Looking to new aircraft configurations

Researchers at Cranfield University's College of Aeronautics discuss the needs and benefits of studying different aircraft configurations such as the blended-wing body.

“The dominance of the ‘cigar tube with lifting surfaces’ as a civil aircraft configuration is both a tribute to the development skills of engineers around the world and a monument to the inertia of the industry,” said Professor John Fielding, Research Team Leader at Cranfield University's College of Aeronautics in the UK. “It took just 15 years for the configuration to come to the fore at the beginning of powered flight, and 80 years later is still with us. But now it is time for some fresh thinking.” Fielding also believes there is a need to challenge “stereotypical thinking” because of what is seen as conflicting changes in the aerospace industry. Civil aircraft research and development elements at both British Aerospace and Rolls-Royce are collaborating with Cranfield.

On the one hand, passenger air travel is growing fast and becoming a commodity in which low price is an important determining factor. On the other hand, environmental issues have been offsetting much of the potential performance gains from aircraft refinement, said Fielding, adding that if future projections of limitations on noise, greenhouse emissions, concerns about solar radiation, and the production of high-altitude cirrus clouds from vapor trails are taken into consideration, it may be that without substantial improvements in performance, the viability of air transport as a whole could be called into question.