A study on parameter estimation for general aviation canard aircraft

Abstract

This paper presents the procedures used for estimating the stability and control derivatives of a general aviation canard aircraft from flight data. The maximum likelihood estimation method which accounts for both process and measurement noise was used for the flight data analysis of a four seat canard aircraft, the Firefly. Without relying on the parameter estimation method, several aerodynamic derivatives were obtained by analyzing the steady state flight data. A wind tunnel test, a flight test of a 1/4 scaled remotely controlled model aircraft, and the prediction of aerodynamic coefficients using the USAF Stability and Control Digital Data Compendium (DATCOM), Advanced Aircraft Analysis (AAA), and Computer Fluid Dynamics (CFD) were performed during the development phase of the Firefly and the results were compared with flight determined derivatives of a full scaled flight prototype. A correlation between the results from each method could be used for the design of the canard aircraft as well as for building the aerodynamic database.