Chinese Journal of Aeronautics, (2019), 32(3): 595–610

Chinese Society of Aeronautics and Astronautics

& Beihang University
Chinese Journal of Aeronautics
cja@buaa.edu.cn
www.sciencedirect.com

Vee-tail conceptual design criteria for commercial

transport aeroplanes
Alejandro SANCHEZ-CARMONA *, Cristina CUERNO-REJADO

Faculty of Aerospace Engineering, Department of Aircraft and Spacecraft, Technical University of Madrid (Universidad
Polte´cnica de Madrid), Madrid 28040, Spain

Received 8 January 2018; revised 3 February 2018; accepted 19 March 2018

Available online 5 July 2018

KEYWORDS
Commercial transport aero-
plane;
Conceptual aircraft design;
Tail design requirements;
Unconventional tail design;
Vee-tail
Abstract Vee-tail configuration is an unconventional tail configuration for commercial transport
aviation, the use of which could suppose reductions on CO2 emissions. The conceptual design cri-
teria have been selected inspired on the certification requirements established by the aviation regu-
lation in force. They are static stability in cruise, control after Critical Engine Failure (CEF),
control in crosswind landing, and trim in these three conditions. The study is carried out through
a combination of semi-empirical techniques and Vortex-Lattice Methods (VLM) and thus this anal-
yses the consequences of applying these criteria to a reference aeroplane substituting its conven-
tional tail by a parametrised Vee-tail configuration. The Vee-tail is defined by four parameters:
span, root chord, taper ratio and dihedral angle. The results of the study establish a relation
between the parameters in order to accomplish the proposed conceptual design criteria. To sum
up, minimum and maximum limits are obtained for dihedral angle depending on the combination
of the rest of parameters. In addition, a design restriction to the yawing trailing-edge tail control is
reached when the results are analysed, demonstrating that its minimum size must be between 60%
and 80% of the half-span of the tail, depending on the Vee-tail geometry.
Ó 2018 Chinese Society of Aeronautics and Astronautics. Production and hosting by Elsevier Ltd. This is
an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).

1. Introduction also taking actions to combat climate change. In fact, the

The majority of governments around the world are concerned
about air pollution emissions.1–4 On concrete, the aviation is
* Corresponding author.
E-mail address: alejandro.sanchezc@upm.es (A. SANCHEZ-
CARMONA).
w
Peer review under responsibility of Editorial Committee of CJA.
Production and hosting by Elsevier
International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO) agreed in
October 2016 on a resolution to address CO2 emissions from
international aviation as of 2021.5 This resolution establishes
a scheme to offset around 80% of the emissions above 2020
levels during the period 2021–2035.6 This should allow for
improvements including how this schema contributes to the
objectives of the Paris Agreement.7 One possible way to reduce
CO2 emissions is to decrease the fuel consumption of commer-
cial aeroplanes by improving engines, reducing their weight or
changing the aircraft configuration.8,9 This last option can
improve aerodynamic efficiency and consequently reduce
transport emissions. Aeroplane configurations have hardly

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cja.2018.06.012
1000-9361 Ó 2018 Chinese Society of Aeronautics and Astronautics. Production and hosting by Elsevier Ltd.
This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).
596
changed throughout history. The conventional configuration is
composed of high aspect ratio wings, a slender fuselage, two
stabilizing surfaces situated in the rear end of the fuselage
and engines positioned under the wing or at the rear of the
fuselage.10 Many unconventional configurations contemplated
in the open literature suggest radical changes to the aircraft
appearance such as joined-wing, flying wing or box-wing.8,11–13
Alternatively, it may be more valuable to study unconven-
tional configurations which suggest small changes in aircraft
appearance as these would be easier to implement in commer-
cial aviation. For example, the designers can only act in the
empennage. The rear-end of the aircraft contributes around
20% to the aeroplane drag, so a new tail configuration which
reduces this drag would result in a more environmental-
friendly aircraft. In response to that, a new conceptual design
tool for unconventional tail configurations needs to be devel-
oped to aid designers in analysing the potential benefits and
drawbacks of these configurations in the first stages of the
design process.
The simplest unconventional tail configuration which could
be installed in commercial transport aeroplanes is Vee-tail con-
figuration.12,14 This configuration is more often employed in
the Remotely Piloted Aircraft Systems (RPAS) field in aircraft
such as the Northrop Grumman Global Hawk or the General
Atomics MQ-9 Reaper. In spite of that, a mass produced
manned Vee-tailed aeroplane exists today: the Beechcraft
Bonanza Model 35, a six-seated general aviation aeroplane,
was introduced in 1947. Vee-tail aircraft present potential ben-
efits from the standpoint of empennage drag and weight,
because this tail configuration is composed of two surfaces
instead of the three surfaces of conventional tails. However,
some studies deal with the consequences of the use of this con-
figuration in the controllability of the RPAS. A comparative
study between conventional tails and Vee-tails of directional
stability derivatives has been performed through wind tunnel
tests at a low Reynolds number.15,16 This study is thought suit-
able for unmanned aircraft because of the Reynolds number.
Analogous studies deal with a comparison of the whole stabil-
ity derivatives of a RPAS using Computational Fluids Dynam-
ics (CFD) techniques, also for low Reynolds number.17,18
Finally, this configuration has been studied also from the
standpoint of dynamics models for RPAS taking into account
different failure models with the objective to develop fault-
tolerant autopilots for this kind of aircraft.19
Furthermore, some works study the possibility of using
Vee-tails in commercial aviation. The results of the EU funded
NACRE project indicate that this configuration could present
benefits in reductions of empennage drag but not in weight.12
Also, the effects of varying the dihedral angle of Vee-tails have
been studied for use in a blended wing-body aeroplane.20 In
this case, the results have been reached by modelling the aero-
dynamic forces and moments with Vortex Lattice Method
(VLM). As a result of the limitations of this kind of tool,
this study has only been carried out for air speeds lower than
50 m/s.
Despite the amount of research carried out regarding the
Vee-tail, none of these studies establish a procedure for design-
ing these tails in conceptual stages of the design process. Some
authors indicate design guidelines for these tails, but they sug-
gest designing the Vee-tail just considering the horizontal and
vertical projections of the surface as a conventional tail.21 In
these stages, a rapid design tool is desirable because the aero-
A. SANCHEZ-CARMONA, C. CUERNO-REJADO
plane geometry is not yet fixed, so a low computational time of
calculations to obtain results is necessary to allow the designer
to implement changes in a short period of time. The price to
pay for the use of these rapid design tools is the loss of preci-
sion, where the error is bounded around 10%.11 Accuracy will
be a mandatory requirement in more advanced stages of the
design process. In this framework, because the available
knowledge of conventional tails is far more extensive than that
of others, there are already several methods for designing con-
ventional tails with these requirements. Some of them are
based on correlations and dimensionless parameters such as
the volume coefficient.11,21–23 These procedures need informa-
tion about/on several similar aircraft in order to obtain valid
results. This is a drawback to using these kinds of methods
for unconventional tail configurations because there are no
similar aircraft with the same tail configuration with the same
operations. The conceptual design tool valid for Vee-tail is
multidisciplinary because it encompasses both aircraft perfor-
mances and structural aspects, so Multidisciplinary Design
Optimisation (MDO) techniques are applicable. This design
practise has already been used in some other studies in the avi-
ation field. In fact, it has been applied to optimise an aircraft
design to reduce CO2 emissions24 and also to unconventional
tail configurations,25 among others.
Notwithstanding the previous studies about conceptual air-
craft design for unconventional tail configurations, there is a
crucial aspect that has not been taken into account, the regu-
lation in force. It is possible to establish a design procedure
based on the roles and the certification requirements of the
rear end surfaces. Basically, there are four criteria applicable
to tails: guarantee longitudinal and lateral-directional control-
lability in cruising conditions, have enough trim capacity to
balance the aircraft, assure the control of the aircraft if the crit-
ical engine fails and, finally, allow landing in crosswind condi-
tions.11,26 These criteria require that estimations of some
stability derivatives are made to study each condition. The sta-
bility derivatives of conventional tails can be estimated
through semi-empirical equations.27,28 Furthermore, some
studies present corrections to these classical semi-empirical
methods with the aid of CFD software.29 The drawback is that
these semi-empirical equations are restricted to conventional
tails. In addition, other techniques can be used in order to
analyse the static and dynamic behaviour of the aircraft such
as the bifurcation and continuation methods.30,31 These meth-
ods allow the designer to analyse the behaviour of the aircraft
in trim and unbalanced conditions depending on the value of
only one design parameter.
Thus, it is possible to conclude that the knowledge of the
design of a Vee-tail is not mature yet, especially the viability
of the usage of this configuration in commercial transport avi-
ation. Because of that, the goal of this paper is to include the
airworthiness regulations in force nowadays applicable to a
Vee-tailed commercial transport aeroplane in a conceptual
design tool. The schema followed by this tool is slightly differ-
ent from that which has previously been used in conceptual
design because of the lack of similar aeroplanes necessary to
build statistical methods or refine semi-empirical correlations.
First of all, a reference aircraft with a conventional tail config-
uration is selected in order to analyse its behaviour towards the
criteria proposed to be studied, static stability in cruise, con-
trolling after Critical Engine Failure (CEF), controlling in
crosswind landing, and trimming in these three conditions
Vee-tail conceptual design criteria for commercial transport aeroplanes
(cruise, climb and land). This aeroplane is taken from the Cen-
tral Reference Aircraft Data System (CeRAS) database,32
which is thought to give support to the scientific community
because it is difficult to find reliable data about commercial air-
craft. So, the database will be composed of data for several
aeroplanes from every flight segment, in order to allow the
community use of the same data, which means comparisons
between different studies will be possible. Nowadays, the data-
base contains just one aircraft: CSR-01, with similar perfor-
mances and geometry to an Airbus A320 or a Boeing 737.
Then the next step is to substitute its conventional empennage
with a Vee-tail. To do this, the Vee-tail geometry will be
defined through four design parameters: span b, root chord
cr, taper ratio k and dihedral angle C. Some previous studies
indicate that these parameters are the most relevant to the per-
formances of this kind of tail.14 Some other parameters such as
the sweep angle, twist angle or the aerofoil will be fixed a pri-
ori. In conclusion, the results of the paper will establish the
feasible design space of these parameters by applying certifica-
tion requirements for commercial aviation to Vee-tail
configuration.
2. Materials and methods
2.1. Design criteria for unconventional tail
As it has been stated previously, this study focuses on imple-
menting a new conceptual design procedure for unconven-
tional tails. To establish a set of conditions for developing
the procedure, compliance with the essential airworthiness reg-
ulations related to the flight requirements has been selected as
the starting point. The regulations applicable to commercial
transport aviation, in the case of large aeroplanes, are CS-
25,26 in case of the European Union (EU) or FAR-2533 for
the United States of America (USA). In both regulations,
the Subpart B Flight from articles 25.171 to 25.181 deal with
aircraft stability. Trim conditions are included in the same sub-
part, article 25.161. The crosswind velocities are indicated in
articles 25.233 and 25.237. Finally, the articles which deal with
aeroplane performances and controllability conditions where
the critical engine failure condition is involved are articles
25.121 and 25.147. All these articles are applicable to aircraft
tail design. From them, it is possible to extract four design cri-
teria: being longitudinally and laterally stable in cruising con-
ditions, controlling the aircraft if the critical engine fails during
climbing after taking-off, controlling the aircraft in crosswind
land and trimming capability in the three previous conditions.
The first criterion will be implemented through comparison
with the reference aircraft in terms of static stability deriva-
tives. It is established that the new unconventional tail aircraft
must be at least as statically stable as the reference aircraft in a
certain cruising condition in order to accomplish the certifica-
tion requirements. The second and the third criteria indicate
that the aircraft must be controllable after the critical engine
failure and must be able to land with 90° crosswind of 20 kn
(1 kn = 1.852 km/h) or 20% of the stall speed, whichever is
greater, but needs not exceed 25 kn. The controllability is
reached if the resultant bank angle of the aircraft is lower than
5°. In the case of this study, these manoeuvres will be carried
out without taking into account the ailerons deflections, which
are known as flat manoeuvres, in order to be conservative in
597
the results.34 In addition, the crosswind speed considered is
25 kn, which is the boundary established by regulation.
Regarding critical engine failure condition, the sideslip angle
b is one of the degrees of freedom. If the engine which fails
is on the right-hand side of the pilot position, the aeroplane
can remain in flight with negative values of sideslip angle by
using a smaller tail plane as compared with zero sideslip
angle.26 Nevertheless, the sideslip angle is not totally free
because it is constrained by the maximum bank angle admissi-
ble by certification requirements. In order to be conservative,
the aircraft will be balanced at zero sideslip angle in this con-
dition instead of selecting the sideslip angle that means the air-
craft to fly with the maximum admissible bank angle. If the
resultant bank angle is below the limit, the sideslip angle which
means the aircraft to flight at maximum admissible bank angle
would be selected. Finally, the last criterion consists in having
enough power control to balance the aircraft in every flight
condition. In the case of pitching moment, it has been consid-
ered that both trailing edge and leading edge high-lift devices
are deflected.
The aerodynamic forces and moments acting on the aero-
plane will be estimated through a combination of semi-
empirical and VLM methods. The main reason for the usage
of these methodologies is due to the fast-tool requirements
for conceptual design stages. In addition, because in future
works the aerodynamic forces distribution along the Vee-tail
will be necessary to estimate the structural weight of the sur-
face, it has been decided to estimate the aerodynamic forces
in the tail using a VLM tool by the name of Tornado.35 This
is a VLM for linear aerodynamic wing design applications in
conceptual design stages. By modelling all lifting surfaces as
thin plates, Tornado can solve most of aerodynamic deriva-
tives for a wide range of wing geometries and also estimate
aerodynamic forces distribution. With a very high computa-
tional speed, Tornado gives the user immediate feedback on
design changes, making quantitative knowledge available ear-
lier in the design process. This software is valid for subsonic
flow, but it is possible to extend its validity range to high sub-
sonic flow through the Prandtl-Glauert correction.36 More-
over, Tornado gives more reliability in the estimation of
forces than moments.35 In view of that, a combination proce-
dure of semi-empirical and VLM methods has been proposed.
The idea is to use Tornado for estimating only the force acting
on the tail. This software has already been utilized to estimate
aerodynamic force coefficients in Vee-tails and it has been
established a validity range up to 45° of dihedral angle
approximately.14,37 The rest of the terms which contribute to
aerodynamic forces and moments are estimated through the
semi-empirical methods described by Torenbeek27 because
they are well-known procedures applicable at these early
design stages for commercial transport aeroplanes. Correction
factors have been included to take into account the interfer-
ences among the tail and the fuselage, the wing and the other
tail surfaces, both in longitudinal and lateral derivatives. These
interferences have relevant contributions to aerodynamic
forces and moments.27,38–41 In the case of Vee-tail, the interfer-
ence with the fuselage has been modelled as in horizontal tails
for longitudinal forces and moments and as in vertical tail for
lateral ones. The interference among a horizontal tail and a
fuselage depends on the geometry of the part of the surface
which is inside of the fuselage.27 Thus, this same methodology
can be applied to Vee-tails. The interference among a vertical
598
tail and a fuselage depends on the vertical tail geometry.40 So,
it has been decided to consider an equivalent vertical tail
obtained by projecting the Vee-tail to the plane of symmetry
of the aircraft. This equivalent vertical tail is used as an input
to the semi-empirical estimation of the interference among
these elements, the vertical tail and the fuselage. In the case
of conventional tails, it is also possible to consider the interfer-
ence among the horizontal and vertical tail surfaces, but this
factor has not been included for Vee-tail configuration. In
addition, Tornado does not retain non-linear effects for high
deflection angles of the controls. In order to improve the reli-
ability of the results, a semi-empirical correction has been pro-
posed which consists in considering an effective control
deflection to be the actual deflection multiplied by an effective-
ness factor which depends on the deflection angle.39
Before starting with the physical-mathematical model, the
unconventional tail configuration needs to be characterised.
In the case of the Vee-tail, four geometric parameters have
been selected: span, root chord, taper ratio and dihedral angle.
The rest of the parameters necessary to fully define the config-
uration, such as sweep angle, twist angle or aerofoil geometry,
are fixed a priori because their effects are not as relevant as the
previous ones.14 In addition, the tail needs to include both
yawing and pitching controls. The geometry of these controls
will also be fixed a priori. After analysing how these controls
are implemented in actual Vee-tailed RPAS, it has been
decided to divide each half-wing control in two equal parts.
A longitudinal trailing edge control has been installed in the
inboard half of the tail and in the outboard part there is a lat-
eral control. In Fig. 1 there is a schema of how these controls
are set up. In future works, the effect of interchanging the roles
between the controls and what will suppose for the Vee-tail
design will be accomplished. Finally, the maximum deflections
considered for these controls will be based on the reference air-
craft data, assuming the yawing control deflection limits for
the Vee-tail to be the same as for the rudder of the reference
aircraft. Analogously, the maximum longitudinal control
deflection for the Vee-tailed aircraft is assumed to be the same
as for the pitching control limits of the reference aircraft.
The study of Vee-tailed aircraft will be carried out by ana-
lysing the effects of the four proposed parameters (span, root
chord, taper ratio and dihedral angle) according to the criteria
presented previously. These parameters will take values
between the limits indicated in Table 1. These boundaries have
been established based on previous studies.14 Furthermore, it is
Fig. 1 Definition of tail controls selected for pitching and
yawing and geometric variables.
A. SANCHEZ-CARMONA, C. CUERNO-REJADO
Table 1 Vee-tail geometric parameters range.
Parameter Range
Span b (m) [12, 26]
Root chord cr (m) [3.3, 4.5]
Taper ratio k [0.28, 0.36]
Dihedral angle C (°) [0, 50]
necessary to indicate some additional hypotheses. The longitu-
dinal and vertical position of the tail is the same as the hori-
zontal tail of the CSR-01. The idea is to examine how much
dihedral angle must be given to a horizontal tail in order for
it to be able to do without the vertical tail. As an initial solu-
tion to the problem, it has been decided not to change the lon-
gitudinal position of the Vee-tail because a redesign of the
fuselage rear-end would be required. The aerofoil used in the
tail is NACA 0012. Future research and optimisation processes
could result in changing the aerofoil, but for this study it has
been fixed a priori. Another initially selected parameter is the
incidence angle. On one hand, it has been considered that
the tail has no variable incidence angle because further
research is necessary to assure that this system is viable for
Vee-tails. On the other hand, in the present study, the inci-
dence angle has been set to zero and, in future extensions of
this research, a comprehensive analysis will be carried out in
order to check the effect of this parameter.
2.2. Physical-mathematical model
To carry out this study, it is necessary to make use of the lon-
gitudinal and lateral equilibrium moments equations. The
expression of longitudinal one is indicated below:
1 2 q 1
qV Sw
MAC
CmA - T  T
qV2 Sw lTH CLT þ Te ze ¼ 0 ð1Þ
2 q 2
where q is the air density, V is the aeroplane speed, Sw is the
wing area, MAC is the mean aerodynamic chord of the wing,
qT/q is the dynamic pressure ratio between tail and wing, lTH is
the tail moment arm, CLT is the tail lift coefficient, Te is the
thrust of the aircraft and ze is the vertical distance between
the thrust and the center of gravity. In Eq. (1) the coefficient
CmA - T represents the pitching moment of the aircraft eliminat-
ing the contribution of the tail. This coefficient is estimated
through semi-empirical methods.26
CL ðxcg  xac Þ
CmA - T ¼ CmTor þ Cmairfoil þ DCmHLD þ DCmfus þ
MAC
ð2Þ
where CmTor and Cmairfoil are the aircraft pitching moment contri-
butions of the twist angle distribution of the wing and the
aerofoil pitching moment coefficient, respectively; DCmHLD
and DCmfus are aircraft pitching moment contributions of the
high-lift devices and the fuselage; xcg and xac are the longitudi-
nal positions of the centre of gravity and the mean aerody-
namic chord, respectively; CL is the lift coefficient of the
aircraft.
In Eq. (2), the first term corresponds to the contribution of
the twist angle distribution of the wing and the second term to
the aerofoil pitching moment coefficient. Furthermore, it is
necessary to take into account the contribution of the high-
Vee-tail conceptual design criteria for commercial transport aeroplanes
lift devices because during climbing after taking-off and land-
ing flight conditions, these are extended. Also, a correction
corresponding to the fuselage contribution has been added.
Finally, the last term is associated to the moment generated
by the weight W, which is supposed to be balanced by the lift
of the aircraft. The lift coefficient is determined by the vertical
axis forces equation:
1 2
qV Sw CL ¼ W
2 terms in Eq. (6) dependent on the aircraft without tail effects
In order to reach the necessary lift coefficient CL extracted
from Eq. (3), it is necessary to determine the angle of attack a
and the longitudinal control deflection dsym and also accom-
plish the longitudinal moment equilibrium equation. The
dependency of the lift coefficient with these parameters and
with the high-lift devices deflection can be estimated as follows:
q in the last term of the previous equation. The value of the lat-
CL ¼ CLA - T ðaÞ þ DCLHLD ðdf Þ þ T CLT ða; dsym Þ ð4Þ
q
In Eq. (4), the dependencies of each term are indicated,
where the lift coefficient without tail contribution CLA - T only
depends on the angle of attack. The contribution of the
high-lift devices DCLHLD depends only on the flap deflection
df, in first approximation, and the lift coefficient of the tail
CLT depends on the deflection of the control dsym and also
of the angle of attack a. It is remarkable that the angle of
attack of the tail does not have to be the same as the angle
of attack of main wing because of the downwash gradient
caused by the wing situated upstream of the tail. The down-
wash deflection depends on the angle of attack of the main
wing and has been modelled according to classical semi-
empirical methods.27 The lift coefficient of the aircraft without
tail contribution and the increment of lift coefficient generated
by flap deflections are both calculated through classical semi-
empirical methods.27 Thus, taking into account the angle of
attack of the tail and the control deflection, the tail lift coeffi-
cient can be estimated using the Tornado software. To sum up,
the final system of equations to be solved is
8


< 1
qV2 Sw CLA - T ðaÞ þ DCLHLD ðdf Þ þ qqT CLT ða; dsym Þ ¼ W
2
: 1 qV2 S
MAC
C
mA - T ðaÞ  q
2 qV Sw lTH CLT ða; dsym Þ þ Te ze ¼ 0
qT 1 2
w
2 Assuming that the bank angle is low, it is possible to simplify
?>The unknowns in Eq. (5) are the angle of attack and the
longitudinal control deflection. They cannot be solved analyt-
ically because the terms dependent on the tail are calculated by
means of Tornado. Hence, it has been decided to solve the sys-
tem through a Newton method. So, it is necessary to compute
the Jacobian matrix of the system, which is estimated using a
finite differences scheme. Note that a positive deflection of
Fig. 2 Forces in aircraft when flying with bank angle.
599
the elevator is considered if it generates a nose-down pitching
manoeuvre of the aircraft.
Following this, the development of the yawing equilibrium
moment equation has been carried out. The final expression is
1 2 1
qV Sw bw CnA - T  qV2 Sw lT CYT þ Te ye ¼ 0 ð6Þ
2 2
where bw is the wing span and ye is the lateral distance between
ð3Þ the critical engine and the aircraft plane of symmetry. The
CnA - T have been estimated using semi-empirical approxima-
tions and the contribution of the tail to lateral force CYT has
been estimated using Tornado. The main contribution to the
lateral moment of the aircraft CnA - T is generated by the fuse-
lage and its value depends on the sideslip angle. The moment
caused by the failure of the critical engine is taken into account
eral force acting at the tail needs to balance this equation. This
force can be varied by modifying the lateral control deflection
dasym. The sign criterion of the asymmetric control deflection is
taken as positive if it generates positive yaw moment. To meet
the regulations in force, once the aircraft is balanced laterally,
it is necessary to assure that the aircraft does not reach a bank
angle higher than 5°, both in critical engine failure and cross-
wind landing conditions. Fig. 2 shows the forces acting in the
aircraft when flying with bank angle /.
Thus, the lateral forces equilibrium equation is
W V2
YA - T þ W sin / ¼ YT þ
cos / ð7Þ
g R
and the vertical forces one is
W V2
L ¼ W cos / þ
sin / ð8Þ
g R
Again, the lateral force generated by the aircraft without
taking into account tail contribution YA-T is calculated
through semi-empirical methods. This term has two contribu-
tions: fuselage and dihedral angle of wing, which also depend
on the sideslip angle b. The term YT is the lateral force gener-
ated by the tail and R is the turning radius of the manoeuvre.
ð5Þ the equation, and the final expression for the bank angle is as
follows:
qffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi
YT  YA - T
/¼  ðYT  YA - T Þ2  4ð1  L=WÞ ð9Þ
W
Finally, the static cruising stability properties of the aircraft
will be characterised through two parameters: Cma and Cnb.
The first one represents the static longitudinal stability beha-
viour and the second one the static lateral stability one. These
600
parameters are going to be studied in cruising condition and
compared with the reference aircraft. The way to calculate
them is easy once the moment equations are known, pitching
and yawing respectively. The Cma is calculated by deriving this
equation from the angle of attack around the point which bal-
ances the aircraft. Because the tail contribution is estimated by
Tornado, the derivative is calculated numerically. The same
procedure can be applied to the computation of Cnb, but using
the lateral moments equation and deriving from the sideslip
angle.
3. Reference aircraft
3.1. Repository data
First of all, it is necessary to characterise the reference aircraft
in order to carry out the goals of this paper. As it has been
mentioned in the Introduction, the reference aircraft will be
the only aeroplane included in the CeRAS repository: the
CSR-01. There, it is possible to find a wide range of informa-
tion about its geometry, weights and performances. This infor-
mation is necessary for applying the semi-empirical methods
described in Section 2.42 Table 2 includes the main parameters
obtained from the CeRAS repository used in this study, and
Fig. 3 shows the planform geometry of the wing. Additionally,
the repository also includes information about polar curves
depending on the Mach number. These data are useful for esti-
mating the necessary thrust for each flight condition in order
to maintain a constant cruise speed.
Table 2 Parameters of CSR-01 airplane.42
Parameter Value
Wing area Sw (m2) 122.40
Wing span bw (m) 12.46
Mean aerodynamic chord MAC (m) 3.46
Vertical distance of thrust axis ze (m) 1.32
Lateral distance of critical engine ye (m) 5 representative one for a middle point of the route and takes
Horizontal tail moment arm lTH (m) 17.57
Vertical tail moment arm lTV (m) 16.88
One-engine-failure thrust Te (kN) 117
Aerodynamic centre position xac/MAC (%) 28.6
Centre of gravity at take-off xcgTO/MAC (%) 30
Centre of gravity at land xcgL/MAC (%) 31.75
Fig. 3 CSR-01 wing planform.
A. SANCHEZ-CARMONA, C. CUERNO-REJADO
3.2. Additional data
There are some necessary data about the CSR-01 that are not
included in the database repository, for instance the maximum
deflections of the controls. These limits have been estimated
using data from similar aircraft. In this case, a flight controls
document about A320 has been used as a reference,43 which
indicates that the elevator deflection de is in the range [17°,
30°]. These boundaries must not be exceeded when longitudi-
nal trimming of the aeroplane is reached by the methodology
presented in the previous section. In this case, the design is
not feasible. On the other hand, the maximum rudder deflec-
tion depends on the flight speed, since the regulation indicates
that the maximum force applied by the pilot must be lower
than 667 N.26 The maximum rudder deflection dr extracted
from the same document is represented in Fig. 4. This limit
applies when the aircraft must be balanced laterally. In this
study, there are two conditions: after critical engine failure
after taking-off and at crosswind landing. The first occurs at
the minimum control speed, which is 13% higher than the stall
speed at 1 g. Therefore, the minimum control speed is approx-
imately 94 m/s and, consequently, the maximum rudder deflec-
tion is 18°. On the other hand, at landing the speed is supposed
to be equal to 1.23 times the stall speed at 1 g. In this condi-
tion, the maximum control deflection is 25°.
According to the described methodology, there is a limita-
tion in the cruising condition introduced by Tornado. It is not
possible to select a transonic condition for determining the sta-
tic stability derivatives. Because of this, the flight manoeuvring
envelope has been analysed depending on the flight altitude.
The manoeuvring speed (VA) has been selected as the cruise
speed at the altitude where the Mach number Ma is 0.6. The
result of this analysis is that the chosen altitude is 22000 ft
(1ft = 30.48 cm). Finally, it is also necessary to estimate the
aerofoil moment coefficient in order to apply the methodology
to the CSR-01. This contribution is estimated with the aid of
X-Foil tool.44 The weight for this condition is obtained as a
the value of 66600 kg. Of course, in this condition the flaps
are retracted so the corresponding terms in the procedure are
neglected. Additionally, the tail incidence angle has been con-
sidered as constant and has been fixed to 0.1° based on
repository information. Finally, the interference factors con-
sidered for CSR-01 are the following: fuselage/tail surfaces,
wing/tail surfaces and horizontal/vertical tails.
Fig. 4 CSR-01 maximum rudder deflection estimation.
Vee-tail conceptual design criteria for commercial transport aeroplanes
3.3. Comparison of methodology
A comparison process has been carried out to analyse the reli-
ability of the procedure combining semi-empirical and compu-
tational methods. The comparison has been made using
Tornado, Torenbeek’s method and a combination of both as
proposed in the present work. The reference aeroplane with
conventional geometry has been selected. It is supposed that
Torenbeek’s method is adequate for the conceptual design
stages because it has been used in many studies and principally
for commercial aviation. Two flight conditions have been
selected: cruising flight at VA and climbing flight after
taking-off. Torenbeek’s method consists of the procedure
stated previously but also estimates the tail lift with semi-
empirical equations, like the main wing. As it has been indi-
cated, the performances of the aerofoils have been modelled
with the aid of X-Foil software. Tornado’s procedure has been
computed by introducing the main wing and tail geometries
into the software as it is not possible to consider the effects
introduced by the fuselage. The results for moment coefficient
have been modified in order to take into account the aerody-
namic moment of the aerofoils, a term that Tornado does
not compute. Finally, the proposed combined methodology
consists of estimating the force acting on the tail with Tornado
and the rest of the terms with Torenbeek’s method, as it has
already been explained. Fig. 5 shows the results for the two
flight conditions studied. On viewing the graphs, Tornado’s
results do not follow the curves extracted by Torenbeek’s
method, which is the reference. As a result of this, it has been
Fig. 5 Comparison between Tornado, Torenbeek and proposed
method in cruising flight at VA and climbing flight.
601
decided not to estimate the aerodynamic forces and moment of
the complete aeroplane with Tornado. Finally, when the pro-
posed method is analysed, the results change substantially.
They present more reliability for lift coefficient estimation. In
fact, both curves, from Torenbeek’s and proposed methods,
are almost overlapped. If cruising condition at VA is examined,
for which the lift coefficient is approximately 0.5, the angle of
attack necessary for reaching that lift coefficient presents a
deviation of 0.14% with respect to Torenbeek’s method.
The same comparison can be made for climbing flight and
the deviation is 0.25%. By analysing the moment curves, it
is possible to see that in the case of low airspeed, the proposed
method better follows the results obtained with Torenbeek’s
method than for the high subsonic condition. In fact, studying
the lift coefficient necessary for flying in climbing condition,
the variation of the pitching coefficient with respect to Toren-
beek’s method is 1.8%, but the deviation in cruising flight is
around 12%. Thus, it is possible to conclude that the com-
bined method proposed in this paper is better than using only
a VLM for the full aircraft and is very similar to Torenbeek’s
method, especially in the case of low subsonic airspeeds.
Another comparison has been performed in order to anal-
yse if non-linear effects for high angles of control deflection
dc are retained with the hypothesis considered in the proposed
methodology in this paper. It has been carried on by estimat-
ing the lift coefficient at zero angle of attack and varying the
trailing-edge control deflection through four procedures: two
semi-empirical methods, which are Torenbeek’s method and
Roskam’s method,39 Tornado and the combination of Ros-
kam’s method and Tornado (proposed method). The results
are shown in Fig. 6. It is possible to see that Tornado estimates
the lift coefficient linearly for the whole range of control deflec-
tion values. However, both Roskam’s and Torenbeek’s meth-
ods consider that the control effectiveness is lower for high
control deflection angles. So the hypothesis to use an effective
angle of control deflection as input for Tornado software
obtained to multiply the actual value by the effectiveness of
the control included in Roskam’s methodology is an improve-
ment to Tornado’s aerodynamic coefficients estimation. In
fact, the differences between the proposed method and Ros-
kam’s or Torenbeek’s methods are under 10% in the range
of angles studied.
Fig. 6 Comparison of control derivatives between Torenbeek,
Roskam, Tornado and proposed method for zero angle of attack.
602
3.4. Application of design criteria to reference aeroplane
The three scenarios considered are tested using data from the
reference aircraft. The first scenario is the cruising flight. In
this case, only the equations for longitudinal moments and ver-
tical forces (Eq. (5)) are used. First of all, it is necessary to esti-
mate the lift coefficient and the moment coefficient of the
CSR-01 eliminating the contribution of the tail and depending
on the angle of attack. As it has been indicated previously,
these coefficients have been obtained using semi-empirical
methods and the results are as follows: CLA - T ¼ 0:1812 þ
4:876a; CmA - T ¼ 0:073002 þ 0:0719a. The contribution of
the horizontal stabiliser is very important especially with
respect to the pitching moment coefficient. In fact, when the
tail is considered, the sign of the Cma changes, so the aircraft
becomes stable. The thrust contribution to the pitching
moment equation is obtained with the aid of the polar curve
included in CeRAS documentation, for the flight conditions
of this case. Once all the necessary data are estimated, the
system of equations is solved. Table 3 shows the results for
the angle of attack and the elevator deflection. The values of
elevator deflections are between the limits established by the
control system. Furthermore, the static stability derivative
estimated around this point is: Cma ¼ 2:493.
The yawing moment coefficient of the aircraft, without the
contribution of the tail, is estimated using Torenbeek’s
method: CnA - T ¼ 0:1396b. Now it is possible to estimate
the lateral-directional static stability: Cnb ¼ 0:1590. This has
been obtained through equation of equilibrium of yawing
moments, with no deflection of the rudder and no sideslip
angle. By analysing the results for both static stability deriva-
tives, it is possible to conclude that the tail accomplishes its
role, as the aircraft becomes stable when the contribution of
the tail is taken into account. These values are also relevant
because it is supposed that the aircraft presents adequate sta-
bility behaviour in cruising flight with this tail geometry. Thus,
the Vee-tail needs to reach at least these static stability values
in order to assure similar stability behaviour to the reference
aircraft.
The procedure for the other two flight conditions, climbing
and landing, is analogous. The results for balancing the air-
craft longitudinally are included in Table 3. In these cases,
the flaps are extended with deflections of 10° for climbing
and 35° for landing, and the slats are extended with deflections
of 15° and 25° respectively. In addition, the thrust considered
in the first case is the maximum at take-off, and in the second
case it is zero, because it is a case included in the certification
requirements. Again, it is possible to see that the values of
pitching control deflections fall into the feasible range of the
control. After that, the aircraft needs to be balanced laterally
Table 3 Trimming angles of CSR-01.
Phase Cruise Climb Land
Angle of attack a (°) 3.6 2.2 0.6
Elevator deflection de (°) 3.2 0.17 0.7
Rudder deflection dr (°) 7.6 12.1
Bank angle / (°) 2.5 2.8
A. SANCHEZ-CARMONA, C. CUERNO-REJADO
because of the asymmetric thrust or the crosswind condition
respectively. For both conditions, it is necessary to estimate
the lateral force coefficient of the aircraft eliminating the tail
contribution. The coefficient depends on the sideslip angle as
follows: CYA - T ¼ 0:1893b. In the case of the failure of the
critical engine, the aeroplane has remained in flight without
sideslip angle, as it has been commented previously. On the
other hand, the crosswind landing condition supposes a side-
slip angle of 11°, considering 25 kn of crosswind at 90°. The
value of rudder deflection needs to be between the limits of
the control system, which is accomplished according to
Fig. 3. The results obtained for both lateral conditions are
included in Table 3.
4. Results
4.1. Pitching moment trimming
First of all, the necessary deflection of symmetric control for
each flight condition is analysed. To do this, the equations in
Eq. (5) must be solved. Since the tail does not contribute
greatly to the lift of the aircraft, only around 10%, the angles
of attack obtained in all the combinations of geometric param-
eters for the different Vee-tails for each flight condition are
almost the same. The resultant angles of attack are around
3.6° for cruising condition, 0.6° for landing and 1.9° for climb-
ing. In fact, the differences between the values for each combi-
nation of geometric parameters are under 0.5%. On the other
hand, the deflection of the symmetric control has more
remarkable differences. According to the hypothesis explained
previously, the control needs to be deflected down in order to
balance the aircraft longitudinally in the three flight condi-
tions. This means that without any deflection there is too much
downward lift on the tail to balance the aircraft longitudinally
in the cruising condition. If the tail dihedral angle increases,
this excess of lift is lower because the tail lifts less for the same
angle, concretely it is reduced to the cosine squared of the dihe-
dral angle.37 Thus, the control deflection necessary to balance
the aircraft decreases with higher dihedral angles. This is
shown graphically in Fig. 7(a). Additionally, this same beha-
viour is extracted from the other two flight conditions: climb-
ing and landing. The results are shown in Figs. 7(b) and (c)
respectively.
The behaviour of the control deflection with changes in
root chord is more complex to explain. First of all, it is impor-
tant to highlight that in order to balance the aircraft, each tail
needs to generate the same lift while considering the same flight
condition. From now on this tail lift will be referred to as goal
tail lift. Obviously, the goal tail lift depends on the flight con-
dition. Considering the same flight condition, what changes
between different tail geometries is the necessary control
deflection. Therefore, the root chord of the tail affects the
moment arm and the tail area. This supposes that for the same
angle of attack, higher values of root chord suppose lower val-
ues of tail lift coefficient to reach the goal tail lift. In addition,
the root chord also affects the aspect ratio of the surface,
reducing its lift curve slope for higher values of root chord.
However, there is also an increase in the value of the pitching
control derivative. These two effects come into conflict but the
second one is more pronounced. Thus, finally the control
Vee-tail conceptual design criteria for commercial transport aeroplanes 603

Fig. 7 Analysis of effect of span (b), root chord (cr) and taper ratio (k) varying dihedral angle C of Vee-tail in symmetric control
deflection for longitudinal trimming in cruising, climbing and landing conditions.

deflection necessary to balance the aircraft becomes lower. It is possible to apply analogous reasoning to explain the
This behaviour can be seen in Fig. 7 for each flight condition effect of varying the tail taper ratio. Increasing the taper ratio
studied in this paper. supposes an increase in the area and the lift curve slope
604
because the aspect ratio augments too. However, in this case
the power control derivative barely changes. Hence, if the area
and the slope are slightly higher, the necessary deflection to
reach the goal tail lift must be higher too. In spite of that,
the effect of the taper ratio is not very strong, as it possible
to see in Fig. 7.
However, the behaviour with span changes is different
between climb and cruise, on one side, and land, on the other.
In climbing and cruising conditions, the equilibrium lift coeffi-
cient of the tail is quite different than in the other two cases
due to the effect of the thrust. The thrust generates a pitching
moment that aids the aircraft to balance. This means that the
goal tail lift in these conditions is different than in the landing
condition; in fact, the sign is not the same in both cases. On the
other hand, increasing the span supposes that the tail lift curve
slope will also increase. Consequently, the tail lift coefficient is
higher, in absolute value, for the same angle of attack. So in
order to reduce the tail lift to obtain the goal tail lift, in the
case of negative lift, it is necessary to reduce the control deflec-
tion; and in the case of positive lift, it is necessary to increase it.
Thus, for climbing and cruising conditions, increasing tail span
implies that the symmetric control deflection increases too. On
the other hand, increasing tail span in landing condition sup-
poses that the necessary control deflection becomes lower. This
is shown schematically in Fig. 8.
4.2. Static stability at cruising condition
In this section, the static stability derivatives are analysed at
cruising condition. The results are shown in Fig. 9, for longitu-
dinal and lateral derivatives respectively. In Fig. 9 the results
of the derivatives for the reference aircraft in the same condi-
tions are indicated by dashed lines. The Vee-tail aircraft must
be at least as stable as the reference aircraft. Thus, in the case
of longitudinal stability, the possible design zone is situated
under the horizontal line called in the legend as Cma ref.
Fig. 8 Schematic of qualitative behaviour of symmetric control
deflection to balance aircraft with changes in tail span in three
different flight conditions.
A. SANCHEZ-CARMONA, C. CUERNO-REJADO
However, for lateral stability, the feasible design field sits
above the horizontal line called in the legend as Cnb ref. As
expected, increasing the tail’s area supposes more stability.
The effect of augmenting the tail dihedral angle is beneficial
for lateral stability, but it is detrimental for longitudinal stabil-
ity. For instance, in the case of 20 m of span in the first graph
of Figs. 9(a) and (b), the static longitudinal stability restricts
the dihedral angle from being higher than approximately 45°
and the lateral stability from being higher than 40°. This means
that the static longitudinal stability is an upper restriction to
dihedral angle and the static lateral stability is a lower one.
4.3. Yawing moment trimming at critical engine failure condition
In this condition, the asymmetric control deflection required to
null the moment generated by the engine failure introduces a
new restriction to the design. The results are shown in
Fig. 10. The boundary fixed by the maximum control deflec-
tion is marked with the horizontal line called in the legend as
ddasymMAX. The maximum deflection was determined by the
reference aircraft and takes the value of 18°. This restriction
supposes a lower limit to the dihedral angle, because for lower
dihedral angle the necessary deflection is higher than the max-
imum admissible. Again, if the area of the tail increases, this
restriction allows the design of tails with lower dihedral angles.
The last result to be analysed for this flight condition is the
bank angle, which has been calculated for all the cases where
the maximum control deflection was not achieved. This angle
depends on the lateral force generated by the tail. As the force
to be balanced is always the same, the thrust of one engine, the
necessary tail force is always the same too. Therefore, theoret-
ically, the resultant bank angle is equal to that obtained for the
reference aircraft: 3.1°. However, the resultant bank angles
vary between 2.7° and 3.0°. This is caused by the imprecisions
made by the Tornado software and also by the mathematical
method used to find the control deflection. In spite of that,
every configuration meets the regulations in force, which
allows a maximum bank angle of 5°.
4.4. Yawing moment trimming at crosswind landing condition
At crosswind landing condition, the necessary asymmetric control
deflection required to balance the aircraft laterally has been deter-
mined by solving Eq. (6) for each geometric parameters’ combi-
nation for the Vee-tail. The results are pictured in Fig. 11. The
maximum deflection of the control according to landing speed
of this condition is also represented in this figure. This boundary
is estimated using data from the CeRAS aircraft, as explained
previously, and takes the value of 25°. It is both upper and lower
limit because it corresponds both to maximum positive and neg-
ative deflections. Fig. 11 shows that the maximum negative con-
trol deflection is hardly reached by any parameter combination.
However, the maximum positive deflection bounds the dihedral
angle as a lower limit. The behaviour of the control deflection
with changes in dihedral angle is as follows: for low dihedral
angles the vertical projection of the tail is small enough to need
high positive deflections of the asymmetric control in order to bal-
ance the aircraft. On the other hand, for high dihedral angles, the
vertical tail projection is too big in order to balance the aircraft
with maximum negative deflection of the asymmetric control.
Vee-tail conceptual design criteria for commercial transport aeroplanes 605

Fig. 9 Analysis of effect of span, root chord and taper ratio varying dihedral angle of Vee-tail in longitudinal and lateral static stability
in cruising condition.

Fig. 10 Analysis of effect of span, root chord and taper ratio varying dihedral angle of Vee-tail in asymmetric control deflection for
lateral balancing with critical engine failure in climbing conditions.
606
Fig. 11 Analysis of effect of span, root chord and taper ratio varying dihedral angle of Vee-tail in asymmetric control deflection for
lateral balancing at crosswind landing conditions.
5. Discussion
On viewing the results obtained for each flight condition, it is
possible to compile them in order to analyse which restriction
is active depending on the combination of the design parame-
ters. First of all, it has been seen that longitudinal trimming
does not introduce any limitation to the Vee-tail design. Only
the case of trimming in the landing condition supposes a con-
trol deflection near to the maximum, and only for lowest tail
areas. This means that the longitudinal control power is exces-
sive, so a redesign of longitudinal tail control is necessary. In
this case study, the longitudinal control spanned half of the tail
and 25% of the chord. Hence, one possibility is to reduce its
span or the percentage of chord. Another variable to take into
account is the trim incidence angle. In this study, it has been
fixed at zero, but a refined design will select an angle that sup-
poses not to deflect the longitudinal control to trim the aircraft
longitudinally for a cruising design condition. The drawback
of this is that the design flight condition is Ma > 0.6, which
would require the designer to use another aerodynamic model.
Also, a variable tail incidence angle system could be considered
for the Vee-tail. In spite of these improvements changing the
results, it has been shown that longitudinal trimming is not a
determining problem when designing a Vee-tail.
However, it is now necessary to discuss the stability deriva-
tives results for cruising condition and asymmetric control
deflection for one engine failure during climbing and crosswind
landing conditions. In these cases, the established boundaries
are eventually reached, so all of them introduce some kind
of restriction to the design. Thus, it is possible to determine
the relation between the design parameters at the boundary.
The proposed problem has four degrees of freedom: span, root
chord, taper ratio and dihedral angle, and each active restric-
tion reduces in one degree the freedom of the problem. There-
fore, the equations of the boundaries have three degrees of
freedom. Because all the restrictions are represented by
inequalities, each of these three-dimensional surfaces will
divide the design space into two subspaces, in one of which
the solution will be possible, but in the others it will not. This
means that one of the initial degrees of freedom could be
A. SANCHEZ-CARMONA, C. CUERNO-REJADO
chosen as the dependent variable. By choosing the dihedral
angle, the dependency of this variable along the boundaries
with the other three parameters is presented. Fig. 12 includes
the resultant boundaries in the design space when static stabil-
ity in cruising conditions and critical engine failure are applied.
The figure shows that the longitudinal static stability restric-
tion is an upper boundary to the dihedral angle and the lateral
static stability one is a lower boundary, as stated previously.
Moreover, the critical engine failure during climbing restric-
tion represents a lower boundary too. However, this boundary
is inactive because lateral static stability is more restrictive.
This establishes the possible design space between the two
curves defined by stability restrictions. This space becomes
wider when higher root chords are considered. The fact that
critical engine failure restriction is not active indicates that
the hypothesis about the size of the asymmetric control has
been too conservative. The size could be selected such as the
associated boundary will move to reduce the distance to the
curve defined by the lateral static stability derivative. However,
it is necessary to study the crosswind landing condition before-
hand as it would be more restrictive than controlling the air-
craft after critical engine failure one for the asymmetric
control redesign.
Analogously, the crosswind landing condition can be anal-
ysed in the same way. As it has been explained previously,
there are two boundaries introduced by this restriction. The
lower limit is generated by the positive maximum deflection
of the asymmetric control. The restriction obtained through
this condition is inactive, because lateral static stability in
cruise is more critical. In fact, the crosswind landing condition
is even less restrictive than controlling after critical engine fail-
ure. The results are shown in Fig. 13. However, the upper limit
appears when the maximum negative control deflection is
reached. As it can be seen in Fig. 13, this restriction is active
only for the highest root chord considered and the higher val-
ues of span.
The results obtained for crosswind landing condition indi-
cate that the procedure to redesign the asymmetric control
needs to be applied to critical engine failure condition. This
could be concluded because the boundary associated with
Vee-tail conceptual design criteria for commercial transport aeroplanes 607

Fig. 12 Design space taking into account cruising static stability, both longitudinal (Cma label) and lateral (Cnb label), and balancing
aircraft after critical engine failure (CEF label).

Fig. 13 Design space taking into account cruising static stability, both longitudinal (Cma label) and lateral (Cnb label), and balancing
aircraft in crosswind landing conditions, for maximum negative deflection of control (CwL MAX label) and maximum positive deflection
(CwL MIN label).

the crosswind landing condition is below the curve associated
to critical engine failure condition, resulting in a bigger control
for critical engine failure condition. Thus, Fig. 14(a) represents
the minimum span basym of the asymmetric control in order to
accomplish with controlling after critical engine failure with-
out converting this restriction to an active one. This means
that with the size obtained through this procedure, the critical
engine failure curve is overlapping the lateral static stability
boundary. The redesign has been implemented by simply
changing the percentage of span which has a trailing edge
device, as it is indicated in Fig. 14(b). The percentage of chord
has been maintained equal to 25%. The corresponding control
sizes represented in Fig. 14(a) are referred to the quarter span,
which was the previous span of the asymmetric control. Thus,
the necessary control size is between 62% and 84%, depending
on the tail geometry, of the size considered in the initial
hypotheses.
The last step is to analyse what happens in crosswind
landing condition with this new yawing control definition.
Currently, the size of the asymmetric control for each
608 A. SANCHEZ-CARMONA, C. CUERNO-REJADO

Fig. 14 Minimum asymmetric control size (basym) referred to previous control size (b/4) to assure that critical engine failure boundary is
on lateral static stability in cruise one and definition of parameter basym.

Fig. 15 Final design space imposing critical engine failure for maximum deflection on lateral static stability in cruise and static stability
in cruising and crosswind landing restrictions (The feasible design space is shaded for cr ¼ 3:3 m and k ¼ 0:28).

combination of geometrical parameters is the result obtained
in Fig. 14. The analysis is focused on the upper limit because
the lower limit is less restrictive than the lower limit for critical
engine failure, as it has been seen previously. This upper
restriction is presented in Fig. 15 in conjunction with the other
active restrictions. It is possible to see that, with this control
size, the crosswind landing condition becomes active and
bounds the space design in maximum dihedral angles. In order
to clarify which is the feasible design space for each Vee-tail
geometry, Fig. 15 represents this space in the case of
cr ¼ 3:3 m and k ¼ 0:28 by shading this region. Of course, if
the asymmetric control is bigger than the considered, the crit-
ical engine failure restriction becomes inactive and the cross-
wind landing one moves upwards so it is less restrictive. On
the other hand, if the control span is lower, the critical engine
failure condition becomes more restrictive than lateral static
stability in cruising condition, and crosswind landing curve
goes down, so the design space is more reduced.
6. Conclusions
(1) In this paper, an analysis of the application of classical
design criteria to an unconventional tail configuration
has been presented. These classical criteria are based
on certification aspects such as static stability, and air-
craft control after critical engine failure or in crosswind
landing conditions. The study is focused on the Vee-tail
Vee-tail conceptual design criteria for commercial transport aeroplanes
configuration, which has been modelled through four
design parameters: span, root chord, taper ratio and
dihedral angle.
(2) The analysis has established the feasible design space
according to the aforementioned criteria. The dihedral
angle has been considered as dependent on the other
three variables, so the conclusions obtained are that lon-
gitudinal static stability is an upper limit to dihedral
angle, but lateral static stability is a lower one. The crit-
ical engine failure is also a lower boundary to dihedral
angle. Finally, the crosswind landing condition intro-
duces two more boundaries, lower and upper limits
respectively.
(3) Furthermore, some restrictions to pitching and yawing
controls have been determined. The initial hypothesis
was to divide the tail surface in two halves along semi
span such as the inboard part with trailing edge device
used as longitudinal control and the outboard part
which has a trailing edge device as directional-lateral
control. This hypothesis is based on the Vee-tail config-
urations used in the RPAS field, in which the number of
aeroplanes with this kind of tail is greater than in other
aeroplane categories.
(4) It has been demonstrated that the longitudinal control
has enough capability to balance the aircraft in climb
after taking-off, cruising and landing conditions.
Despite this, deeper studies should be developed in order
to optimise the longitudinal control size for assuring
controllability in non-stationary manoeuvres.
(5) On the other hand, the yawing control is oversized when
the design criteria considered in this study are analysed.
Thus, it is possible to determine the minimum size of this
control in order to make the boundary introduced by
critical engine failure to be as restrictive as the lateral
static stability one. This minimum control span is
around 20% and 35% lower than that in the initial
hypothesis. When considering this asymmetric control
span, the upper boundary introduced by crosswind land-
ing condition becomes active and consequently, the
design space is more reduced. In spite of that, the feasi-
ble design space includes the typical dihedral angles
installed in Vee-tailed RPAS.
(6) From the standpoint of the methodology presented in
this study, it is possible to conclude that Tornado does
not retain non-linear effects caused by high control
deflection angles nor does it estimate any interference
among the elements of the aircraft. Because of that, it
has been demonstrated that a combination of semi-
empirical design methodologies and Tornado improves
the fidelity of the results. The semi-empirical methodolo-
gies allows to take into account in the procedure inter-
ference factors, non-linear effects, aerodynamic forces
and moments generated by the main wing.
The results obtained in this paper are the first step towards
developing an optimisation design tool for unconventional tail
configurations. In future research, an objective function to be
optimised in the final design space established in this paper will
be selected. This goal function would be the tail drag, its
weight, or even a combination of these two. In response to this,
MDO techniques will be used to solve this problem.
609
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