The Long Range Regional Liner

Students¹: B.A. Hummelink, D. R. A. E. Del Regno, J.E. Geudens, K. Geris, M.S. Smid, P.M. vanMeer, R.E. Martens, S.R. Otting, T.A. Croes-Marten

Project tutor: ir. J. Sinke

Coaches: dr. S.J. Hulshoff, ir. J.P. van Loon, M. Foeken

Introduction
As the big hub airports become increasingly congested and the delay for the passengers increases, alternative solutions have to be found. One possible solution is to move the intercontinental segment of the air transportation market to the regional airports which are close the hub airport. This project set-up consists of two parts. The first part is the design of a small to medium size aircraft which is able to fly long range. The second part of the project is the completion of a business case in which the economical feasibility of the aircraft is investigated. The two parts are performed in parallel as the results of the business case are continuously implemented in the design of the aircraft.
The following requirements were established at the beginning of the project:

• Provide a viable feasibility study.
• The aircraft should be capable to transport 100-130 passengers with luggage.
• The aircraft should have minimum range of 10000 km.
• The aircraft should meet the latest regulations on noise and pollution.
• The operation of the aircraft should be competitive with the current way of travel via international airports.

These were translated into the following mission need statement:

"Conduct a feasibility study and design a long range aircraft capable of transporting approximately 100 passengers by using regional airports."

The paper of this project as available as a PDF-document here.

Footnotes

1. The Design Synthesis Exercise forms the closing piece of the third year of the Bachelor degree course in aerospace engineering at the TU Delft. The objective of this exercise is to improve the students’ design skills while working in teams with about 10 fellow students for a period of 10 weeks. Despite the fact that the final designs result from a design process executed by small groups of students with limited experience, the designs are of good quality.