Requirements Analysis for Design Optimization of Aerobatic Aircraft

Abstract

Aerobatic aircraft design and simulation is challenging as these aircraft need to fly at any angle of attack and sideslip angle (full-envelope aerodynamics). They fly at velocities close to stall speed, all the way up to the never exceed velocity. These aircraft are also routinely stressed to 6-12 g's in both upright and inverted flight. Presently, most aerobatic aircraft are designed using heuristic knowledge. There is a need for a systematic approach to design aerobatic aircraft in a multi-disciplinary design framework. Towards this goal, this paper presents an extensive study of requirements, metrics and design variables to define a good aerobatic aircraft. First a historical perspective is given to know the current state-of-the-art. Information obtained from regulations, aircraft performance, subject matter experts and analysis of existing aircraft is used to obtain metrics to evaluate. The possible design configurations is given as a morphological matrix. Finally, possible analysis approaches to evaluate the metrics are discussed.