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Straight-level flight
Published in Mohammad H. Sadraey, Aircraft Performance, 2017
One of the important parameters in a cruising flight is the lift-to-drag ratio. One of the objectives in aerodynamic design of an aircraft is to design an aircraft that produces the maximum lift with a minimum drag. In this regard, the lift-to-drag ratio plays a significant role in the aircraft design process. This design objective has several applications.
Margins in design – review of related concepts and methods
Published in Journal of Engineering Design, 2023
Arindam Brahma, Scott Ferguson, Claudia Eckert, Ola Isaksson
Beginning in the mid-late nineteenth century, the term ‘Factor of safety’ started being used. For instance, Rankine (1872) suggests a multiplication factor in the context of bridges and tunnels. Wilson (1874) provides guidance on selecting a proper ‘coefficient’ or ‘factor of safety’ in boiler design against uncertainties such as defects, wear and tear. The concept of a factor of safety was driven by serious boiler explosions in the late 1800s and the early 1900s, resulting in formal discussions on measures to prevent boiler accidents (Peters and Pham 2018). As the aircraft industry became established, such factors became a part of the aircraft design process. Wilbur Wright comments in a letter that he is constructing his machine to sustain about five times his weight and considers the ramifications of a crash landing (See an excerpt from the letter in Figure 2). Shanley (1962), when tasked with rationalising U.S. civil-airworthiness requirements in 1932, introduced a 1.5 ‘ultimate factor of safety’ (Muller and Schmid 1977) and a ‘load factor’ of about 6 for a typical aeroplane. Shanley’s notes reveal that these numbers are not ‘sacred’ but were generated by considering the properties of prior aircraft that had ‘good service records’ (Shanley 1962).
Comparison of univariate and multivariate anthropometric design requirements methods for flight deck design application
Published in Ergonomics, 2020
Gilvan V. da Silva, Gregory F. Zehner, Jeffrey A. Hudson
Clearly, accommodation of the user population is highly important in workstation design and the flight deck is one of the most affected by poor anthropometric accommodation due to its complexity. Having a broad flight deck accommodation envelope it is an important point to be considered during an aircraft design process. If the anthropometric criteria, which express design-relevant variation, for a workstation design does not result in successful fit for the intended users, their performance will likely be adversely affected and they will be at increased risk of injury and discomfort, impacting safety and operation as well (da Silva, Gordon, and Halpern 2018; Lee et al. 2013; Oudenhuijzen 1998; Thomas 2013). This can put several human lives in risk, in case of commercial aircraft. For this reason, the regulation (FAR/CS 25.777c) from the airworthiness authorities (e.g. Federal Aviation Administration – FAA and European Union Aviation Safety Agency – EASA) defines a broad flight deck accommodation range using pilots’ stature (from 158 cm to 191 cm) as design parameter (FAA 2011; EASA 2020).