Engineering Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2500 words

Engineering - Essay Example discussion is to study the development of a control system through the designed scheduled autopilot that enables the flying of a model at different speed conditions in the air. Aircraft have been designed by different parameters and analysis is needed to establish their effects on the performance of the vehicle. The Wright brothers used the wind tunnel to study the performance of various types of airfoils. There have been advanced wind tunnels that are used to determine the characteristics of full scale aircraft. On the other hand, use of the wind tunnel in determining flight characteristics and performance of full scale aircraft remains an expensive exercise and time consuming proposition. Due to advancement in information systems and technology, high speed computing helps determine flight performance of aircraft designs through the use of virtual tunnels. This process involves a computer generated model that is plugged in a Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) program that determines flow characteristics. The results obtained are compared to those found from the real wind tunnel test and the real aircraft performance in flight. However, several studies have been conducted to demonstrate validity and efficacy of the virtual wind tunnel. In this discussion, the two processes are introduced during undergraduate Aircraft Design class. Scale models of different types of aircraft such as the trainer, transport, fighter, and UAV are studied. The scaled models are installed in low speed cross-section wind tunnel used to establish the lift and drag coefficients and pressure profiles. Design of a virtual model of the corresponding aircraft by use of SolidWorks is also done. The virtual models developed are imported to the SolidWorks Flow Simulation software. The low speed virtual wind tunnel is simulated in Flow Simulation to establish lift and drag coefficients as pressure profiles are established for various aircraft at different angles of pitch, yaw, as well as roll.