Impact of Non-Occupied Seats on the Thermal Comfort in Long-Range Aircraft for Novel Ventilation Concepts

Abstract

Novel ventilation systems for aircraft cabins have attracted the attention of scientists and aircraft manufacturers during the last years. Previous studies demonstrate the potential of energy saving as well as a achieving a higher level of thermal comfort in a single aisle aircraft. To allow for a greener and smarter testing of novel ventilation concepts for future long-range airliners, a full-scale twin aisle cabin mock-up with thermodynamically realistic boundary conditions by means of temperature-controlled fuselage elements was developed at the German Aerospace Center (DLR) in Göttingen. Temperature controlled thermal manikins allow to simulate the heat release and obstruction of real passengers. In this study, ceiling-based ventilation concepts were investigated experimentally with regard to incompletely occupied cabins, which are rather the rule than the exception (passenger load factor 75 to 90%, and even much less during the present pandemic time). Changes of the horizontal temperature distribution by switching off thermal manikins on selected seats for different flight phases were analysed using high-resolution local measurement probes as well as infrared cameras. A comparison with results of non-occupied seats in a single aircraft cabin will be conducted using previous studies and conclusions on the robustness of the ceiling-based concepts will be drawn.