Experimental Aircraft Design
The goal of the project was to design a cargo plane capable of transporting 5 satellites weighing 1242 lbs each, at cruising speeds no larger than Mach 1 and capable of continuous flight for over 1400 NM. Using a very detailed engineering approach my team and I got started on this 10-week adventure learning and problem solving the best way to design this aircraft. We started by using an introductory guide to aircraft design with proper approximations given by perfect flight conditions to parameterize the project.
WHERE it Started
Matlab
Calculations were originally done in Matlab to optimize the calculation process to make the design phase as accurate as we can.
Excel
Then the team split up and additionally designed an Excel sheet to verify that Matlab Program was correct in its calculations.
ENGINE Choice
An engine was chosen using a list of popular engines specifications given by the introductory guide from the book. After the forces were summed and the weight and lift coefficients were found, my team decided to go with the general electric GE90-90B engine.
VERIFICATION
Using hand calculations the results in both Matlab and Excel were officially verified and the project could move past the design stage and into the modeling stage.
Renderings
This is my favorite part of the project as the team and myself was able to see and visualize all the hard work we had accomplished. Using Fusion 360 a model was created in which then got exported to Blender to create the stunning visuals seen below.
THE REPort
This report consists of my technical thinking when in the process of this project. It defines objectives and breaks down the actions and the steps that were used to get to the final design.
