Use of Low-Fidelity Codes for Teaching Aircraft Design

Abstract

The concept of using unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) for aerial surveillance is acquiring lot of importance in military as well as public sectors. The use of rotary wing UAVs for surveillance has gained popularity due to the hovering capabilities. The endurance and range for the rotary wing are considerably less compared to fixed-wing UAVs. The range and time span of surveillance can be remarkably improved with use of fixed-wing UAVs for aerial surveillance. The present work concentrates on developing a conceptual design procedure for the fixed-wing UAVs using low-fidelity codes and applying the constraint diagram approach. The performance requirements of the proposed UAV were used, in current design procedure, to generate constraint diagram from which design drivers like power loading, wing loading and maximum lift coefficient were obtained. The procedure is applied for the design of a fixed-wing (wingspan < 3 m) conventional configuration UAV with electric propulsion system.