Problem 9.

96 [Difficulty: 3]

Given: Data on airplane and parachute

Find: Time and distance to slow down; plot speed against distance and time; maximum "g"'s

Solution:
The given data or available data is

km km kg
M  8500 kg Vi  400  Vf  100  CD  1.42 ρ  1.23 Dsingle  6  m Dtriple  3.75 m
hr hr 3
m

π 2 2 π 2 2
Asingle   Dsingle  28.274 m Atriple   Dtriple  11.045 m
4 4
dV 1 2
Newton's second law for the aircraft is M  CD  ρ A V
dt 2
where A and C D are the single parachute area and drag coefficient

dV CD ρ A
Separating variables   dt
2 2 M
V
Vi
Integrating, with IC V = Vi V( t)  (1)
CD ρ A
1  Vi t
2 M

2 M  CD ρ A 
Integrating again with respect to t x ( t)   ln 1   Vi t (2)
CD ρ A  2 M 

2 M Vi 
Eliminating t from Eqs. 1 and 2 x  ln
 (3)
CD ρ A  V 

To find the time and distance to slow down to 100 km/hr, Eqs. 1 and 3 are solved with V = 100
km/hr (or use Goal Seek)
dV
2
dt CD ρ A V
The "g"'s are given by  which has a maximum at the initial instant (V = Vi)
g 2 M g
 For three parachutes, the analysis is the same except A is replaced with 3A. leading to

Vi
V( t) 
3  CD ρ A
1  Vi t
2 M

2 M  3  CD ρ A 
x ( t)   ln 1   Vi t
3  CD ρ A  2 M 
The results generated in Excel are shown here:
t (s) x (m) V (km/hr) t (s) x (m) V (km/hr)
0.0 0.0 400 0.0 0.0 400
1.0 96.3 302 1.0 94.2 290
2.0 171 243 2.0 165 228
3.0 233 203 3.0 223 187
4.0 285 175 4.0 271 159
5.0 331 153 5.0 312 138
6.0 371 136 6.0 348 122
7.0 407 123 7.0 380 110
8.0 439 112 7.93 407 100
9.0 469 102 9.0 436 91
9.29 477 100 9.3 443 89

"g "'s = -3.66 Max

Aircraft Velocity versus Time

400
350
One Parachute
300
Three Parachutes
250
V (km/hr)
200
150
100
50
0
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
t (s)

Aircraft Velocity versus Distance

400
350
300 One Parachute
250 Three Parachutes
V (km/hr)
200
150
100
50
0
0 50 100 150 200 250 300 350 400 450 500
x (m)