Integrated Assessment of Aircraft and Novel Subsystem Architectures in Early Design

Abstract

The aerospace industry’s progressive transition toward More Electric subsystem architectures presents some unique challenges for the early design stages: in part, due to the unavailability of historical data and the presence of a large number of subsystem architecture possibilities. Such novel subsystem architectures, which may have a pronounced effect on aircraft performance, must therefore be considered earlier in the design process than conventional architectures have traditionally been. This paper demonstrates the integration of aircraft and engine sizing with explicit sizing and analysis of the subsystems, using models and methods that are suitable for the early design phases. The resulting Integrated Subsystem Sizing and Architecture Assessment Capability is used to investigate a subsystem architecture design space for three aircraft sizes. The assessment reveals a characteristic clustering of subsystem architectures driven by the design characteristics of a few subsystems. It also reveals subsystem design solution trends existing in the best-performing subsystem architectures for each aircraft size. A sensitivity analysis is also performed to determine the impact of uncertainties in the secondary power extraction penalties on the performance of an electrified subsystem architecture.