Author : Poonam Harakare and V.K. Heblikar

The most important aspects in the aircraft design are safety and weight of the structure. Wing is one of the major components of the aircraft. Wing creates the lift required for flight. Spars, ribs and skins are the major structural elements of the wing. Spars are the structural members which run through the wing root at the fuselage to the wing tip. Spars carry the major wing bending loads. Ribs are the structural members which are oriented in the chord wise direction. Ribs carry the shear loads on the wing. Ribs also help the wing to maintain its aerodynamic shape under loaded condition. Current study includes a wing box configuration consisting of five ribs and two spars. The aerodynamic distributed load on the wing creates shear force, bending moment and torsional moment at wing stations. Static load carrying capability of the wing box is carried out through a linear static stress analysis. The top skin of the wing box will experience the axial compression during wing bending. The top skin panels between the ribs and stiffeners will be considered for the buckling analysis. These panels will be evaluated for their buckling critical loads through analytical approach.

Keywords: Wing-box, Design, Stress analysis, Spar, Rib, Design optimization, Compression, Buckling.

Article published in the Proceedings of National Conference on ‘Women in Science & Engineering’ (NCWSE 2013), SDMCET Dharwad