"This Wing Design Method is based on a technique the author originally developed for use in the Aircraft Industry, and modified to enhance usage for aerospace students, and more recently for home builders."
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A Wing Design Method For Aerospace Students and Home Builders:
Strength, Weight, Flutter, Divergence, Buckling, Deflection and Twist by M.A. Ferman, PhD, P.E. Trafford Publishing
book review by Arthur Gershman
In this slim volume, Dr. Ferman delineates in clear, uncluttered prose an effective and comprehensive approach to wing design. Using fifteen lucid figures, it takes the aerospace engineering student, or home builder, step by step through the wing design process.
The meat of the design approach is accomplished in four chapters. The first is comprised of three flowcharts guiding the reader through a preliminary, interim, and final design phase. In the second chapter, the "detailed preliminary design" takes the student or home builder, starting with air load calculations on the wing, through root stress analysis. The third chapter discusses interim and final designs. The fourth and final design chapter tackles models for wing design. Two examples are given. In the first example, the total weight is 2600 lbs with a crew of two, and in the second, the total weight is 1100 lbs with a crew of one.
The backmatter rounds out this volume. In a brief, prefatory table, the nomenclature and symbols used throughout the book make a handy reference tool, and the appendix lays out aerodynamic coefficients, grouped by several ranges of Mach number (i.e. the speed of an object moving through a fluid substance). Also included is Dr. Ferman's impressive resume; his qualifications include a BSAE, an MS in Applied Mechanics, a PhD in engineering, and registration as a Professional Engineer. He worked for 35 years at McDonnell Douglas, as well as sixteen years as a college instructor. Not only is his aerospace experience unbeatable, but he is attuned to the needs of the college student as well as the home builder.
Since time immemorial mankind has longed to fly. Dr. Ferman's book gives the aerospace student and home builder the tools to soar.