The paper addresses the aeromechanical design of lightweight fan blades for an electric fan thruster. It explores the use of carbon-fiber reinforced composites to reduce overall weight and enhance aeroelastic performance, particularly in terms of flutter stability. A comparison is made between the baseline metallic fan blade and different laminate stackups in the composite blade. The results indicate that when carefully tailored, composite fan blades can potentially provide higher aeroelastic stability than the reference metallic blade. At nodal diameters where disk motion dominates the mode shape, the aeroelastic response is less dependent on the choice of stackup. Additionally, the study demonstrates that choosing the appropriate laminate stackup can avoid potentially dangerous resonant crossings throughout the flight envelope. Several prototype blades were manufactured and tested in a vibration test rig to assess manufacturability and validate the numerical models used in blade design.

Paper explores the potential of using carbon-fibre reinforced composites for designing low-pressure compressor blades with improved aeroelastic performance. Comparison between the blades with different laminate  stackups is made with respect to the modal behaviour and aerodynamic damping. It is found that if carefully designed, the composite blades can provide higher aeroelastic stability than the reference metallic blade. At the same time the results reveal that a laminate stackup with stabilizing behaviour in one mode could have a destabilizing effect for the other mode. The dependency on ply angle and arrangement of plies in laminates is observed to be complex and furtheri nvestigations and experimental validation is therefore deemed necessary.