Highest-G maneuver capabilities of any aircraft or drones?
Posted by Antique__throwaway@reddit | aviation | View on Reddit | 11 comments
Pretty much: how maneuverable can you feasibly make a drone? Manned aircraft are limited to \~9g but drones can now go past that. I think one interceptor drone is claimed to be capable of 20g, but how high can it go?
Gravitational force seems like a very common concept that should have well-known charts with examples like those that say "X decibels is the same as a jackhammer, shotgun, jet engine, etc" but I can't find any references past about 12g.
What are the manned and unmanned aircraft with the highest load factor/maneuverability and how high could it get in theory?
Alexthelightnerd@reddit
The presence of a human pilot isn't quite a limiting factor in the way most people think. Building an aircraft to structurally support high G loading is difficult, and prone to compounding challenges. The smaller and lighter an aircraft is, the easier it is to make it capable of high Gs. As the aircraft gets larger and heavier, the structural support needed for high Gs gets heavier, the heavier something is the more strain it is placed under at higher Gs. This means that the larger a plane gets, G loading becomes exponentially more difficult to increase. Airliners aren't rated to 9G just because most passengers would hate it, building an airliner to that structural limit would be massively difficult.
High G loads also contribute to structural fatigue over time, leading to lower design limits in aircraft that are intended to have a long service life. Many modern fighters are actually rated to G loads below their structural limits specifically to increase airframe lifetime.
This is why unmanned aircraft capable of extremely high Gs tend to be small, light, and intended for either single use or limited use. Adding a pilot to an aircraft doesn't reduce its likey maximum G loading just because of the need to accommodate the squishy human. It means the aircraft must be at least a certain size and weight, and it also means the aircraft is something that will need to survive and be reused, likely for a very long time.
Things like OWA drones and missiles can have very high G limits because they are relatively small and light and there's no worry about structural fatigue since they only need to survive a single trip one way. Fighter sized combat drones like the currently in development CCAs are likely to have very similar maximum G loads to manned fighters because they will be similar in size and will want to be reused for years of service.
Antique__throwaway@reddit (OP)
Well, combat drones are meant to be semi-attritable right? And are there any sources for the true structural limits of common aircraft?
Hungry_Orange666@reddit
RC controlled gliders used for dynamic soaring routinely go over 60g, and hit above 100g.
https://avweb.com/aviation-news/rc-glider-hits-548-mph-in-record-flight/
That's maybe close to the limit, because you need airframe capable of producing tons of lift while being able to go fast enough. And only subsonic wing with high aspect ratio can achive that.
Antique__throwaway@reddit (OP)
Why are gliders so fast and maneuverable?
Hungry_Orange666@reddit
Gliders need lot of lift to circle thermals slowly, and low drag to fly fast between thermals.
Ability to generate lot of gees is byproduct of their optimalisation.
Those RC models are specialised to dynamic soaring, where they need to make exanchages between kinetic energy and potential energy efficiently.
rcbif@reddit
They are fast because they need little drag as possible to glide well.
But if you mean those rc gliders in particular, they are very specialized. Google search dynamic rc soaring.
FallOfSix@reddit
For your list request:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orders_of_magnitude_(acceleration)
Just_Another_Pilot@reddit
For fixed wing, max lift divided by weight. That will usually be a structural limit at normal operating speeds.
For vectored thrust (quadcopters, etc), max thrust divided by weight. Generally more of a power limitation.
MrFickless@reddit
An AIM-9X can pull 60g if you consider them one-way interceptor drones.
mrmurnio@reddit
Modern missiles can pull 80g and the difference between drone and missile is thin
stickJ0ckey@reddit
Each a/c have these charts and/or limitations in its POH. They may differ from aircraft to aircraft even if they're the same type.
Modern fighters F16 F22 are in the 9-12g range, some aerobatics a/c can go 13, keep in mind these are positive g net limits, gross would be 1.3 or even 1.5x. Most pilots can't take that many gs for longer than a few seconds though, this too depends on a number of factors.
Drones don't need to be able to exceed these limitations even if they could be designed to do so considering the human factor is no longer an issue.