Continued development of the structural analysis module in Vehicle Sketch Pad (VSP) has resulted in an enhanced conceptual structural design capability that has been applied to a representative transport aircraft wing. The objective is to provide conceptual and preliminary air vehicle designers with structural feedback for conceptual design purposes. The end objective is to apply the VSP structural analysis capabilities to finite element method (FEM) based mass property estimates. FEM based methods are expected to generate higher-fidelity mass estimates than are possible with current mass estimation techniques. The target FEM program is CalculiX, an open source 3-D FEM program from the Free Software Foundation. Nomenclature a.c. = Aerodynamic center (dimensionless when expressed in terms of wing chord fraction) c = Wing chord (any consistent system of units) t/c = Wing thickness ratio (dimensionless) Acronyms CD = Conceptual design CAD = Computer Aided Design CAE = Computer Aided Engineering FEM = Finite Analysis Method GUI = Graphical User Interface PC = Personal Computer UAV = Unmanned Air Vehicle UT = University of Texas at Austin VSP = Vehicle Sketch Pad
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