Fly-by-wire flight control systems are becoming more common in both civil andmilitary aircraft. These systems give many benefits, but also present a new set ofproblems due to their increased complexity compared to conventional systems andthe larger choice of options that they provide. The work presented here considersthe application of fly-by-wire to a generic regional transport aircraft. The flying qualities criteria used for typical flying qualities evaluations are describedbriefly followed by analysis of several past transport aircraft flying qualities programmes against these criteria. From these results, some control law independentdesign requirements are formulated for a civil aircraft for the approach and landingtask. These control law independent flying qualities criteria are intended to be usedwith any generic rate-like control law for a transport aircraft and enabled a numberof different control laws to be designed.The results of a number of flying qualities evaluations are presented. Both an ILSapproach task and a formation flying task were used. The effects of windshearwere also considered. It was found that control laws which maintain flight path aresuitable for the ILS approach task, while most rate-like response characteristics givegood flying qualities for the formation flying task.Finally, the conclusions drawn from these evaluations are presented, and both theCivil and Military current airworthiness requirements are assessed.In addition to the flying qualities work, a study is made of the management issuesassociated with fly-by-wire design. A fly-by-wire aircraft design programme wasproposed and the project management issues associated with this were considered.A timescale was proposed for the design process for a generic regional aircraft, andthe critical path for this process is presented.
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