Air-to-air refueling (AAR) has been commonly used in military jet applications. Recently,
civilian applications of AAR have been garnering increased attention due to the high cost of air
travel, which is largely dictated by the cost of jet fuel. There are two types of AAR approaches:
probe-drogue and flying boom systems. This work explores the probe-drogue AAR system in
commercial applications. Typical AAR applications deploy a drogue connected to a long flexible
hose behind a moving aircraft tanker. The drogue is connected to a probe in a receiver aircraft
before initiating fuel transfer and is retracted back into the tanker when the fuel transfer is
completed. In order to ensure a safe and efficient refueling operation sophisticated systems need
to be developed to accommodate the turbulences encountered, particularly in respect to vibration
reduction of the flexible hose and drogue. The objective of this work is to develop a probe-drogue
system for helicopter AAR applications. The first project is to make a preliminary design of a new
AAR system for helicopter refuelling from a modified AT-802 tanker aircraft. [...
