Didactical Tool for Wing Weight Estimation in a Preliminary Aircraft Design Stage

Author(s):  
Giacomo Frulla

Aircraft preliminary design requires a lot of complex evaluations and assumptions related to design variables that are not completely known at a very initial stage. Didactical activity becomes unclear since students ask for precise values in the starting point. A tentative in providing a simple tool for wing weight estimation is presented devoted to overcome these common difficulties and clarifies the following points: a) the intrinsic iterative nature of the preliminary design stage, b) provide useful and realistic calculation for the wing weight with very simple assumption not covered by cumbersome calculations and formulas. The procedure is applied to the calculation of wing weight for a typical general aviation aircraft in the preliminary design stage. The effect of the main variables on the wing weight variation is also presented confirming well-known results from literature and design manuals.

Author(s):  
Giacomo Frulla

Aircraft preliminary design requires a lot of complex evaluations and assumptions related to design variables that are not completely known at a very initial stage. Didactical activity becomes unclear since students ask for precise values in the starting point. A tentative in providing a simple tool for wing weight estimation is presented for overcoming these common difficulties and explaining the following points: a) the intrinsic iterative nature of the preliminary design stage, b) provide useful and realistic calculation for the wing weight with very simple assumption not covered by cumbersome calculations and formulas. The purpose of the paper is to provide a didactic tool to facilitate the understanding of some steps in estimating wing weight at the preliminary design level. The problems of identifying the main variables for the initial estimation is dealt with and specifi aspects that are usually hidden by the complexity of the involved disciplines and by the usual calculation methods applied in structural design are pointed out. The procedure is addressed to highlight main steps in wing weight estimation for straight wing weight to highlight the main steps in estimating the wing weight for a general aviation straight wing aircraft at the preliminary design stage. The effect of the main variables on the wing weight variation is also presented confirming well-known results from literature and design manuals.


2014 ◽  
Vol 543-547 ◽  
pp. 3136-3140
Author(s):  
Di Liang ◽  
Sheng Jing Tang

Aerodynamic analysis and calculation are very important parts in the aircraft design, and aerodynamic engineering prediction is widely used in the aircraft preliminary design stage. However, traditional aerodynamic engineering prediction causes heavy computation and is time-consuming. The developed software such as DATCOM has the disadvantages of complicated operation and black box structure. To overcome the disadvantages above, we develop the software for aerodynamic engineering prediction based on the aerodynamic characteristics and prediction for aircrafts. There are three parts in this software which are database, calculation module and user interface. The software is verified by a numerical example of one aircraft, and compares with the data of Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) and the wind tunnel test. The results show that the calculated results of the aerodynamic engineering prediction and CFD are basically consistent, and the software is able to meet the accuracy demand in the preliminary design phase of the aircraft.


Author(s):  
Dominik B. Schwinn

The design process of new air- and rotorcraft is commonly separated into three different consecutive phases. In the conceptual design phase, the viability of different designs is investigated with respect to customer requirements and/or the market situation. It usually ends with the identification of a basic aircraft lay-out. In the subsequent preliminary design stage the various disciplines are introduced, thus redefining the design process as a multidisciplinary optimization (MDO) task. The objective of this design stage is to enhance the initial aircraft configuration by establishing an advanced design comprising a loft provided with primary structure. This updated aircraft configuration represents a global optimum solution for the specified requirements which will then be optimized on a local level in the concluding detailed design phase with particular regard to manufacturing aspects. The investigations in the preliminary design phase comprise the generation of numerous similar but still different analytical and finite element (FE) models. Even though computational power is constantly increasing the model generation process is still a time-consuming task. Moreover, it is also a potential source of errors which — in the worst case — may lead to time- and cost-intensive redesign activities during the detailed design. As the preliminary design stage, therefore, is of particular importance during the overall design process the model generation process benefits from parametric models and automated process chains. The presented paper overviews the tools used for the automated generation of FE models developed and used at the Institute of Structures and Design (BT) of the German Aerospace Center (DLR) for the subsequent use in numerical simulations. Furthermore, basic requirements for the effective use of parametrization and automation like a common data format and infrastructure will be introduced. Exemplary models and applications will be presented to illustrate the positive impact on efficiency in aircraft design. Concluding, future development steps and possible applications will be discussed.


Structures ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 31 ◽  
pp. 395-405
Author(s):  
Arsalan Alavi ◽  
Elena Mele ◽  
Reza Rahgozar ◽  
Ehsan Noroozinejad Farsangi ◽  
Izuru Takewaki ◽  
...  

1999 ◽  
Vol 36 (03) ◽  
pp. 171-174
Author(s):  
Hüseyin Yilmaz ◽  
Abdi Kükner

It is well known that stability is the most important safety requirement for ships. One should have some information on ship stability at the preliminary design stage in order to reduce risk. Initial stability of ships is an important criterion and can be closely evaluated in terms of form parameters and vertical center of gravity. In this study, using some sample ship data, approximate formulations are derived by means of regression analysis for the calculations expressed in terms of ship preliminary design parameters that can easily provide approximate GM calculations. Thus designers can be provided with ship stability at the preliminary design stage, and also a set of appropriate design parameters for improving vessel stability can easily be determined.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sacheen Bekah

This thesis presents the use of Finite Element (FE) based fatigue analysis to locate the critical point of crack initiation and predict life in a door hinge system that is subjected to both uni-axial and multi-axial loading. The results are experimentally validated. The FE model is further used to obtain an optimum design per the standard requirement in the ground vehicle industry. The accuracy of the results showed that FE based fatigue analysis can be successfully employed to reduce costly and time-consuming experiments in the preliminary design stage. Numerical analysis also provides the product design engineers with substantial savings, enabling the testing of fewer prototypes.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sacheen Bekah

This thesis presents the use of Finite Element (FE) based fatigue analysis to locate the critical point of crack initiation and predict life in a door hinge system that is subjected to both uni-axial and multi-axial loading. The results are experimentally validated. The FE model is further used to obtain an optimum design per the standard requirement in the ground vehicle industry. The accuracy of the results showed that FE based fatigue analysis can be successfully employed to reduce costly and time-consuming experiments in the preliminary design stage. Numerical analysis also provides the product design engineers with substantial savings, enabling the testing of fewer prototypes.


2015 ◽  
Vol 22 (1) ◽  
pp. 28-35
Author(s):  
Katarzyna Żelazny

Abstract During ship design, its service speed is one of the crucial parameters which decide on future economic effects. As sufficiently exact calculation methods applicable to preliminary design stage are lacking the so called contract speed which a ship reaches in calm water is usually applied. In the paper [11] a parametric method for calculation of total ship resistance in actual weather conditions (wind, waves, sea current), was presented. This paper presents a parametric model of ship propulsion system (screw propeller - propulsion engine) as well as a calculation method, based on both models, of mean statistical value of ship service speed in seasonal weather conditions occurring on shipping lines. The method makes use of only basic design parameters and may be applied in preliminary design stage.


1995 ◽  
Vol 11 (04) ◽  
pp. 252-263
Author(s):  
Walter L. Christensen ◽  
Philip C. Koenig

Standard outfit package units for reverse osmosis plants, fire pumps, steering gear, and sanitary spaces were proposed for the LPD 17 amphibious transport dock ship design. The ship was in the preliminary design stage, and it was necessary to determine how this shift to outfit modularity would affect the ship procurement program. Because the use of package units would not have a significant impact on the overall characteristics and performance of the ship, the focus of the investigation was on material ordering and production scheduling. The analysis took account of zone-area-stage outfitting methods and also more traditional practices. With either approach, it was found that the package units did not present any schedule or procurement problems This particular study was focused on a very specific issue, but the approach is applicable to a wide range of production impact assessment problems.


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