Aircraft Design Textbooks

Gudmundsson is one of the best for general light aircraft design, so if that is what you are into its definitely worth it.
 
Alas, nobody mentioned K.D. Wood's "Aerospace Vehicle Design" which was our basic textbook in school, long long ago. It's very accessible and more comprehensive than people give it credit for. My own copy got water damaged so I think I must have pitched it years back, but then again I ended up on a career path that was more about repairing structures than designing them, and then morphed into analysis of military aircraft operations rather than designing anything at all.
 
stever_sl said:
Alas, nobody mentioned K.D. Wood's "Aerospace Vehicle Design" which was our basic textbook in school, long long ago. It's very accessible and more comprehensive than people give it credit for. My own copy got water damaged so I think I must have pitched it years back, but then again I ended up on a career path that was more about repairing structures than designing them, and then morphed into analysis of military aircraft operations rather than designing anything at all.
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I just got my copy of it this week. Thanks for recommending it. I am always on the lookout for good design books. In this case, to me it feels more like a good reference, but if you are looking for design philosophy and depth in the topic, this book is not the book you will want to get first. There is actually a fair amount on helicopters as well as quite a bit of tibits of hard to find data that make it useful. It will have a place in my bookshelf, but there are others that I would reach to first.
 
Not a classical text box, but rather a collection of different design projects with the steps required to come to a solution. Easy to understand and to reproduce. Therefore quite useful when playing around with a hobby design, before starting to dig deeper with the classical text books:


Aircraft Design Projects - for engineering students
by
Lloyd R. Jenkinson
James F. Marchman III
 
Aircraft Design
by
Edward H. Heinemann
Rosario Rausa
K.E. Van Every

Copyright 1985 by The National Nautical & Aviation Publishing Co. of America, Inc.
ISBN: 0-933852-15-0

Yes, THAT Ed Heinemann...

Brilliant overview and introduction to the process of aircraft design. Not a textbook per se, but an excellent intro to basic design principles (and great A-4M cover art!).

Highly recommended...

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If you're ambitious and planning on actually making a plane, get the Federal Aviation Regulations, Parts 23 and 43. Part 23 is what it takes to build a certifiable aircraft, 43 is how to fix it.
 
Scott Kenny said:
If you're ambitious and planning on actually making a plane, get the Federal Aviation Regulations, Parts 23 and 43. Part 23 is what it takes to build a certifiable aircraft, 43 is how to fix it.
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Like almost everything else these days, its available online. The new FAA DRS site is a little clunkier than the old RGL site. Look under Regulations: https://drs.faa.gov/browse
 
Mugs914 said:
Aircraft Design
by
Edward H. Heinemann
Rosario Rausa
K.E. Van Every

Copyright 1985 by The National Nautical & Aviation Publishing Co. of America, Inc.
ISBN: 0-933852-15-0

Yes, THAT Ed Heinemann...

Brilliant overview and introduction to the process of aircraft design. Not a textbook per se, but an excellent intro to basic design principles (and great A-4M cover art!).

Highly recommended...

View attachment 701098
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I'm happy to have that on one of my shelves - clear, clean and simple, and by achieving that elegantly sophisticated!
 
Aeroengineer1 said:
The Design of the Aeroplane by Darrol Stinton is a good one. Also there are a few books written by Pazmany that are also very good.
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Does anyone know how (much) this differs from "The Anatomy of the Aeroplane" (a great resource as well) by the same author?
 
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martinbayer said:
Does anyone know how (much) this differs from "The Anatomy of the Aeroplane" (a great resource as well) by the same author?
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I found a copy of this book that you mentioned online and compared. They are definitely different books. It seems that the book that you reference has a higher focus on high speed aircraft, including some concepts of stealth. The Design of the Aeroplane has more of a low speed focus, and light aircraft. Both good books. Thanks for mentioning this second one!
 
Darrol Stinton also wrote "Flying Qualities and Flight Testing of the Airplane", which is full of good case studies. I have all three of this books.
 
martinbayer said:
Does anyone know how (much) this differs from "The Anatomy of the Aeroplane" (a great resource as well) by the same author?
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It reuses some of the same material but has plenty of different bits as well. Worth it if it's cheap.
 
Aeroengineer1 said:
Aircraft Structures by Peery is also a very nice structures book that can be had cheap. Do not get the second ed, get the reprint of the first. The second ed removed on the order of 100+ pages and did not give any real additions. Not worth it.

All the books @coanda mentioned are fantastic, though Bruhn is a bit of a pain to get through as it has no Index or Table of Contents. There are some that have been created by others that overcome this limitation.

The Air Force Stress Manual is great as well.

Machinery's Handbook is a great references as well. Particularly around threads, fits, and many other misc topics. I have met many design engineers that just think that it is for machinists, but it is a very concise reference.

Mil-Hdbk-5 and -17 for materials properties for metallic and composite properties. These are great if you are in a company that cannot invest a lot of money on materials properties and need certified properties that can be used. Unfortunately they are now held under a commercial consortium to maintain and -5 went to MMPDS and each subsequent release gets a higher dash number increment. CHM-17 is the replacement for -17.

The Practical Galvanic Series is also a fantastic reference. It is better than most large companies and their data that I have found in many cases.
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Bruhn & Peery were my top notch "real life" references when I started an aerostructures engineer (after a 5 years university course in this field). MIlHDBK 5, 17 of course and Lockheed Stress Memo and other aerospace company "stressman bibles" completed the picture ;-)
 
I have been 'out' of the day to day biz of design/perfomance & structures but when i'm scratching my head I pull one of these books out of my Library.

Raymer - Aircraft Design
Hoerner - Fluid Dynamics
Andrerson - Introduction to Flight &Fundamental Aerodynamics
Perry - Aircraft Structures
Corning - Supersonic and subsonic Aircraft Design

I did not labor with CFD so I try to keep up with Ledncer's works.
 
Mugs914 said:
Aircraft Design
by
Edward H. Heinemann
Rosario Rausa
K.E. Van Every

Copyright 1985 by The National Nautical & Aviation Publishing Co. of America, Inc.
ISBN: 0-933852-15-0

Yes, THAT Ed Heinemann...

Brilliant overview and introduction to the process of aircraft design. Not a textbook per se, but an excellent intro to basic design principles (and great A-4M cover art!).

Highly recommended...

View attachment 701098
Click to expand...
I saw one on Alibris - think it was $120+
 
This NACA report is interesting - a lot of familiar aircraft types and looking at the little things to reduce or at least recognize for drag reduction.

Enjoy the Day! Mark
 

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