(Georgia Institute of Technology, 1997-08)
DeLaurentis, Daniel A.; Mavris, Dimitri N.; Calise, Anthony J.; Schrage, Daniel P.
Accurate stability and control derivative information is essential to the configuration designer. As new, non-conventional aircraft are being designed, however, the trusted stability and control estimates usually used in conceptual design may no longer be useful. Using sophisticated analysis to compute every derivative in the highly iterative design environment is not a viable approach either. This paper proposes a method for addressing this dilemma by combining experimental design techniques for model building with vortex lattice aerodynamics for analysis. The careful implementation of this method results in parametric regression equations for three important derivatives as a function of the variables of most interest to the designer (e.g. wing, tail geometry, center of gravity location, etc.). These equations are based on actual analysis and not historical trends. Finally, uncertainty associated with this method is introduced and an initial technique for analyzing the effect of such uncertainty is presented.