Designing Light Aircraft - More Methods and Tools
Program and Registration Form - Register on-line
LAA members - discount price (same as RAeS Members rate) = £47.00 (incl VAT)
Any queries, please contact:
Gemma Crabb
Conference & Events Organiser
Tel: 0207 670 4372
The conference will develop the theme successfully launched at the 2009 General Aviation Group Conference (Design Methods and Tools for Light Aircraft) which aimed to review design data, design software and affordable tools now available to designers and entrepreneurs. The 2010 conference will address topics highlighted in the 2009 post-Conference reviews. It will build on the broad overview with further insight into the utility of specific computer tools, and specific aerodynamic, structural and manufacturing issues. The organising committee have invited speakers who are active in their fields so that presentations are pertinent to the design challenges of today.
Aircraft Design Software (ADS) is a software package dedicated to take the designer through the entire aircraft conceptual design process. ADS can handle light aircraft, UAV and commuter category aircraft of any configuration and can be used either to design a new aircraft from scratch or to design modifications to existing aircraft. The presentation will cover the whole conceptual design phase, including optimisation of the design. The underlying equations and algorithms will be described and validation reports presented.
A case study of the Lambert Mission will be presented. This will be a joint presentation by designer Filip Lambert and by Francis Donaldson. Francis was responsible for the Mission's certification through the Light Aircraft Association (LAA). By giving both the design and certification viewpoints, the two sides of the story can be compared and issues can be seen and understood.
Use of FEA software will be described, with emphasis on techniques suitable for light aeroplane design analysis.
Composites are increasingly used in light aircraft, but many still see them as difficult to use. The many types of composite, resin, lay-up and curing techniques don't help. But they offer tremendous advantages in creating lighter, more streamlined aircraft. This paper attempts to shed some light on which composite materials and techniques are most cost-effective in different situations from experimental one-offs to prototypes to production.
The Brunel Flight Safety Laboratory (BFSL) is currently completing a research programme on loss of control and spinning. Design lessons from this programme will be presented.
Doug Howarth examines the aircraft features and economic conditions that enable general aviation designs go from concepts to successful production runs. New aircraft builders must make many key design decisions that have significant economic impact. Given that new aircraft concepts will be airworthy, the key to having them adapted by companies and pilots who will pay to acquire them is providing platforms that satisfy the customers’ value propositions within the market demand limits at prices that exceed producers’ costs. These three constraining economic elements, demand, cost and price, can be characterized as an economic system consisting of statistically significant equations. The output of these equations describes market geometries from which economically optimized design parameters, as aircraft attributes or features, may be extracted. Detailed market analysis reveals the market responsiveness to changes in attributes such as seating capacity, maximum cruising speed, maximum altitude, range and cabin height. Mapping these attributes shows open locations within the market, offering positions with the least possible competition, but with features designed to satisfy demonstrated buyer preferences.