Unmanned Aerial Vehicle Conceptual Design Using a Genetic Algorithm and Data Mining

Aircraft design is a complex process involving multiple co-dependent design variables and many design decisions. For commercial aircraft design, this di‐culty is ofiset somewhat by the wealth of knowledge available. Observing existing designs has provided useful empirical relationships and insights for the designer to apply yielding a relatively well deflned problem. The wide variety of conflguration possibilities, mission proflles, and the relative lack of historical data leave the problem of unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) design less deflned. The purpose of this research was to develop a robust optimization package for UAV design using data mining to aid conflguration decisions and to develop empirical relationships applicable to a wide variety of mission proflles. An optimization software package was developed using a Genetic Algorithm (GA) and Data Mining. The algorithm proved succesful in carrying out the preliminary design phase of a number of test cases similar to existing UAVs. Designs produced by the algorithm promise improved performance and reduced development time. Future work will introduce high fldelity analysis to the framework developed in this research.