Thin-Haul Transport and Air Taxi Aircraft Design System Requirements Review Purdue University, Spring 2019 AAE 451 Team 4 Sam Buck, Nicholas Turo-Shields, Joseph Tenney Nicholas D'Onorio, Liam Ochoa, Tristan Zabicki 7 February 2019 Supervisor: Dr. William Crossley Contents 1 Executive Summary 2 2 Nomenclature 3 3 Study Objective and Mission Statement 3 3.1 AIAA RFP . .3 3.2 Mission Statement . .3 4 Market Analysis and CONOPS 4 4.1 Potential Market Overview . .4 4.2 Primary Market . .5 4.3 CONOPS . .9 4.4 Design Mission . 12 4.5 Additional Markets for Consideration . 13 5 Aircraft System Design Requirements 14 6 Baseline Aircraft 15 6.1 Selection of Baseline Aircraft . 15 6.2 Beechcraft Baron G58 . 15 6.3 Daher TBM 700C2 . 17 6.4 Limitations of Baseline Aircraft . 18 7 Technologies and Advanced Concepts 19 7.1 Hybrid Propulsion . 19 7.2 Composite Technology . 21 8 Sizing Tools 22 8.1 Aircraft Database . 22 Appendix: MATLAB Code 24 1 1 Executive Summary Black Tie Air is an aircraft design company whose mission is to provide an aircraft for luxury on-demand service to popular business locations around the country. The company was founded by a group of Purdue Aerospace Engineering students in Purdue's 451 senior design course. The team used the American Institute of Aeronautics (AIAA) 2018-2019 Thin Haul Transport and Air Taxi design competition as a starting point and guide for the aircraft design but ultimately decided to focus on the luxury market. Upon completing some initial market research, the team determined that the Air Taxi/Thin Haul market was highly saturated with aircraft carrying out the mission of the AIAA request for proposal with ease. The team felt that even a very well designed aircraft would only be a marginal improvement on the current fleet and the team was not confident about competing in this market space. When narrowing in on our market the team considered the following analogy: Consider the taxi cabs in a big city like New York City. The Ford Crown Victoria is a common car to be used as a taxi cab because it is cheap, reliable and gets the job done. Even if our team designed a car that was in our marginally better than the Crown Victoria it would be hard to convince taxi drivers that they need to upgrade their cars from something that already fits their needs. Now consider a luxury car service. The luxury car service in order to appease its customers needs the latest and greatest cars to keeps its clientele happy. For this reason our team decided to focus on the luxury market as a better business prospect. Our city-hopper aircraft will service business men and women and help them travel comfortably to and from business meeting in neighboring cities. Some additional markets the team is also targeting include:air taxi, individual ownership, cargo operations and aeromedical. Design requirements were developed start- ing with the RFP and adding additional requirements including cabin volume, and wing loading to assure the best experience for passengers. The team selected the Beechcraft Baron G58, and Daher TBM 700C2 as the baseline aircraft which will be used as references during the design process. Features from each will be drawn from and improved upon to create our proposed aircraft. Advanced technology will also be implemented in the aircraft design. Research is being done into technologies such as hybrid propulsion and composites to evaluate their technology readiness level for service in 2025 and the benefits they can provide in the teams design. Moving forward the next steps for the team include: continuing to develop and validate the sizing code, complete constraint diagrams, and create a geometric representation of the baseline aircraft. 2 2 Nomenclature AIAA American Institute of Aeronautics FBO Fixed-Base Operator TRL Technology Readiness Level RFP Request for Proposal VLJ Very Light Jet 3 Study Objective and Mission Statement 3.1 AIAA RFP The objective of the AIAA design competition is to design a domestic transport aircraft for the thin haul or on-demand service operations that service small airports and short routes. 3.2 Mission Statement The mission of Black Tie Air is to provide our customers with luxury on-demand service to the country's most popular business locations. 3 4 Market Analysis and CONOPS 4.1 Potential Market Overview To find a profitable niche in the market into which an aircraft may fit, we will begin with two extremely general sizing requirements given by the AIAA RFP: carrying 2-6 passengers and having a maximum speed of greater than 180 knots. For reference, we select the two most-produced series of civil aircraft, currently in production, which easily meet these requirements: the Beechcraft Baron and the Cirrus SR22. Both models have seen thousands of aircraft produced, and both are used in civilian applications within the United States, making them excellent representatives of the aircraft market in question. The Beechcraft Baron is a 6-seat, twin piston engined light aircraft with a storied history as a versatile transport. First sold in 1961, the Baron is generally sold to private individuals and small businesses for individual use. At a price of almost 1.5 million dollars [1], the Baron is one of the most expensive aircraft of its class, largely due to its branding and reputation as a luxury model. Most of the Baron's market, therefore, is individuals who own their own aircraft and are willing to pay a premium for luxury features therein. A smaller number of owners are charter aircraft operators, who use the Baron for luxurious, on-demand executive transport. A notable secondary market does exist as a training aircraft for flight schools and tourism, generally using secondhand, lower-cost airframes. The G58 has little to no use in the air taxi market, however, as its cost renders it a relatively difficult aircraft from which to make a profit. The Cirrus SR22 is a 4-seat, single piston engined, composite aircraft, which has grown an impressive presence in the small aircraft market. The SR22 was introduced in 2001 and has sold over 5,700 airframes, making it one of world's best-selling aircraft [1]. At a price around $600,000, the Cirrus is accessible to a diverse set of markets [1]. While individual and private sales comprise a large proportion of owners, the airframe is used by flight schools, air taxi companies, tourism operators, and a variety of other niche businesses, including aerial photography and surveying [1]. This application encourages us to examine the air taxi market more closely. The AIAA RFP encourages the development of the aircraft for air taxi use, so it is sensible to investigate how many aircraft of this type the market would support purchase of in 2025. The two largest and most notable operators of the SR22 as an air taxi have been ImagineAir, with a fleet of around 30, and SATSair, with 26 [2,3]. Both of these operators flew SR22s in an on-demand fashion, offering fares for transport from one airport to 4 another. Both operators, however, have also gone out of business, suggesting that aircraft in the range of the SR22 may not provide sufficient profit when operating as an air taxi. This conclusion is further supported by the recent actions of Hopscotch Air, another similar company. Hopscotch Air, which also flew SR22s on demand for fares, has transitioned to a membership model, requiring anyone wishing to buy a ticket to first pay a steep monthly membership fee [4]. These data provide compelling evidence against the long-term profitability of SR22-like aircraft as air taxis. Despite the uncertain viability of aircraft like the SR22 in the air taxi market, air taxi operators are finding success with other platforms. The largest air taxi organization in the United States, Cape Air, flies a fleet composed, almost exclusively, of Cessna 402 airframes [5], outfitted to seat nine passengers. As these aircraft are aging, Cape Air has elected to order 100 Tecnam P2012 Travellers [5], also designed for nine passengers. Similar (though smaller) air taxi services exist flying the Cessna 208 Caravan and Beechcraft King Air, also designed to carry nine passengers. The nine passenger requirement represents a hard upper limit to the air taxi market in many cases: aircraft carrying nine or fewer passengers may be certified using the FAR Part 23 guidelines, while those with ten or more must adhere to the more stringent Part 25 (though waivers are available in some circumstances). All of these aircraft are far larger than both the SR22 and Baron, indicating that an aircraft designed primarily for the needs of air taxi organizations would be far larger than that envisioned in the AIAA RFP. While such a market may buy some aircraft of the target size for a variety of reasons, we cannot assert that the market exists with enough confidence to \bet the company" on such a proposal. Understanding that the air taxi sector is not a viable market for our potential aircraft, we will return to the first example aircraft to develop a business case. As a luxury aircraft, the Baron has seen high market penetration in private service, and a smaller, but still significant, amount of use in charter service. Both of these markets are much more expansive, with especially the charter market having a significant amount of flexibility to use an aircraft of the size we intend. It is these customers to whom we will turn in order to sell the aircraft. 4.2 Primary Market Charter operators and small airlines regulated under FAR Part 135 will be the customers for whom the air- craft is primarily designed.