Certification of newly designed and built aircraft

[Genghis the Engineer]

One hopes that this is an entirely theoretical question, as if your team is any good, they should all have covered this on their various degree courses.

The main certification standard for an aircraft in your class is likely to be part 23:that is EASA CS.23 in Europe, or FAR-23 anywhere else. That should have been used throughout the initial design as a design guide, and then the document the airworthiness team will be putting together is the compliance checklist against part 23 for the design. Typically you do as much as you can without having a physical system to test, and get that signed off by the internal or external authority to trigger build, do ground testing if/as required during the build, then incorporate those results in the second version compliance checklist which is then used to trigger authorisation for flight testing. Final approval is built upon a third version compliance report, which incorporates all the flight test results, operating data, final design changes, and so-on.

The organisation itself needs to be competent, and typically you'll need an organisation incorporating design, aerodynamics, structures, check-stress, airworthiness, and operations. Depending upon regulatory regime that can be totally informal (such as is the case for amateur built aeroplanes in most countries), or require a very high degree of regulation (as will be the case in most countries for aircraft seeking a full CofA). In any case however, it's likely that "The Authority", whoever that is, will be looking at the overall design and airworthiness organisation and its competences, rather than microscoping down to individual licences and qualifications.

Manufacturing will need quality assurance procedures in place, built upon adequate facilities and competent people - all approved by the obiquitious "authority" in a similar manner to the design and airworthiness teams. Eventually, the same will apply to your flight test team.

As for sub-contractors, generally the manufacturer approves them, and has to justify its approval quality and methods to "The Authority"; in practice ISO9001 plus audit of their working procedures is usually adequate, and in some cases may be excessive in the light aeroplane world.

G