GATE 2024 AE – Question 33

Structures · Flight vehicle structures: torsion, bending and shear of thin-walled sections, loads on aircraft · 1 mark · Numerical answer

An airplane experiences a net vertical ground reaction of 15000 N during landing. The weight of the airplane is 10000 N. The landing vertical load factor, defined as the ratio of inertial load to the weight of the aircraft, is __________ (rounded off to 1 decimal place).

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Correct answer: 1.5 to 1.5

Explanation

At touchdown the wing lift roughly equals the weight, so the net vertical inertial load on the airplane is the ground reaction, 15000 N. The load factor is $n = \frac{15000}{10000} = 1.5$.

Official GATE 2024 answer key: https://gate2026.iitg.ac.in/doc/download/2024/AEFinalAnswerKey.pdf