An Introduction to Aeronautical Structures For Managers

About the Book

This book covers important performance characteristics of aeronautical structures. The subject matter is presented in layman’s terms without complicated mathematical details. This has been a basic one quarter course for safety, contracting, maintenance, research management, professional engineers and other professionals dealing with related aeronautical and systems engineering fields in the US Air Force Institute of Technology (AFIT). The topics covered are aircraft design/ analysis, performance and their maintenance. The book addresses response characteristics of materials, and types of failures in aeronautical structures (e.g., fatigue, creep, fracture, buckling, and stress concentration) in both conventional metallic structures and composites. In most of the cases, as can be seen from publications resulting from AFIT masters level and PhD students’ work (Chapter 11), this subject matter was one of the preparatory courses for their thesis or dissertation. The author has more than 40 years’ experience in industry, research and academia including teaching this course for 5 years in AFIT.

About the Author

Dr Soni has a PhD in Applied Mathematics from the University of Roorkee, India 1972. He has served as a Space Scientist, Senior Scientist, Corporate President /CEO and Associate Professor of Aerospace and Systems Engineering. His expertise includes teaching and research related to systems engineering design, analytical and experimental mechanics of composite materials and structures, rapid product development, and reliability engineering. Dr. Soni’s recent studies include: a) Systems Engineering Approach to Integrated Structural Health Monitoring System for Aging Aircrafts; b) Ballistic response of co-cured adhesive bonded composite joints; and c) Cost Modeling for Composite Aircrafts. Dr. Soni is author/ co-author of 100+ research publications/ presentations in the relevant field of mechanics of solids and structures. Dr. Soni has been a Fellow of the American Society for Composites, an Associate Fellow of AIAA and a member of SAMPE.