The perils of unconventional aircraft design: Snorri Gudmundsson at TEDxEmbryRiddle

Professor Snorri Gudmundsson was born in Reykjavik, Iceland and moved to Florida to pursue his childhood dream of becoming an aircraft designer. He received his B.Sc. and his M.Sc. in Aerospace Engineering from Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University. Having worked on the SR20, the SR22 and been the chief designer of the Cirrus Jet SF50 - he is to aircraft design what Morgan Freeman is to a movie - composed, articulate and extremely talented. He is also an avid musician, adept with multiple instruments and with four extremely popular albums available online. He is also one of the most loved professors at Embry-Riddle.
See more at tedxembryriddle...
In the spirit of ideas worth spreading, TEDx is a program of local, self-organized events that bring people together to share a TED-like experience. At a TEDx event, TEDTalks video and live speakers combine to spark deep discussion and connection in a small group. These local, self-organized events are branded TEDx, where x = independently organized TED event. The TED Conference provides general guidance for the TEDx program, but individual TEDx events are self-organized.* (*Subject to certain rules and regulations)

[@surendrabogadi915]

I'm a teacher and I referred a book authored by Dr. Snorri Gudmundsson. It was fantastic and the best one for Aircraft Design.

[@ronjon7942]

Some good points. I didn't get the idea he's a 'status quo only' type of guy, just realistic. It was interesting to me to see his attributes for a design combined in one slide along with his opinions on each. And he's basically correct, the radical and 'innovative' designs are going to have a hard displacing the current fundamental ones. I do wish he'd have given concrete examples of designs that didn't account for the consequences of the attributes, countered with why we have the amazing aircraft we see today. Also, perhaps veer away from getting too much into basic aerodynamics, broadly speaking (time constraint), and only provide an aerodynamic or technical explanation when discussing a particular attribute for a proven or failed design. Personally, I'd touch on continuous innovations with respect to refinements of current designs, because it seems like there is a never ending challenge to make the existing better. Additionally, I'd also go into detail the risks and difficulties of clean sheet designs. At any rate, it gave me a lot to think about so I'm grateful for his talk.

[@tedsmith6137]

Regardless of whether the subject matter is useful or not, it is poor presentation to do a Powerpoint and just read the pages out loud. If the audience cannot do that for themselves, the content will be way over their heads.

[@bountyhuntermk2520]

Ted Smith lazy use of PP..... I hate it

[@danamurray735]

Not Bad. My only thing is that quite a few unconventional aircraft designs have been the absolute best. They are push-pull configuration airplanes (the Adam 500, the Rutan Defiant, the Dornier SeaStar, and a few others). The safest and the most efficient design of a propeller aircraft to have ever been flown (in my very humble opinion). Engineers and designers should consider it

[@PistonAvatarGuy]

The Adam A500 was a complete failure, but the concept seems sound.

[@richarddeese1991]

Important information, certainly. But I would recommend less technical details & more 'big picture.' You could simply have said, "This flying wing design looks impressive, *_but_* that's not what makes a good, reliable design. As it turns out, this aircraft has some stability problems. Looking good doesn't always equate to working good. Another major hurdle to unconventional design is that it has no track record. People are less willing to trust something that looks unfamiliar and hasn't been used by others." Bringing home the big points makes for a much more effective presentation! Thank you for the video. 𝒕𝒂𝒗𝒊.

[@SuperYellowsubmarin]

The presentation may be poorly executed but it should not distract us from the lessons. It is too easy to consider the perceived pros of a design and shadow or completely omit to study the cons. Cause the customers will see them. It is particularly true when it comes to aircraft design, as the planform drawing and the spec sheet always look promising, but the execution often reveals terrible flaws or the reality of design, manufacturing and operations prevents the supposed pros from ever being realized, as the speaker points out. An aircraft is not designed just for cruise, all the enveloppe matters so, often, unconventional designs which supposedly are better at cruise speed / efficiency behave poorly at different speeds and attitudes.

[@zacharyparis]

the perils of poorly planned power point presentations.

[@veronicaaristeguieta3072]

Flying wings would make great training airplanes!

[@fokjohnpainkiller]

10:17 Bursted out laughing

[@mro9466]

flying wings are so cool looking =)

[@AndrewBlucher]

A presentation is a product. It needs to be designed and tested, just like any other product. One needs to know how the product achieves its purpose. Just reading slides ... I got to 2:29 and saw 4 major flaws. That was enough for me.

[@youngculturephotography]

Anybody else notice the Avengers Tower in the skyline background?

[@peterweinberg4504]

A swept wing is naturally stable in yaw.

[@BrapBrapDorito]

True, but for a configuration like the flying wing shown here, that stability would not be enough. If a wing sweep was all that was needed for true yaw stability, conventional swept wing designs like airliners wouldn’t have vertical stabilizers.

[@DM-py7pj]

Sadly, the book "GENERAL AVIATION AIRCRAFT DESIGN: APPLIED METHODS AND PROCEDURES" seems to be missing the definitions of at least one of the VBA functions used within the book! MAT_GaussP

[@decode110]

Great work sir..but presentation should be more impressive and loaded with new designs.

[@timlucas143]

This presentation was just terrible. Most of it was waffling on very basic aerodynamic fundamentals that anyone mildly interested in unconventional aircraft design would already know and the rest was un-inspired dribble about not trying anything new and playing it safe with death by powerpoint and half the slides on actual aircraft design skipped over due to being out of time. Maybe don't spend the first half talking about iPhones and other off-topic junk. This guy both teaches and designs aircraft for a living, but can't give an engaging or concise presentation on aircraft design? hmmm....

[@stanb.5517]

A fragmented presentation with no meaningful content.

[@danielduerr6061]

Unfortunately poor presented. The speaker is highly nervous which is ok when information is well demonstrated. But then skipping the third of his presentation to be in time wth? Pretty common design one on one at the beginning and then just one example he goes through... sorry but this isnt helping to understand the complexity of failed airplane designs.

[@philalcoceli6328]

What about YOU, Mr. Chip Mahgilify? Your assertion that Daniel Duerr isn't very bright is gratuitous and founded on NOTHING. You lack emotional and rational intelligence. Do you work for the mummified research and development section of Cessna by the way? It is the enemies of aviation innovation that TRULY lack insight and therefore hold on with white knuckles to their outdated, inefficient, stagnant designs... and their profits, putting them before the progress and increasing safety of pilots and passengers.

[@JFrazer4303]

It's too bad that there's a concentration on tail-less all-wing as the only "unconventional" approach. Differential static drag for yaw control is fine for the stealth effects of having no tail on a penetration/strategic strike bomber, but anything else needs a tail. Accepting the constant static drag eliminates the differential static drag and tail-less inherent complexity & risk, and prevents spins (if the design is right) Compare this basic flying wing as presented and a normal plane with a Burnelli 14 through CBY-3 series lifting fuselage body, or Arup-4 projected to larger size, and see what happens. All objections disappear except those of being a new product. Operational history in these examples, safety & stability, and all the benefits of a all-wing: slippery, yet nimble and stable all at the same time and usually in both low-speed/landing and cruise performance. Good low speed handling. Extended range and/or payload & speed and , stall-resistant and practically spin-proof. Better L/D ratio and less "wetted" area and drag, less structural weight (By Airbus, Boeing, McD, Lock-Mart, NASA, and other authorities) who've looked into design theories which seek to eliminate static drag in favor of lifting drag, where possible. Burnelli, Arup Modern Lock-Mart and others all have strong tails and no loss in stability associated with all-wing tail-plane-less finned wing/body craft. A lifting tail/tandem wing also only improves the L/D & efficiency, as opposed to a down-force tail. Airbus is still shying away from lifting bodies, while Boeing is irrationally and non-rationally against the idea for some reason. See their model 754 of the mid-'70s. Lock-Mart is dancing around the idea, with their hybrid BWB logistics jumbos. The Frigate Ecojet looks like a good design, but like all of them, restricted to paper-only because of the "giggle factor", and new appearance. They do not require advanced future technology to make enormous fuel savings and apparently, much safer planes. Easily 60% the landing speed of a normal plane of similar foot-print. Maybe less. (by the Lock-Mart HWB logistics or Boeing model 754) Look also at the 2 little 1930s US "Arup" planes, which built up an impressive operational history between the two that did airshow circuits for multiple seasons, Hatfield, who worked on and flew the Arup, built the "Little Bird" series in the '80s to verify the safety and utility of the Arup use of low-aspect-ratio wing/body planes. In one youtube vid, he congratulates Mr Rutan then challenges him to repeat his recent "Voyager" flight with an Arup planform and he bet that it'd be faster, easier, bigger interior, lower TO/L speeds and rolls and have plenty of fuel left over after going around the world un-refueled. Fauvel before the War was working on little test planes of tail-less but finned all-wing designs that were as well-behaved and efficient. Cheranovsky, Canova, Lippisch and the Hortens and a few others in Europe had their work interrupted by the War, usually fatally for the design philosophy.

[@JFrazer4303]

Again regarding lifting bodies The Vought/Sikorsky Effort into Zmmerman's idea for VTOL craft was a digression from the work of carrying on from the impressive performances which the Arup-2 gave for NACA, the Army and the CAA (with Zimmerman working for NACA on the team that saw the Arup). It did not need the giggle-factor-inducing huge flapping props and the gearing system which killed the follow-on. It did not exhibit the abnormally large amount of wing-tip vortex drag, while in low-A cruising flight. In very high-A, very low speed flight of a low-aspect ratio wing, you want the vortex, and it's futile to try to reduce drag by counter-rotating the props. US aeronautical makers have historically been unable to produce flight-ready gearing or contra-prop or extension props. They should ask train or boat makers how they transfer power from multiple engines onto shafts. That the Navy chose to pursue this, was throwing away a plane like the Bearcat though heavier maximum weight, faster, more payload & range, with 40kts landing speed. If the Navy for its "flapjack" fighter had built the little Boeing 396 test plane as a precursor to the model 390 fighter, it would have changed aeronautics history as much as the advent of all-metal planes or retractable landing gear, or lifting-devices in wings. The advent of the jet-age isn't what killed them, as was the Navy's choice to do the Zimmerman idea and the inherent complexity and risk, instead of an honest follow-on to the Arup. The Navy continued using piston/prop planes for logistics and support as well as tactical combat and Strike, until the '70s. Chance-Vought had a design for a jet version, and Sergei Sikorsky worked on another. They were anything but silly-looking as Zimmerman's plane, and if built instead of the P-80 & F-86, would have been a decade or more ahead of anything else on the drawing-boards. Perhaps even they needed tails instead of just fins, but perhaps not. Everything today would be a lifting body or all-wing of some sort if Boeing had built their little single buried-engine single nose-prop plane in '43.

[@ronjon7942]

Thoughtful post, thnks. What is your area of expertise, aerodynamics, history, just like aviation? You sound like a good guy to have a conversation with.

[@latinokooll7]

The worst Ted talk I ever seen. So we should always do copy paste never try new configurations and new approaches to plane design...

[@DanFrederiksen]

yeah it wasn't entirely without merit but it seemed most of the sentiment was aversion to change.

[@kuharaajgovindan7929]

I understand your opinion Tiago, but that's not really the case when it comes to the aerospace industry. It tends to be conservative due to the huge risks involved for things to go wrong here. This is after all the industry which came up with Murphy's law: "whatever can go wrong, will go wrong". Each project is massively expensive, takes a long time for development, and holds the risks of lives lost if things were not thought through properly. That is why the conventional design of aeroplanes are used so widely. These have been tested and proven, and can be improved for better performance. Unconventional designs are still being developed however, as you would know, by NASA, and other such research organizations, but it is not advisable for the commercial sector. That's basically the point Mr Gudmundsson was trying to make. Sorry for the long comment though.

[@doogleticker5183]

Sadly, poorly presented and content of low intrinsic value. Delete...

[@JavierChiappa]

Very bad presentation, TED talks should be encouraging to try new designs and ideas. Leave the "You have to be Realistic"s, the "Absence of previous safety records" , "Very limited operational history", "The FAA should set you straight" and "Looks very un-usual to us" to the mediocre bean-counters and their friends in the regulatory bureaucracy. Please, future airplane designers, make it efficient, make it look cool and just ignore this guy.

[@ChucksSEADnDEAD]

I think the point was that if you want to try new designs and ideas, don't use your client's money for it. Before the B-2 became operational it took decades of studying flying wings.

[@philalcoceli6328]

This presenter was probably paid by those who love and profit from the status quo in aviation. Probably people like Tutankhamen Mummified Cessna Design and Development.

[@TubeYouTek]

Snorri made a great book, may you say a new one better?

[@AriKolbeinsson]

a quick google search would have disproven that. He is behind the sleek, modern (but conventional) design that has been giving the old aircraft companies some proper competition, the Cirrus SR22.

[@sychrovsky]

this is so bad

[@tinolino58]

Dont forget that Mr. Gudmundson translated his books into chineese in order to help them get up on speed designing dozens of drones and cruise missiles! They habe now the biggest drone fleet on earth and will use it to sink the US battle groups im the south asian sea. According to his answer: Gudmundson „sees no conflict“ in his chineese books built on american university imcome. 👻

[@ronjon7942]

I'm not sure I understand where you're trying to take this - are you insinuating Gudmundsson's a traitor? Textbooks are translated into different languages regularly - even into Chinese. Do you not think all of the publicly available info on the F-35 has been translated into Chinese?

[@tinolino58]

@@ronjon7942 yes traitor

[@alirezatabrizi1851]

I disagree with almost everything this guy says. I don’t think the conclusions he draws are logical.