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Abstract
The Society of Automotive Engineers (SAE) Aero Design competition allows students to
gain real world experience by applying concepts learned within their engineering education to a
real-world application. The competition challenges students to design and build a fixed wing, allelectric, remotely controlled aircraft. The team plans on participating in the regular class, where
the focus is designing an aircraft to maximize carrying capacity while performing under a 750-
watt power constraint.
This is the second year a team from the University of Southern Indiana has participated in the
competition. The team’s design from the 2023 competition is also evaluated within this report.
The competition challenges students across multiple engineering fields, such as mechanical,
electrical, and aeronautical engineering. Throughout the project, existing knowledge was
revisited, and fresh insight was acquired, fostering continuous learning and growth. The project
detailed within this report approached the competition in a way that produced a creative solution
to the design of the aircraft. This was done by reviewing and innovating previous projects.
This document presents a review of research about aircraft design, the requirements given
from the competition, and similar projects that competed in previous SAE Aero Design
competitions. Throughout this report the designs selected for each subsystem are explained and
supported through engineering calculations and simulations. The construction, testing,
modifications, and testing are then discussed, including the results of the competition.