Aircraft and launch vehicles behave as unconstrained systems in flight, with six rigid-body modes. These vehicles may be “trimmed” using aerodynamic control surfaces and thrust vector control to prevent rotation about the vehicle center-of-gravity (CG).
There is a need to calculate the vehicle’s displacement response to wind, gusts, buffeting and other external forces. This process requires separating the rigid-body response from the elastic response. The elastic response is the relative displacement referenced to the CG displacement. The stress and strain can then be calculated from the elastic displacement response. The method is carried out by inertia relief, where rigid-body motion is constrained by applying an inertial acceleration that is opposite to the acceleration resulting from the external forces.
Here is a paper, which is a work-in-progress inertia_relief.pdf
See also: The Mode Acceleration Method MA_method.pdf
Mode Acceleration Method Matlab scripts
mdof_modal_arbit_force_newmark_MA.m (main script)
Generalized_Eigen.m
mdof_plot.m
ODE_force_input.m
Newmark_modal_force_MA.m
line_colors.m
– Tom Irvine