Reducing rotor aerodynamic noise is an important challenge in helicopter design. Active flap control (AFC) on rotors is an effective noise reduction method. It changes the segment airfoil shape, aerodynamic load distribution, and the wake path of the rotor flow by adding trailing edge flaps (TEFs). Although AFC noise reduction control is easily simulated, the relevant experiments have not been widely conducted due to test technical problems and limited financial support. The acoustic characteristics of the AFC-equipped rotor, such as the placement of TEFs for noise reduction and whether multiple winglets can provide a better effect than single winglets, have not been verified in previous experiments. In this work, an AFC-equipped rotor with two TEFs was designed, and its acoustic properties were tested in the FL-17 acoustic wind tunnel with microphone arrays in the far field. The results showed that the noise reduction effect of AFC was closely related to the control frequency and phase. Increasing the control phase could move the reduction region toward the azimuth-decreasing region for far-field noise. The noise reduction in a single outboard TEF was better than that in a single inboard TEF, while the dual-TEF model performed better. In this experiment, the average noise reduction in the observation point at the lower front of the rotor could be more than 3 dB, and the maximum noise reduction could be 6.2 dB.

In urban settings, buildings create complex turbulent conditions, affecting helicopter flight performance during missions and increasing safety risks during takeoff and landing. A numerical study on rotor–building coupled flow field is carried out to address rotor aerodynamic performance under building interferences in natural atmospheric conditions. A high-fidelity atmospheric boundary layer (ABL) model described by an exponential law is established herein. The solution of the coupled flow field is based on the Reynolds-averaged Navier–Stokes (RANS) equations, with the rotor’s rotation achieved through the overset grid method. Based on the dominant wind features, the building flow field is distributed into four regions, where the updraft along the headwind side impacts the rotor, bringing about a 76% increase in pitching moment. On the lateral side of the building, distorted rotor wake squeezed upward into the rotor disk, leading to severe blade–vortex interaction (BVI). During low-altitude hovering over rooftops, the mixing of building shed vortices with forward flow wakes causes the formation of a circulation region on the rotor’s windward side, resulting in a thrust loss of approximately 7.8%. Meanwhile, the flow environment on the leeward side of the buildings is more stable. Therefore, it is recommended that helicopters adopt a headwind approach during rooftop operations. However, an 11.4% loss in the average hover figure of merit is observed due to consistent thrust losses caused by the recirculation region.