic yield
stress by scaling the static yield stress:

Fig. 10. LS-Dyna model of rotor spinner internal

components.

constitutive constants through the shell thickness. In addition, the bulk viscosity control entity (*CONTROL_BULK_
VISCOSITY) is activated and the coefficients (q1, q2) are
defined to smear the discontinuities of the shock wave
generated by the bird strike impacts.

&
y = ys + 1 +
C

Hashin criterion for fiber failure:

2

(12)

(16)

2. Cockpit Nose Cone

Compressive fiber: 11 1
Xc

Test Correlation. The finite element model is validated by

correlating against the bird strike tests conducted at SwRI.
The most load-critical test condition was selected as the correlation case to compare the primary as well as the secondary structural impact responses, including composite failure
mode, failure size, failure location, and elastic/plastic deformation. The schematic of the bird location is illustrated
in Fig. 11. Figure 12 shows the dynamic impact of bird
strike test and simulation correlation for airplane mode shottargeting at the cyclic lever. The impact speed is 240 kn
with a 4-lb bird. The composite failures (size and location)
of the spinner cone correlate favorably with the corresponding test, as shown in Fig. 13. Both analysis and test show
that the spinner cone is severely damaged for this carbon/epoxy design configuration.

Various types of composite failures can be defined by using

either Chang-Chang (*MAT_54) or Tsai-Wu (*MAT_55)
failure criteria. In this paper, Hashin and Chang-Chang failure criteria were employed for the fiber failure and matrix
failure, respectively. The failure criteria are described in the
following as:

where y is the dynamic yield stress, ys is the static yield

stress, & is the strain rate, C is the reference effective strain
rate for which the yield stress doubles, and P is the strain
rate material parameter to be determined from the dynamic
tensile tests. In this paper, C and P for the aluminum controls components are selected as 5 and 6500 /s, respectively.
Based on numerical studies, the strain-rate effect of aluminum is much less significant than steel.

The material model MAT_ENHANCED_COMPOSITE_

DAMAGE (*MAT_54) is employed for the anisotropic carbon/epoxy fabric materials used in the spinner cone and side
panels. This material model is only valid for thin shell elements. It is important to activate the lamination shell theory
when using this material model so that the assumption of a
uniform constant shear strain through the thickness of the
shell can be corrected. For sandwich shells where the outer
layers are much stiffer than the inner layers, the structural
response will tend to be too stiff unless the lamination theory
is activated in the calculation.

Tensile fiber: 11 + 12 1
Xt S

(15)

(13)

Bird strike tests and corresponding simulation analyses were

conducted on the BA609 nose cone, which is made of

Fig. 11. Schematic of bird location for airplane

cyclic lever shot.

Fig. 13. Rotor spinner bird strike post-test

deformation.

Fig. 14. Nose cone LS-Dyna model.

Fig. 12. Rotor spinner bird strike correlation.

The aluminum face sheet is modeled with 4-node Belytschko-Tsay shell elements and an elastic-plastic (*MAT
24) material model representation, with defined true stressstrain curve, as shown in Fig. 15.

fiberglass honeycomb sandwich design configuration, to

further validate the simulation methodology.

The failure criterion of the face sheet is based upon the plastic failure strain threshold, failp., and is selected to be at 15%
for Al 2024-T42 for this model. In this approach, the element is deleted and excluded from the finite element computation once the plastic strain exceeds the failure threshold.
The honeycomb core is modeled using 3-layer constant
stress solid elements with the honeycomb material model
(*MAT 126). Figure 16 illustrates the typical mechanical
property of the honeycomb core. In the figure, E is the
Youngs modulus, Et1 is the first tangent modulus, Et2 is
the second tangent modulus, f is the foam crushing
strength, and d is the densification strain. This combined
shell and solid modeling technique for the composite sandwich design configuration allows the failure details of the
face sheet and honeycomb core to be evaluated separately,
as shown in Fig. 17.

Test Condition. The test conditions simulate an impact of a

4-lb bird with the aircraft at a cruise speed (Vc) of 240 kn.
This is equivalent to a kinetic energy of 10,206 ft-lb. The
pass/fail criteria require that no portion, including fluid from
the bird, may enter the cockpit; particles may not spall off
inside the windshield or structure that could injure the crew.
Finite Element Modeling. Figure 14 shows the LS-Dyna
bird strike finite element model in airplane mode (i.e., 240
kn impact speed with a 4-lb bird) using the ALE technique.
The idealized bird is modeled using the same techniques,
including the constitutive model, geometry, and calibrated
parameters as described in the previous section. The inner
and outer skins of the nose cone are made of Al 2024-T42
face sheets, while the interior of the panel is made of fiberglass flex-core honeycomb.

Tensile True Stress-Strain Curve for

Al 2024-T42 Clad Plate (t<0.249 in) and Al 7075-T73
80
70

Stress (ksi)

60
50
40
Yield stress

30
20

Al 2024-T42 (Failure Strain=15%)

10

Al 7075-T73 (Failure Strain=8%)

0
0.00 0.01 0.02 0.03 0.04 0.05 0.06 0.07 0.08 0.09 0.10 0.11 0.12 0.13 0.14 0.15

True Strain (in/in)

Fig. 15. True stress-strain curve comparison for Al 2024 T-42 and Al 7075-T73.

drawback of this technique is that it is computationally more

expensive, due to the increased number of elements required
for detailed modeling of the sandwich core using shell and
solid elements.
The other viable technique for modeling the composite
sandwich core is to represent the structure using shell elements only, with an effective smeared property for the face
sheet and honeycomb core. Even though this approach is
much simpler in terms of modeling effort and is more computationally efficient due to a lesser number of elements, it
usually results in much stiffer structural responses. Further,
the failures of the face sheet and honeycomb cannot be
evaluated in as great of detail. The element is only deleted
after both the face sheet and honeycomb fail.

Fig. 16. Typical Mechanical Property of Honeycomb.

Test Correlation. Figure 18 shows the airplane mode bird

strike test correlation for the BA609 nose cone honeycomb
sandwich design configuration. This is an airplane mode
shot condition (i.e., 240 kn and 4.0 lb bird) and is one of the
most load-critical shots. The deflection on the honeycomb
panel caused by the bird impact matches closely between
test and analysis. There was little rebound of the bird on the
impact location. Subsequently, the bird tripped near the
bulkhead, bending the forward flange of the bulkhead and
damaging the panel. Figure 19 shows the post-test damage
location, secondary impact fracture, and failure mode of the
honeycomb panel for both test and analysis. The damage
location, failure size, and failure modes correlate exceptionally well with the test.

The shell and solid elements share common nodes and are
bonded by a tie-contact interface with the prescribed stressbased failure criterion in LS-Dyna:

n
n
fail

+
fail

(17)

where nfail = normal stress at failure

fail = shear stress at failure
In addition, this technique allows one to simulate the
debonding phenomenon for the sandwich core. The only

Fig. 17. Modeling approach for composite honeycomb sandwich.

Fig. 18. Bird strike simulation correlation for

nose cone honeycomb configuration
(top side view).

Fig. 19. Bird strike structural damage correlation

for nose cone honeycomb configuration
(bottom side view).

10

3. Wing Leading Edge

Bird strike tests and corresponding correlation were performed for the BA609 wing leading edge structure. The LSDyna finite element model is shown in Fig. 20. In this design configuration, the local/global modeling technique is
employed to model the wing leading edge to reduce the
computational cost. In the local/global modeling technique,
a finer mesh is used for the anticipated bird impact zone
only. For the non-impact zone, the structure is meshed with
coarser elements. The transitional elements between the
finer impact zones and coarser non-impact zones are connected by applying a tie-break contact interface in LS-Dyna
to allow the impact load paths to be transmitted correctly.
Since the wing leading edge structure is long, the required
fidelity of the element size to accurately predict the failure
modes will result in extensive computational time. The local/global technique described herein significantly reduced
the computational time due to fewer number of elements.

Fig. 21. BA609 wing leading edge bird strike comparison (ALE vs. SPH).

Both the ALE and SPH bird modeling techniques are employed to simulate the bird strike impacts with the wing
leading edge structures. Figure 21 shows the comparison of
the structural responses using both ALE and SPH techniques. Both techniques exhibit very similar responses in
terms of bird deflection and splitting.
4. Empennage

Bird strike correlation on the BA609 empennage structure

was performed. Figure 22 shows the bird impact locations
on the leading edge of both the vertical stabilizer and horizontal stabilizer. Figure 23 shows the test/analysis correlation for the airplane mode test condition at the leading edge
of the horizontal stabilizer (labeled as Location 3 in Fig. 22)
using the SPH technique. Both test and analysis indicated
that the leading edge on the horizontal stabilizer successfully

Fig. 22. BA609 Empennage Bird Strike.

Fig. 20. Local modeling technique for BA609 wing

leading edge bird strike.

Fig. 23. BA609 horizontal stabilizer bird strike correlation.

11

split the bird. Figure 24 shows the test/analysis correlation

for the airplane mode shot at the center of the vertical stabilizer (labeled as Location 5 in Fig. 22) using the ALE technique. Both test and analysis demonstrated that the bird did
not penetrate into the vertical stabilizer. Figure 25 compares
the permanent plastic deformation revealing favorable correlation in terms of the structural responses.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

This project was funded by the Center for Rotorcraft Innovation (CRI) and the National Rotorcraft Technology Center
(NRTC), Aviation and Missile Research, Development and
Engineering Center under Technology Investment Agreement W911W6-06-2-0002, entitled National Rotorcraft
Technology Center Research Program. The authors would
like to acknowledge that this research and development was
accomplished with the support and guidance of the NRTC
and CRI. The views and conclusions contained in this
document are those of the authors and should not be interpreted as representing the official policies, either expressed
or implied, of the Aviation and Missile Research, Development and Engineering Center or the U.S. Government. Figure 1 is an image from the U.S. Department of Defense. The
photograph in Fig. 2 is copyright by Mr. Greg Ochocki,
Lake City Nature Photos and reproduced by permission.

CONCLUSIONS

The bird strike simulation methodology developed at Bell

using both ALE and SPH techniques in LS-Dyna has been
demonstrated to be a viable alternative to costly and timeconsuming tests. The constitutive bird models have been
validated using multiple analytical correlation cases and test
conditions of different design configurations for the BA609
tiltrotor. In each design configuration, the most load-critical
test conditions were selected to evaluate the structural failures of the BA609 bird strike test specimen subjected to the
bird strike dynamic loads. The correlation cases showed
excellent agreement between the measured and predicted
bird strike damage to the rotor spinner controls, cockpit
nose, wing leading edge, and empennage. Specifically, the
analysis achieved favorable post-test correlation in terms of
structural deformation, composite/metal failure modes, and
failure location, as well as the secondary impact fracture.
The correlation study established a high degree of confidence in the analytical capability, in predicting the dynamic
responses and structural failures subjected to the high-energy
bird strike impacts. The validated analytical tool has been
successfully used as a design tool to produce useful load
mechanism information to guide the interim design for the
BA609 rotor spinner control.

REFERENCES

1. Cleary, E., et al., Wildlife Strikes to Civil Aircraft in

the United States 1990-2006, Federal Aviation Administration National Wildlife Strike Database, No. 13,
July 2007.
2. LS-Dyna Keyword Users Manual, Version 971,
Livermore Software Technology Corporation, May,
2007.
3. Lucy, L.B., A Numerical Approach to the Testing of
the Fission Hypothesis, Astronomical Journal, Vol. 82,
1977, pp.1013-20.
4. Wilbeck, J.S., Impact Behavior of Low Strength Projectile, Air Force Materials Laboratory, Technical Report AFML-TR-77-134, 1977.
5. Federal Aviation Administration, Issue Paper G-1, FR
Doc. E7-19053, September, 2007.

Fig. 24. BA609 vertical fin bird strike correlation.

Fig. 25. BA609 empennage bird strike correlation.

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