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Pressure, Atmosphere and Instrumentation

58 bytes added, 13:41, 13 March 2019
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Stall speed and \(V_{NE}\)
Recall that an ASI actually measures the dynamic pressure, so we can mark a critical value (this marking is best fixed) on the ASI at which point the aeroplane stalls, known as the stall speed. It is '''very important''' to understand that the aeroplane stalls at a critical dynamic pressure.
We want this stall speed to be a well defined value that the pilot can easily compare a cockpit reading to. In other words, the stall speed should be a function of the critical dynamic pressure and nothing else. Therefore, the stall speed defined for an aeroplane is an indicated airspeed. If the ASI does not correct for the density variations and read the IAS all the time, the pilot can conveniently compare his flying to the stall speed. In other words, the ASI shows the stall margin correctly.
Note that the reasoning above applies to other flying conditions apart from stalling: the mapping between the angle of attack to a wide range of aerodynamic performances is one to one. Therefore, other speeds such as the speed of minimum sink (best glide) are also best defined as indicated airspeeds. It, therefore, makes a lot of sense that the aeroplane keeps track of its indicated airspeed even if, with the aid of modern computers, calculating the TAS is a piece of cake. On larger aeroplanes with sophisticated avionics, the TAS is displayed real-time for navigational reference.
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