AIRCRAFT STABILITY AND CONTROL

STATIC LATERAL STABILITY AND CONTROL

BY Y.K.SINHA

SIDE SLIP AND YAW ANGLE

LATERAL STABILITY
Stability about the aircrafts longitudinal axis, which extends from the nose of the aircraft to its tail, is called lateral stability. This helps to stabilize the lateral or rolling effect when one wing gets lower than the wing on the opposite side of the aircraft. It is the ability of the aircraft to recover from a roll without pilots intervention.

For a aircraft to be laterally stable Cl should be positive

There are four main design factors that make an aircraft laterally stable: Dihedral Wing placement on lateral stability Vertical tail placement on lateral stability Keel effect and weight distribution Sweepback

ESTIMATION OF DIHEDRAL EFFECT

If a disturbance causes one wing to drop relative to the other, the lift vector rotates and there is a component of the weight acting inward which causes the airplane to move sideways in this direction. When wings have dihedral, the wing toward the free-stream velocity, hence the lower wing, will experience a greater angle of attack than the raised wing and hence greater lift. There results a net force and moment tending to reduce the bank angle.

Positive sideslip (nose left) creates an upward velocity on right wing and downward velocity on left wing Equivalent of downwash Increases angle of attack over right wing, decreases angle of attack over left wing Results in a rolling moment to the left The stabilizing effect of this configuration is known as the dihedral effect.

EFFECT OF WING PLACEMENT ON LATERAL STABILITY

EFFECT OF VERTICAL TAIL PLACEMENT ON LATERAL STABILITY

INTERFERENCE OF WING ON VERTICAL PALNE

EFFECT OF VERTICAL TAIL PLACEMENT ON LATERAL STABILITY OR KEEL EFFECT

During flight, the side area of the airplane's fuselage and vertical fin react to the airflow in much the same manner as the keel of a ship. That is, it exerts a steadying influence on the airplane laterally about the longitudinal axis. Such laterally stable airplanes are constructed so that the greater portion of the keel area is above and behind the center of gravity. Thus, when the airplane slips to one side, the combination of the airplane's weight and the pressure of the airflow against the upper portion of the keel area (both acting about the CG) tends to roll the airplane back to wings-level flight.

Sweepback The secondary effect of sweepback is to improve lateral stability. When a side-slip occurs, the lower wing presents a larger span as seen from the direction of the approaching air, and as with dihedral, the effect is to roll the aircraft back towards the horizontal. In general, as the sweepback angle is increased the dihedral angle will be reduced.

Airbus380

HARRIER

EFFECT OF FLAP DEFLECTION ON LATERAL STABILITY

EFFECT OF POWER ON LATERAL STABILITY

LATERAL CONTROL

Lateral control with aileron

Lateral control with spoilers

LOAD DISTRIBUTION DUE TO ROLLING VELOCITY

SPANWISE LIFT DISTRIBUTION DUE TO AILERON DEFLECTIONS

At a given helix angle, the distance to complete a roll remains constant regardless of forward speed. The helix angle is the ratio of tip velocity in roll, pb/2, to the aircrafts forward velocity, V.

Estimation of Lateral Control Power Strip Integration

Assumption The airplane to be a single degree of freedom in roll about X Axis The wing is considered to be a rigid structure with the rolling moment arising due to aileron deflection (a)and damping moment due to angular velocity (p)

The two parameters rolling moment due to a and damping moment due to p can be evaluated by strip integration method

For a tapered wing

Note: For a given aileron deflection pb/2V is constant

Aileron Reversal

End