Understanding the Flight Mechanics of Active High-Lift Aircraft Configurations: Achievements of the CRC 880 Project

Abstract

Flight mechanics of short take-off and landing aircraft with active high-lift system and propeller engines exhibit excellent low airspeed flight performance on the one hand but also flight mechanical challenges on the other. These are results of previous work of the 60s as well as of the Collaborative Research Centre CRC 880. In the CRC 880 project, new knowledge about unsatisfactory handling qualities was gained by flight dynamics modeling and simulations based on a high-fidelity computational fluid dynamics database of the CRC reference aircraft. This paper summarizes the results of the flight dynamics that confirm excellent flight performance, minor challenges in the longitudinal motion and major challenges in the lateral-directional motion. Passive and active countermeasures are discussed to improve the handling qualities. Moreover, it is shown that only partial failures of the active high-lift system can be compensated. Finally, the paper gives an outlook on future work.