TRAINING NOTES

CODE: B-206/005
IIAE Airframe Structure - I
TECHNICAL RESEARCH CELL

MAJOR STRUCTURAL STRESSES

Introduction

Aircraft are unique in structural requirements. They must be light in weight at the same
time withstand flights loads, landing loads and wide range of vibration. Every part of aircraft
must be planned to carry out the load to be imposed upon it. The determination of such loads
is called stress analysis. In the study of all metal structure, we will consider five basic stresses
that act on all physical objects: Tension (Tensile), Compression, Torsion, Shear and
Bending.

Stress: Stress is an internal force of a substance which opposes or resists deformation.

Strain: A strain is a deformation or physical change caused by a stress. A material that is
strained within its elastic limit will return to its original size& shape after the stress is removed,
but if it has been strained beyond this limit, it will be permanently deformed.

Types of Stresses:

1. Tension: Tension is the stress that resists a force that tends to pull apart.

Tensile Stress = Load required to pull the material apart (PSI)

Cross sectional area (Sq. Inches.)

2. Compression: Compression is the stress that resists a crushing force. The compressive
strength of a material is also measured in PSI. Compression is the stress that tends to shorten
or squeeze the aircraft parts.

3. Torsion: Torsion is the stress that produces twisting. The torsion strength of a material is
its resistance to twisting or torque. Propeller shaft and helicopter rotor shaft are both
subjected to torsion stress.
 TRAINING NOTES
CODE: B-206/005
IIAE Airframe Structure - I
TECHNICAL RESEARCH CELL

4. Shear: Shear is the stress that resists the force tending to cause one layer of a material
to slide over an adjacent layer. Aircraft parts, specially screws, bolts, rivets are often
subject to a shearing force.

5. Bending: Bending is the stress combination of compression and tension. When the
aircraft is on ground, the top skin of wing is under tensile stress and bottom skin is under
compressive stress. In flight these forces are the opposite. The top skin is under compressive
stress and bottom skin under tensile stress.
 TRAINING NOTES
CODE: B-206/005
IIAE Airframe Structure - I
TECHNICAL RESEARCH CELL

FATIGUE

As an aircraft ages, it is subjected to a variety of stresses. These stresses come from

loads applied on the ground, during taxiing, take-off and landing, aircraft pressurization, and
during flight. The accumulation of these stresses over time results in a weakening of the
material. This weakening is called fatigue.
In the discussion of elasticity in Aircraft Basic Science, it was stated that when the load
is released from a component, the component returns to its original configuration. To the
naked eye this is true, but in actuality there is a slight difference in the component's shape and
grain structure each time a load is applied and then released. Because of this slight change in
the material, the attributes of the material also change slightly each time a load is applied.
Unless the elastic limit of the material is exceeded, the effects of fatigue are rarely noted.
Each time a material experiences strain (growth in a linear dimension); even if the
stress applied does not exceed its elastic limit, there is a minor deformation experienced. This
results in the material being slightly (often minutely) different each time an additional stress is
applied to a material. These differences compound until the material is no longer capable of
carrying the applied stress.
A simplistic example may help explain this phenomenon. Assume that a material with a
UTS of 65 000 psi is 3 in [76.2 mm] wide, J a
in [254 mm 1 long. and 0.032 in [0.813 mm]
thick and that a tension load of 4992 Ibs is
repeatedly applied along the length of the
material that results in a 0.0001 percent
increase in the length of the material. Also
assume that the volume of the material
always remains the same and that the
increase in length results in a decrease in the
thickness. In this example it is assumed that
the width remains constant in an effort to
simplify the mathematics. In an actual
application, changes in the material's width would also have to be considered.
The load was determined by applying a safety factor of 25 percent to the maximum load
calculations.

 Hoop stress

In a pressurised aircraft the structure is subjected to stress that derives from the fact
that there is a difference in pressure between the inside and outside of the pressurised area of
up to 65·5 kN/m2 (9·5Ibf/in2). This is known as hoop or circumferential stress (Figure). If
the pressurised area is considered as a thin-walled cylinder then it can be understood that the
internal pressure will tend to expand the cross-sectional area, this expansion creating a tensile
load in the circumference of the cylinder. This load and its resulting stress are in addition to the
loads deriving from normal ground and flight operations. The internal pressure also acts
against the bulkheads at the ends of the pressurised area and creates stress along the length
of the cylinder. However, the longitudinal stress is always less than the hoop stress, resulting
in a difference in design strength between joints in different directions.
 TRAINING NOTES
CODE: B-206/005
IIAE Airframe Structure - I
TECHNICAL RESEARCH CELL