The study towards BE(Aeronautical) involves learning about the Design, Analysis, Flight, and Operation of Aircraft and other Flight Platforms. This unit facilitates the training towards becoming professional aeronautical engineers through a globally-unique experiential-learning opportunity to provide a strong background familiarity with aircraft hardware. This unit is designed to educate and facilitate the learning of aircraft design, basic aircraft construction techniques, the operation of light aircraft and the registration and regulations relating to light aircraft. In addition to hands-on skills on the construction phase, this unit facilitates learning in motivations for unique aircraft design, aircraft aerodynamics, flight mechanics, structural aspects and other design-related issues. Teamwork plays a very important role in this unit; the ability to work with peers and supervising staff is an invaluable skill sought after by employers of engineers.
Throughout the semester, students will be actively participating in the construction of a light aircraft, and of aircraft structural components. The aircraft is to be constructed under current Australian Civil Aviation Regulations so that students will gain an insight into all aspects of the process. By being a part of the construction team, students will also experience the organisational requirements necessary to successfully complete a complex engineering project. The aircraft construction workshop component is complemented with lectures, homework, research and assignments to further enhance the learning experience on aircraft. The final outcome will be that students gain a good foundation of: aircraft design and analyses methods; innovative methods of construction; techniques for selecting, sizing and stressing components; regulatory requirements for certification; off-design requirements; construction tolerances; and team-work requirements in undertaking complex engineering projects.

This unit of study introduces students to the role of professional aerospace engineers, along with the development of fundamental engineering knowledge and skills for aerospace vehicle design, analysis performance and operation. Students will learn through experience, to develop professional skills in research, interpretation, communication, and presentation of information relating to aerospace engineering. Expected learning includes: introduction to lateral thinking concepts; glossary of aerospace vehicle components and terminology; an introduction to the multiple disciplines related to aerospace engineering, such as aerodynamics, aircraft and spacecraft performance, mechanics of flight, aerospace structures, materials and propulsion systems; how the various disciplines are integrated into the design and development of flight platform systems; the operating characteristics of modern flight vehicles, their uses and limitations; modern developments and future trends in aerospace; the limitations of the aerospace environment; teamwork; and resource management.
Significantly, professional enhancement is introduced through the development of basic hands-on workshop skills. These practical skills enable students to have a better appreciation of the tools that they are expected to apply their engineering knowledge to, during their aerospace engineering profession. Experiential learning is facilitated through developing skills with machine and hand tools; solid modelling; and microcontrollers in a supervised environment, to develop fundamentals of practical aerospace vehicle component design, manufacture, control, servicing, and repair.
Manufacturing Technology: An overview of a range of processes related to the design and manufacture of aerospace components is provided through hands-on experience. Manufacturing Technology practical work is undertaken in: (a) Hand tools, Machining, and Fibreglassing - an introduction to basic manufacturing processes used to fabricate aerospace engineering hardware. Safety requirements: All students are required to provide their own personal protective equipment (PPE) and comply with the workshop safety rules provided in class. Students who fail to do this will not be permitted to enter the workshops. In particular, approved industrial footwear must be worn, and long hair must be protected by a hair net. Safety glasses must be worn at all times. (b) Solid Modelling - the use of computer aided design (CAD) tools to model geometry and create engineering drawings of engineering components. (c) Microcontrollers - ubiquitous in modern engineered products - will be introduced through experiential learning with development kits.

This unit aims to develop in students an understanding of the fundamental concepts involved in the operation and performance of aircraft. The students will acquire an ability to make accurate and meaningful measurements of take-off, climb, cruise, turn, descent and landing performance; to perform weight and balance calculations; to understand the use of aerodynamic derivatives and their impact on aircraft performance. Students will be shown methods to optimise performance for specific missions. It will also cover modern issues such as airport congestion, noise restrictions, aviation certification requirements for the use of different aircraft categories and novel methods solving these problems.

This unit aims to introduce students to the terminology, technology and current practice in the field of Space Engineering. Course content will include a variety of topics in the area of orbital mechanics, satellite systems and launch requirements. Case studies of current systems will be the focus of this unit.

This unit of study aims to develop deeper practical knowledge in the area of Aerospace systems engineering. Students who take this subject would be interested in developing design skills by working on the sub-system of a real satellite or launch vehicle, autonomous vehicle research, flight simulation research or advanced propulsion systems research.

This unit of study should prepare students to be able to undertake aerodynamic performance calculations for industry design situations.
The unit aims to develop a knowledge and appreciation of the complex behaviour of airflow in the case of two dimensional aerofoil sections and three dimensional wings; To encourage hands-on experimentation with wind-tunnel tests to allow an understanding of these concepts and their range of applicability. To understand the limitations of linearised theory and the effects of unsteady flow.

This unit of study teaches the students the techniques used to propel aircraft. The students will learn to analyse various propulsion systems in use- propellers, gas turbines, etc.
The topics covered include: Propulsion unit requirements for subsonic and supersonic flight; thrust components, efficiencies, additive drag of intakes; piston engine components and operation; propeller theory; operation, components and cycle analysis of gas turbine engines; turbojets; turbofans; turboprops; ramjets. Components: compressor, fan, burner, turbine, nozzle. Efficiency of components: Off-design considerations. Future directions: minimisation of noise and pollution; scram-jets; hybrid engines.

This unit aims to develop a student's understanding of the theoretical basis of advanced aerospace structural analysis; and introduce students to the solution of real-world aircraft structural problems. This unit of study will develop the following attributes: An understanding of the derivation of the fundamental equations of elasticity and their application in certain analytical problems; An understanding of plate theory and the ability to use this to obtain analytical solutions for plate bending and buckling problems; An understanding of energy-method to develop a deeper appreciation for the complexities of designing solution techniques for structural problems; An understanding of the basic principals behind stressed-skin aircraft construction and the practical analysis of typical aircraft components, including the limitations of such techniques.
At the end of this unit students will have an understanding of: 2-D and 3-D elasticity- general equations and solution techniques; Energy methods in structural analysis, including the principles of virtual work and total potential and complimentary energies; Fundamental theory of plates, including in-plane and bending loads as well as buckling and shear instabilities; Solution techniques for plate problems, including Navier solutions for rectangular plates; Combined bending and in-plane loading problems; Energy methods for plate-bending; and Plate buckling for compression and shear loadings; Bending of beams with unsymmetrical cross-sections; Basic principles and theory of stressed-skin structural analysis; Determination of direct stresses and shear flows in arbitrary thin-walled beams under arbitrary loading conditions including: Unsymmetrical sections, Open and closed sections, Single and multi-cell closed sections, Tapered sections, Continuous and idealized sections; The analysis of common aircraft components including fuselages, wings, skin-panels, stringers, ribs, frames and cut-outs; The effects of end constraints and shear-lag on the solutions developed as well as an overall appreciation of the limitations of the solution methods presented.

This unit aims to introduce students to the theory and practice of aircraft component design. In doing so it will emphasize all the considerations, trade-offs and decisions inherent in this process and thus enable students to gain an understanding of why aircraft structures are designed in the way they are with respect to aircraft operational, certification, manufacturing and cost considerations. At the end of this unit students will be able to understand the design process, especially as it applies to aircraft individual component design; Have a familiarity with some of the standard industry practices for component design; An increasing familiarity with typical aerospace analysis techniques along with the primary failure modes that need to be considered; An understanding of the importance of different failure modes for different components and how these relate to load-conditions; a familarity with the operating environment that must be considered when designing components; and understanding of some of the legal and ethical requirements of aircraft design engineers to give a basic understanding of the regulatory framework in which aircraft design is conducted.

This unit aims to develop an understanding of the aerospace industry procedures for design, analysis, and testing of aircraft and aerospace vehicle components. It provides a Design-Build-Test experience by putting into practice, learning outcomes from this and other previously completed UoS, through working on a small structure which is representative of a typical light metal aircraft. Students will be introduced to typical metallic and composite materials and structures for aerospace vehicles. The unit also provides an introduction to fatigue and damaged tolerance analysis of metallic aircraft structures. Experiential learning opportunities are provided to acquire skills and knowledge in structural design, analyses, testing methods, procedures, techniques, and equipment.
On satisfactory completion of this unit students will have gained practical skills relevant to working on typical modern aircraft and aerospace vehicle components. They will learn from methods, techniques, and experiences from the modern aerospace industry. Experiential learning is enhanced through verifying analyses with actual testing of fabricated component, and the experience of a full design-build-test cycle of a typical aerospace structural component. Subject areas covered will include design methods, internal loads calculations, stress analysis, design for manufacture, joints and fasteners, test procedures, fatigue and damage tolerance, composites, and the art of design.

This unit aims to develop an understanding of aircraft longitudinal equilibrium, static stability, dynamic stability and response. Students will develop an understanding of the importance and significance of flight stability, will gain skills in dynamic system analysis and will learn mathematical tools used for prediction of aircraft flight behaviour. Students will gain skills in problem solving in the area of flight vehicle motion, and learn the fundamentals of flight simulation.
At the end of this unit students will be able to understand: aircraft flight conditions and equilibrium; the effects of aerodynamic and propulsive controls on equilibrium conditions; the significance of flight stability and its impact of aircraft operations and pilot workload; the meaning of aerodynamic stability derivatives and their sources; the effects of aerodynamic derivatives on flight stability; the impact of flight stability and trim on all atmospheric flight vehicles. Students will also be able to model aircraft flight characteristics using computational techniques and analyse the aircraft equations of rigid-body motion and to extract stability characteristics.
Unit content will include static longitudinal aircraft stability: origin of symmetric forces and moments; static and manoeuvring longitudinal stability, equilibrium and control of rigid aircraft; aerodynamic load effects of wings, stabilisers, fuselages and power plants; trailing edge aerodynamic controls; trimmed equilibrium condition; static margin; effect on static stability of free and reversible controls.

This unit of study aims to develop deeper practical knowledge in the area of Aerospace systems engineering. Students who take this subject would be interested in developing design skills by working on the sub-system of a real satellite or launch vehicle, autonomous vehicle research, flight simulation research or advanced propulsion systems research.

This unit of study aims to provide students with a learning environment that promotes systems thinking and allows students to develop skills in systems analysis and design. In particular the unit will focus on Aerospace systems, and students will develop both theoretical and practical skills in the area of systems engineering for this discipline. The primary objective is to develop fundamental systems engineering and systems thinking skills. At the end of this unit students will be able to: define the requirements process and be able to apply it to aerospace systems design; conduct requirements analysis for an aerospace system and to drill down through requirements breakdown and the use of the V-diagram in this analysis; conduct functional and technical analysis and determine design drivers in a system; manage the use of a log book and its application in engineering design; develop technical skills in the design and development of satellite subsystems; conduct appropriate interaction processes between team members for the successful achievement of goals. Course content will include fundamentals of systems engineering; satellite subsystems; systems design.

This unit aims to introduce students to: elementary and advanced topics in Gasdynamics (High Speed Flows). Course content will include review of Equations of Gasdynamics, One-Dimensional Gas Flow, Isentropic Flows, Normal Shock, Flow in a Converging and Converging-Diverging Nozzle, Steady Two-dimensional Supersonic Flow, Shock waves (Normal and Oblique), Method of Characteristics, Two-dimensional Supersonic Aerofoils, Introduction to Three Dimensional Effects, Unsteady Flows, Moving Shocks, Shock Tube Flow and Transonic Flow and Compressible Boundary Layers, introduction to turbulent flows.
At the end of this unit the student will be able to calculate a high speed flow about an aerofoil and compressible flow through a duct of varying cross-section and will have a good appreciation of Transonic and Hypersonic Flows.

This unit aims to teach fundamentals of modern numerical and analytical techniques for evaluating stresses, strains, deformations and strengths of representative aerospace structures. In particular the focus is on developing an understanding of: Fundamental concepts and formulations of the finite element methods for basic structural analysis; Elements for typical aerospace structures, such as beams/frames, plates/shells, and their applications and limitations; Finite element techniques for various types of problems pertinent to aerospace structures; and, developing hands-on experience of using selected commercial finite element analysis program.
At the end of this unit of study the following will have been covered: Introduction to Finite Element Method for modern structural and stress analysis; One-dimensional rod elements; Generalization of FEM for elasticity; Two- and three-dimensional trusses; FEA for beams and frames in 2D and 3D; Two-dimensional problems using constant strain triangular elements; The two-dimensional isoparametric elements; Plates and shells elements and their applications; FEA for axisymmetric shells and pressure vessels, shells of revolution; FEA for axisymmetric solids subjected to axi-symmetric loading; FEA for structural dynamics, eigenvalue analysis, modal response, transient response; Finite element analysis for stress stiffening and buckling of beams, plates and shells; Three-dimensional problems in stress analysis; Extensions to the element library, higher order elements, special elements; Constraints; FEA modeling strategy; FEA for heat conduction; FEA for non-linear material and geometric analysis.

This unit aims to develop an understanding of the application of design to the modern aerospace industry. Students will gain an overview of how to manage a design team and will also gain skills in carrying out detailed design problems. Course content will include: Design requirements; Sources of information for aircraft design; Configuration design: performance, weight and balance, propulsion; Aerodynamic design: lift, drag and control; Structural design: loads, materials; Philosophies of design and analysis; System design: requirements and specification; System design procedures; systems integration.

This unit aims to develop an understanding of the application of flight mechanics principles to modern aircraft systems. Students will gain skills in problem solving in the areas of dynamic aircraft behaviour, aircraft sensitivity to wind gusts, control systems development and aircraft handling analysis.
At the end of this unit students will be able to: understand the nature of an aircraft's response to control inputs and atmospheric disturbances, including the roles of the various modes of motion; analyse an aircraft's response to control inputs in the frequency domain using Laplace Transforms and Transfer Function representations; represent and model wind gust distributions using stochastic methods (Power Spectral Density); analyse an aircraft's response to disturbances (wind gust inputs) by combining Transfer Function representations with gust PSD's; understand the principles of stability augmentation systems and autopilot control systems in aircraft operation, their functions and purposes; understand basic feedback control systems and classical frequency domain loop analysis; understand the characteristics of closed loop system responses; understand the characteristics of PID, Lead, Lag and Lead-Lag compensators, and to be competent in designing suitable compensators using Bode and Root-locus design techniques; design multi-loop control and guidance systems and understand the reasons for their structures.

This unit aims to teach students the fundamental principles and methods of designing solutions to estimation and control problems in aerospace engineering applications. Students will apply learned techniques in estimation and control theory to solving a wide range of different problems in engineering such as satellite orbit determination, orbit transfers, satellite attitude determination, satellite positioning systems and remote sensing. Students will learn to recognise and appreciate the coupling between the different elements within an estimation and control task, from a systems-theoretic perspective. Students will learn to use this system knowledge and basic design principles to design and test a solution to a given estimation task, with a focus on aerospace applications (such as satellite remote sensing).

This unit of study aims to develop deeper practical knowledge in the area of Aerospace systems engineering. Students who take this subject would be interested in developing design skills by working on the sub-system of a real satellite or launch vehicle, autonomous vehicle research, flight simulation research or advanced propulsion systems research.

Objectives/Expected Outcomes: To develop a specialist knowledge in the fields of computational, non-linear and unsteady aerodynamics. The develop familiarity with the techniques for predicting airflow/structure interactions for aerospace vehicles.
Syllabus Summary: Advanced two and three dimensional panel method techniques; calculation of oscillatory flow results; prediction of aerodynamic derivatives. Pressure distributions for complete aircraft configuration. Unsteady subsonic flow analysis of aircraft; calculation of structural modes. Structural response to gusts; aeroelasticity; flutter and divergence. Solution of aerospace flow problems using finite element methods. Unsteady supersonic one-dimensional flow. Hypersonic flow; real gas effects. Introduction to the use of CFD for transonic flow.

This unit aims to develop an understanding of the theory of flight, design and analysis of helicopters, auto-gyros and other rotary wing aircraft. Students will gain an appreciation of the extra difficulties involved when the vehicle flow is cyclic in nature. At the end of this unit students will be able to: Identify and predict the various flow states of a generic lift producing rotor; Use appropriate methods to determine the forces and torques associated with the rotor; Estimate values for typical stability derivatives for helicopters and be able to construct a simple set of stability analysis equations for the vehicle; become aware of the regulatory and liability requirements relating to all aspects of commercial helicopter operation and maintenance. Course content will include introduction to rotary wing aircraft; vertical flight performance; forward flight performance; blade motion and control; dynamics of rotors; rotor-craft stability; rotor blade design.

This unit of study aims to provide familiarity and understanding with practical aircraft design processes expected in industry, including the evaluation and case studies of existing aircraft designs. Students will gain a better understanding of relevant issues particularly related to the design of aircraft with a level of confidence to lead them to develop new designs or modifications, having a good balance between theory and real-world applications. Good familiarity with unique and stringent international aviation regulations and certification processes will be expected with respect to the design of aircraft. Topics covered by the lectures will include aircraft specifications; aircraft selection and evaluation; aircraft configuration design; design considerations for aerodynamics, structures, systems, manufacture, testing, certification, life-cycle-cost, operations; the use of computational aircraft design tools, in particular DARcorp's Advanced Aircraft Analysis (AAA); and introduction to multidisciplinary design optimisation methods. Projects will be based on case study analyses and evaluation of aircraft types to operational specifications and requirements.

This unit aims to develop an understanding of aircraft flight test, validation and verification, and the development of modern flight control, guidance, and navigation systems. Students will gain skills in analysis, problem solving and systems design in the areas of aircraft dynamic system identification and control.
At the end of this unit students will be able to understand elements of the following: the principles of stability augmentation systems and autopilot control systems in aircraft operation, their functions and purposes; the characteristics of closed loop system responses; advanced feedback control systems and state-space design techniques; the concepts of parameter and state estimation; the design of observers in the state space and the implementation of a Kalman Filter; multi-loop control and guidance systems and the reasons for their structures; flight test principles and procedures and the implementation a flight test programme.

Estimation techniques are applied to a wide range of aerospace systems. In this subject optimal estimation techniques will be presented as a collection of algorithms and their implementation.

Objectives/Expected Outcomes: To develop specialist knowledge and understanding of Unmanned Air Vehicle (UAV) systems. To be able to assess, evaluate and perform preliminary design analysis on complete UAV systems.
Syllabus summary: This course will focus on understanding UAVs from a system perspective. It will consider a variety of key UAV subsystems and look at how these interact to determine the overall effectiveness of a particular UAV system for a given mission. Based on this understanding it will also look at the evaluation and design of a complete UAV system for a given mission specification. Some of the primary UAV subsystems that will be considered in this course are as follows.
Airframe and Propulsion: The role of the basic airframe/propulsion subsystem of the UAV in setting operational mission bounds for different classes of UAVs, from micro UAVs, through to larger vehicles.
Flight Control and Avionics: Typical UAV primary flight control systems; Sensor requirements to support different levels of operation (eg auto-land vs remote-control landing etc. ,); Redundancy requirements.
Navigation: Navigation requirements; inertial navigation; aiding via use of GPS; strategies to combat GPS failures.
Typical Payloads: Electro-Optical (EO); Infra-Red (IR); Electronic Warfare (EW); Electronic Surveillance (ES); Radar and others. Payload stabilization and pointing accuracy requirements.
Air-Ground Communication Link: Typical Civilian and Military communication links. Range, Security, Bandwidth, Cost issues.
Ground Control Station(GCS): Air-vehicle monitoring; payload monitoring; data dissemination; control of multiple vehicles.
The course will also consider other general issues associated with modern UAV systems including multi-vehicle systems, certification of UAV systems and others. As part of the course students will spend 1 day operating a UAV system, with their own mission guidance/mission control software on board.