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Old 4th Sep 2004, 19:51
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Mad (Flt) Scientist
 
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Some speed tapes now have stall margin indicators which are computed via an AOA input. A really clever system could use actual aircraft wt, ‘g’, configuration, and lift coefficients to correlate vane AOA with indicated speed. Less complex systems have simpler routines and make assumptions about lift characteristics based on trim position, the end results are surprisingly accurate.
Actually, that 'clever' system would appear to be being too clever for its own good. You actually don't need weight, 'g', etc., since what you really care about is "how far from the stall am I?". You can express that as a speed margin or an alpha margin. If you do it as an alpha margin you have the advantage that the stall alpha is generally known independent of weight for a given configuration, and you have a direct measurement of your current alpha, so you can work out how close you are to the stall as an alpha (delta or factor, the latter being more useful for what comes next).

Having determined I'm using up "50% of my alpha" I can reasonably translate that into "50% of my lift" and use the inverse square relationship to determine what my stall speed factor is. Dividing my current speed by the ratio thus obtained, I get the stall speed for my current configuration etc. By multiplying by known ratios I could present stall warning speed, too.

The advantage of this method is that it removes any need to determine aircraft weight, etc., and it implicitly accounts for load factor, and will increase the 'stall speed' presented to account for load factor. It therefore gives a better indication to the pilot of the manoeuvre margin he has above stall in turning flight - margin to the 1'g' stall speed isn't much direct use in that case.
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