COMPUTATIONAL ANALYSIS OF A TRUSS TYPE FUSELAGE

Abstract

The strength of a welded truss type fuselage of a light aircraft – named SAFAT 01 – is considered in this paper. The aircraft is a monoplane with high strut-braced wings configuration with flaps. The fuselage is of welded tubular steel fabric-covered construction. According to its production contract; the aircraft is fully produced and assembled in Sudan whereas the documentation is limited to technical side only with no information available about design procedures and calculations. This makes it difficult to further modify or upgrade the aircraft. The fuselage geometry has been modeled using a CAD program. The main dimensions have been obtained using 2-D drawings and the missing dimensions and data due to lack of documents were extracted experimentally from a built aircraft. Aerodynamic loads were determined using computational fluid dynamic program for the horizontal tail. Static structural analysis was conducted by finite element method (FEM) using fastened connection property between the tubes. The results were observed in three main parts; rear part which supports the vertical and horizontal stabilizers and the rear landing gear; the mid part which provides cantilever reaction for the wing and supports front landing gear, and the front part on which the engine is mounted. The Von Mises stresses, displacements and principal stresses were observed in the three parts and found acceptable except for a small region near the attachment between wing and fuselage. However, further experimental validation is needed. Presently, experimental and dynamic analyses are being conducted and the results will be published later.