PPRuNe Forums - View Single Post - ATR Pilots - use of LO BANK for turns
View Single Post
Old 16th December 2010 | 19:49
  #11 (permalink)  
FCeng84
 
Joined: Feb 2009
Posts: 379
Likes: 0
From: Seattle
Turn Rate vs. Load Factor comparison

Rookie,

I am not a pilot, but have spent my career in design of flight control systems. I am very familiar with flight mechanics. A quick look at a little physics/math might help your cause.

The the heading rate during a turn scales with the tangent of the bank angle. (Turn radius scales with the inverse of the tangent of the bank angle.) The steady normal load factor during a turn scales with the inverse of the cosine of the bank angle. It is interesting to compare the two bank angles available with your autopilot:

Bank_ Tan_ 1/Cosine
15 deg 0.27 1.035
28 deg 0.53 1.133

From these data you can see that increasing bank angle from 15 to 28 degrees does not quite double the turn rate (or not quite halve the turn radius) while it increases the incremental load factor by almost a factor of four! (1.133 - 1) ~= 4 * (1.035 - 1)

Where your flight operations permit a half rate turn the payoff in reduced load factor change for your passengers seems well worth it.

I hope you find this comparison helpful.
FCeng84 is offline  
Reply