A Generic Methodology For Flight Test And Safety Evaluation At Conceptual Design

Abstract

The current research is dedicated to the application of a simulation suite that emulates flight testing and is applicable to the aircraft conceptual and preliminary design environment. The configuration concept available for study is an unmodified Cessna Citation X. The research goal is to arrive at a systematic process that reduces aircraft design risk while creating transparency for the manager and engineer during product life-cycle simulation. When integrating the discipline of flight test emulation into the development methodology, the objective is to complement and enrich the design simulation through a correct representation of flight safety relevant disciplines like aircraft certification, flight test, and incident/accident investigation. Clearly, this new `flight safety module' augments the safety-relevant discipline flight mechanics. This novel stability and control and performance assessment capability utilizes a knowledge-based approach with a legacy to conventional and unconventional aircraft to rapidly integrate lessons learned to support systems level design decision-making. The main goal is to parametrically review and assess flight safety aspects originating from stability and control and performance limitations associated with the operational envelope for the flight vehicle configuration under consideration. The assessment procedure of a candidate design requires: (1) pre-flight test procedure that determines a network of possible safe and unsafe flight paths under normal and complex (multi-factor) flight situations for a specified flight test schedule; (2) execution of the virtual flight test emulation system (VATES); (3) post-flight test procedure that correlates classical technical deliverables, and (4) product review (design feedback mechanism) to iterate the parametric design towards improved physical understanding and improved system flight safety. Consequently, this process allows for a higher density of flight tests to be simulated compared to the density typically afforded during full-scale flight testing.