Capstone Project

January 2015 - June 2015

Overview

This project was part of the course "AA410 Aircraft Design I" and "AA410 Aircraft Design II". According to the course description, students estimates the size, selects the configuration, weight and balance, and performance while satisfying the stability, control, and handling qualities requirements

In this project, we designed the supersonic R-UAV with tailless configuration, and we built a model of the aircraft. The entire group was consisted of 36 undergraduate students, and they were divided into subgroups: Aerodynamics, Construction, Flight Dynamics, Flight Test, Mechanical & Electrical Systems, Propulsion, Structure, and Vehicle Integration.

Outcome

The final product of this project is shown below. The one on the left is the final model of the project. The middle is so called "foamy" with which we tested the wiring and electrical components of the UAV before installing them into the actual model. We also constructed the model airplane of P-38 (right) in order to practice manufacturing skills, such as foam cutting, laser cutting, and 3D printing.

My Role

I was involved in the "Flight Dynamics" team and "Mechanical & Electrical Systems" team. In addition to the roles in the specialized teams, I was a documentation manager so I communicated with team leaders to compile a final report of the course. In addition to these teams, I participated in wind tunnel testing and the flight tests of the model aircraft.

As a flight dynamics engineer, analyzed the wind tunnel experiment results in order to generate a mathematical model of the UAV. In the process, I created a matlab program for automating some parts of the data analysis process so that the team did not have to plot everything manually by excel. In addition, I designed a controller to stabilize the UAV since the wind tunnel test showed that the UAV did not satisfy the stability requirement with the tailless configuration. MATLAB and Simulink were used for the entire process of constructing the mathematical model and designing the controller.

Time Response of the System with Initial Conditions in Longitudinal and Lateral Directions. (Lateral direction is unstable)

Damper developed with Simulink	Lateral response with damper

As a Mechanical & Electrical Systems engineer, I participated in connecting the electric components of the UAV from which I gained the extensive experience of soldering.

Pictures

Three Models	Wind Tunnel Experiment