Research of methods and devices for weight determination and the aircraft’s center of gravity position

Grygorii Cherepashchuk, Oleksii Potylchak, Stanislav Klimov

Abstract


The subject matter of the article is the process of weighing and determining the aircraft’s center of gravity position. The goal of this study is to develop research methods and devices for determining the weight and the center of gravity position of aircraft. The tasks to be solved are as follows: formulation of requirements to be imposed on the relevant methods and devices; classification of methods and devices; identification of main groups and subgroups according to certain criteria; description and research of representatives of the identified groups and subgroups; comparison of the methods and devices considered; selection of the most promising method for further development; setting the main tasks for the creation of practically implemented devices for determining the weight and the center of gravity position of aircraft. The following results were obtained: the basic requirements for methods and devices for determining the weight and position of the center of gravity of an aircraft are formulated, namely, ensuring the necessary accuracy, efficiency, ease of use, integration into aircraft onboard systems, and economic feasibility. Known methods and devices are considered, and the main groups and subgroups are identified according to certain characteristics. The following subgroups are identified: based on measuring the components of the aircraft’s weight using force sensors; based on measuring the pressure in the landing gear shock struts; based on using sensors to measure the stroke of the shock strut cylinders; and based on measuring the bend of aircraft structural elements. The characteristics of the main representatives of the identified subgroups are analyzed according to the physical principles used. The considered methods and devices were compared according to a number of key indicators (i.e., accuracy of weight and center of gravity determination, complexity of technical implementation, complexity of integration into aircraft onboard systems, implementation cost, and reliability of operation). Conclusions. The scientific novelty of the results obtained lies in the fact that integral efficiency indicators were calculated for each of the methods based on the analysis of the most important indicators of the methods and means considered. As a result, the most promising methods and devices for further development were selected based on the measurement of the stroke of the shock strut cylinders. The main tasks for further research were defined as follows: development of a methodology for obtaining the static transformation characteristics of cylinders; development of design solutions for the construction of an aircraft weighing and balancing system based on the selected method; improvement of algorithms for calculating the weight and position of the aircraft’s center of gravity based on the measurements obtained from optical sensors; development of issues related to the metrological assurance of the aircraft weighing and balancing system.

Keywords


aircraft; weight; center of gravity position; shock strut; landing gear

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DOI: https://doi.org/10.32620/aktt.2025.5.01