Comparison of pitching moment at different locations

Is it OK to compare all three moment coefficient together given that the reference points are different?

No, it's not ok. The pitching moment will be different at different reference locations, unless lift is 0.

Do I have to change the reference point to 0.25c for the two last results? if so, how can I achieve that without restarting the simulations and specifying the 0.25c as reference point?

The industry standard for reporting and comparing pitching moment is quarter chord, because the classic Thin Airfoil Theory concludes that infinitely thin airfoils in subsonic flow have their aerodynamic centres at quarter chord.
That being said, there is absolutely nothing wrong gathering the pitching moment data about any other point, as long as you stay consistent when comparing to other data (or more importantly other people's data). You can convert the pitching moment from one point (say $x_0$) to any other point ($x$) via:
$$M(x) = (L\cos\alpha+D\sin\alpha)(x-x_0) + M_0 \approx L(x-x_0) + M_0$$
where $L$ is the measured lift, $D$ is the measured drag, and $M_0$ is the measured pitching moment at $x_0$. The approximation works great at small AOA ($\alpha$).


Why is a small amount of smooth ice over the top of the wing more dangerous than an accumulation on the leading edge?

This seems to be from an older Gleim study guide.  It references a now-cancelled AC 91-51A:

  (AC 91-51A) Ice on the leading edge, while seemingly more dangerous, can be removed using deicing systems. Ice on the upper surface is much more difficult to clear from the structure, thus making it more dangerous.

This AC has been replaced by 91-74B, which repeatedly mentions the dangers of ice on nonprotected surfaces, but also points out that:

  Ice on an airfoil can have other effects not depicted in these curves. Even before airfoil stall, there can be changes in the pressure over the airfoil that may affect a control surface at the trailing edge.

and, discussing roll upsets:

  If the flaps are extended, do not retract them unless it can be determined that the upper surface of the airfoil is clear of ice. Retracting the flaps will increase the AOA at a given airspeed.

So current guidance seems to be that ice on the upper surface of the wing is dangerous because of:

The upper surface of the wing generally not featuring an ice protection/removal system, and
The possibility of control surfaces being affected.

but it doesn't go so far as to say it is "more" dangerous.


I would make this a comment since I can't be certain, but I wanted to put some photos in. I concur with Ron that it's a target drone. But what target drone?

The one next to it appears to be a Ryan BQM-34 Firebee.

The most likely possibility is the Beachcraft MQM-107 Streaker.

Here is a chart of US target drones.

source


What is the ratio of actual flight time to simulator time on type for airline pilot training?

Zero hours in type.

The first time a new FO flies the actual airplane could be their first revenue flight with a training captain in the left seat.  Technically, these flights are still considered training, specifically "initial operating experience" (IOE) and a few trips will be flown with training captains before the new FO is released to fly with regular line captains.  IOE is conducted on revenue flights though, so its entirely possible that the before your flight leaves the gate that the FO has exactly 0 hours in type.

The initial training (leading to either a full type or an SIC type) and the upgrade training (full type ride if you only had an SIC type) are 100% in FTD and level D FFS (full flight simulators) and the checkride is in the FFS.


How does having a bigger engine placed slightly more forward and higher impact the plane in pitch?

This is an "I think" rather than "I know" answer so if you disagree please feel free to explain why.

In normal straight and level flight it shouldn't have a significant impact. But at a high AoA, at least a significant portion of the engines are ahead of and crucially, above the CG. The nacelle will be producing both lift and drag the resultant effect of both forces, being above the CG, will be a pitch up moment.

Even if this extra force by itself isn't enough to make the aircraft unstable in pitch, it will require the pilots to make a stronger nose-down command, but when you're so close to a stall you want that to be as easy as possible.


Can seaplanes land on normal airfields or in a marsh or muddy area?

Back in the early 1970s I belonged to a Civil Air Patrol (CAP) squadron that had a J-3 cub with an 85 horse engine on it. During the summer we would operate it on floats, during the winter on wheels. At the end of summer, we would land it on the grass alongside the runway at the Springfield, OR airport (no longer there, it's a big Walmart now) and replace the floats with wheels. In late spring, we'd replace the wheels with floats and take off from the grass.

The joke was that for takeoff you were supposed to line up all the cadets and have them pee in unison along the path the floats would take to aid in the takeoff. Actually, that wasn't necessary since western Oregon gets a lot of rain. Even with wet grass though, for the takeoff we'd get the initial movement by pushing, and we were always careful to ensure that the grass had nothing on the takeoff path that would damage the floats.

With the floats on, you could fly when the airspeed said 40 mph (yes, it was indicated in mph) which is about 35 knots. You could generally count on at least 5 knots of wind right down the runway when it was raining, so at 30 knots across the grass you were good to go.

You can go to YouTube and search "floatplane landings on grass" to see some examples of landing on grass. "Floatplane takeoffs on grass" will show some takeoffs, but a quick look showed using a dolly, which I think we did once or twice before my time with the group but then figured it was easier to just use the grass.


How are wood and canvas wings able to sustain damp and bad weather?

Wood and canvas are not meant to be used in humid conditions. All outer surfaces are painted, so they are water repellent and can sustain a shower, but when left to the elements, wooden aircraft deteriorate rapidly. The unprotected structure will take up water and will warp. Wet canvas is less taut, many glues lose strength when wet and plywood will come apart over time. When a wooden aircraft has suffered a shower, it should be wiped dry and stored under a roof as soon as practical.

When Junkers introduced all-metal aircraft, they were sometimes the only types to fly because bad weather had made all other types unusable. In the war for independence of the Baltic states during 1919, the rapidly moving frontline made the use of aircraft hangars impossible, and only Junkers airplanes were able to operate on rainy days.

DeHavilland designed a sleek, four-engined airliner, the DH.91 Albatross, in 1936. The last three of seven built were put out of service after a crash in Shannon in 1943. This crash had made the fact obvious that the plywood structure had deteriorated beyond repair in bad weather, despite a fabric-and-dope cover to protect it from the elements.

The good thing about wood is its long-term strength. In stark contrast to aluminium, wood shows no fatigue under stress and allows to design a life-safe structure. When stored and operated properly, a wooden aircraft will last centuries. While the fabric cover will lose strength over time and needs to be replaced maybe every 20 years, the wooden structure needs no rejuvenation.

The maximum size of wood-and-canvas aircraft was demonstrated by the Caproni Ca.60, and that of wooden aircraft by the Hughes H-4. Both were the biggest aircraft of their time (1921 / 1947) and were bigger than a Jumbo Jet if you use wing area to measure size. However, fabric cover puts a low limit on flight speed, and indirectly on wing loading. The DH.91 had only 134 kg/m² and I would be surprised if any wood-and-canvas aircraft with a wing loading above 200 kg/m² exists. Even the plywood-covered DH.98 Mosquito had only 195 kg/m².

Now to the materials: Otto Lilienthal used osier stakes which he covered with nettle cloth. As far as I know, treatment was wax (applied dissolved in a volatile solvent). Early designs used linen or cotton and dope for glueing the cloth to the structure as well as tightening the cover. Since maybe 50 years those natural fibers have been displaced by polyester cloth because it has less of a tendency to rot. Still dope is used for glueing and tightening, and a finish of synthetic resin lacquer is used as topcoat.


How do pilots maintain awareness of other airplanes during taxi?

At a large airport, all aircraft movements are coordinated by the ATC tower on the ground frequency. Aircraft should never move without authorization from the controller. The tower will issue instructions to aircraft that might look something like this:

  Taxi to Gate 1 via Alpha, Alpha 1, Lima 3, cross runway 24, hold short Delta.

These names correspond to markings on the ground that match up with the airport taxiing maps. By talking with the pilots, the controllers are able to build up a map of where aircraft are. It also helps that they can look out the window and see the aircraft on the ground.

At airports without a tower, taxiing isn't much of an issue. There aren't many planes around, and there's generally only one runway and not many taxiways. Nevertheless, aircraft taxiing when there is no ground controller comply with "see and be seen" by looking outside and turning on aircraft lights. Furthermore, if the aircraft has a radio, it should self-announce its movements on the ground.


What are these small engine inlets on the Super Hornet?

These are the auxiliary air inlets for the ECS (Environmental Control System):

(image source)

They provide air to the primary heat exchanger (A18), which is then exhausted via the ram air exhaust (A20, the tubes visible behind the inlets in your picture).


Is there a relationship between control surface deflection and a particular turn radius or bank angle?

You need the ailerons only to bank the aircraft; once the bank angle is reached, the aileron deflection is mostly close to zero. I assume we are talking about stationary turns, so speed and aircraft mass will not change significantly over the duration of the turn.

While turning, several moments need to be balanced to keep the roll angle constant, and a good design does this without requiring aileron input:

The rotation around the vertical axis causes more airspeed over the outer wing, increasing its lift. This causes a rolling moment into the turn.
The rotation around the vertical axis causes a sideslip condition at the vertical tail which causes a yawing moment against the turn.
The inertial forces try to pull the wings level. This causes a rolling moment against the turn.

However, the elevator needs to be held at a slightly more negative angle than in level flight to pull the required load factor $n_z$. In a turn, the load factor is proportional to the bank angle $\Phi$:
$$n_z = \frac{1}{cos \,\Phi}$$
Radius $R$: $$R = \frac{v^2}{g\cdot tan\,\Phi}$$
Angular velocity $\Omega$ (rad/sec): $$\Omega = \frac{v}{R} = \frac{g\cdot tan\,\Phi}{v}$$
The amount of elevator deflection needed depends on the stability margin (expressed as $\frac{c_{m\alpha}}{c_{L\alpha}}$) of the airplane, its pitch damping (expressed as $c_{mq}$) and elevator effectiveness (expressed as $c_{m\eta_H}$).


How feasible digital radio communications would be?

Digital is not always better.  Digital modes have been created for amateur radio use; the amateur radio VHF 2m band (144–148 MHz) is very similar to the VHF aircraft band (108–137 MHz).  I have a radio that uses both FM and a digital mode on the amateur 2m band.  Here are some notable differences between FM and digital:

When the signals are strong, the sound quality of FM is slightly better because there are no digital artifacts
When the signals are weak, digital sounds better because there is no static
When the signals are very weak, FM is definitely better because digital either degenerates into unintelligible loud tones ("sounds like R2D2" is what hams say) or is not decoded at all, but analog signals can still be understood with difficulty
Only one digital signal should be transmitted at a time on a channel; if two signals are there at the same time, the stronger signal might get through, but more likely neither signal will get through

The reason that old-fashioned AM has been kept for all these years is that if two signals are there at the same time, both signals can be heard and understood (perhaps with difficulty).  This is a significant benefit; a quieter signal, perhaps from an aircraft further away from the airport, has a much better chance of breaking through to be heard on a busy frequency.  FM and digital modes can't offer that benefit.

Digital radios are not intrinsically more capable than analog radios given the same power levels.  Digital radios can use slightly less bandwidth for the same audio quality, packing more channels into a band, but that's not very relevant for aviation.

The antenna size varies by the frequency, regardless of whether the radio is analog or digital: the higher the frequency, the smaller the antenna.  Switching to digital wouldn't make the antennas any smaller, unless the frequency band changes also.  A higher frequency band would make the antennas smaller, but finding a new large frequency band for aviation use worldwide would be very difficult.


In a flat spin, does the F-16 use its rudder deflection against the rotation for recovering?

It is not possible to have the rudder deflection because the huge amount of AOA and control law take that in consideration and cancel (fadeaway) the pilot rudder inputs.Activating the MPO the slabs moved  max in order to get the nose down to lower AOA and after that we can get responses from the rudder .https://www.flightglobal.com/f-16-spin-recovery-technique-invented/15027.article


Could a shrouded fan blade with long chord length be efficient?

The main objective of the engine is to generate required power $\text{P}$, which is:

$$\text{F} \times \frac{D}{T}$$

where $F$ is force, $D$ is distance, and $T$ is time.

Power generated by modern jets through continuous combustion of fuel dwarfs their piston predecessors.

Next up is efficiency. As in wings, longer, thinner blades do a better job converting this power. A typical measurement is the thrust-specific fuel consumption:

$$\frac{g}{(s \cdot kN)}$$

which is fuel flow (fuel over time) per thrust.

Piston engines went from 2 to 3 to 4 blades, enabling more thrust output, but the "wake", or turbulence generated from one blade lowers the efficiency of the next one following it. 1 blade is most efficient, but to get more thrust from the more powerful engines, some efficiency is sacrificed. Fan jets follow this trend with many blades.

But short blades with a very long chord would be hopelessly inefficient for generating thrust in air. A very good example of this thinking is the modern windmill design, with fewer, longer blades than the old style mills. The faster you turn, the more you want to be like the modern mill. The turboprop makes the most of propeller efficiency and turbine power but:

All types of props or ducted fans reach a speed limit where their own drag makes them less efficient than low bypass turbojets. Propellers reach this limit before fans do, which is why we see fans on longer range airliners.

So we did not get to noise reduction with this concept, which is relegated to desk top fans.

Modern jets do have some success with noise reduction by controlling their fan blade tip speeds, and by improving the design of their containment housings (nacelles).


Should operations such as landings or approaches be logged when acting as pilot monitoring?

The Pilot Monitoring (PM) or Second In Command(SIC) cannot log the approach. FAA has answered this in a 1999 letter:

  You then ask if, for the purposes of maintaining instrument currency, an instrument approach on the above flight flown by the PIC can be logged as an instrument approach by the SIC.  The answer is no.  As the SIC you have not "performed" the approach as contemplated by FAR 61.57(c) because you were not the sole manipulator of the controls during the approach.


How do pilots decide what their cruising altitude will be?

As has been stated, ATC will assign you an altitude, taking into account your requested altitude, traffic conditions, and of course the FAR.

Peter's formulas will apply from a design standpoint. The aircraft designer will use something like that to calculate typical values, which will be included in the aircraft's operating handbook.

The table below is listed by pressure altitude and gross weight. At each combination there will be performance values such as:

Average N1 (for a turbine)
Max TAT for thrust rating
IAS Knots
Mach number
ISA fuel flow LB/HR/ENG
ISA TAS Knots

The flight distance will determine the approximate gross weight, which corresponds to an altitude and cruise speed that provide the best efficiency. Here is an example from a virtual 737 handbook, with the values I listed. The optimum performance is in blue. Higher gross weights have been removed for clarity.

Airlines may have their own performance tables, choosing a custom balance of efficiency and speed. Dispatchers for the airline will take the flight information and decide on a cruising altitude for filing the flight plan, which the pilot will then receive. As you can see, as the aircraft burns fuel and gets lighter, it will be more efficient at higher altitudes. This is the step climb that Peter mentioned, where the aircraft will climb to higher altitudes as the flight progresses when they are cleared by ATC.

Modern planning systems can take into account weather factors such as winds aloft and turbulence to pick the most efficient route.


Why the Mig21 don't use the ailerons like control surfaces on delta wings at landings or take off?

I'm no expert on the plane, but wikipedia claims the Mig-21 has separate flaps and ailerons.

  On the trailing edge there are ailerons with an area of 1.18 m², and
  flaps with an area of 1.87 m².

The common reasons for not combining flaps and ailerons are that it reduces aileron response and increases the chance of stalling the wing tip (which results in a violent roll in the direction opposite to what you want).

As the Mig-21 has a separate horizontal tail for pitch control, there's no need to use elevons.


What factors determine the direction of the resultant force vector?

Yes, the resulting force is not perpendicular to the wing's chord but can point either way, slightly forward and backward. The very first polar charts which were published show this nicely, because those plots were true polar plots and used the wing chord as the reference orientation for 0°.

Illustration on page 196 of Otto Lilienthal's "Der Vogelflug als Grundlage der Fliegekunst" showing measurements on model wings as polar plots (source). Note the left part: Here the forces are plotted in the wing section's coordinate system.

The N/A relationship was covered by the work of Edward C. Polhamus, who did a lot of research on this at NACA Langley and published several papers with equations for calculating the leading edge thrust, the force which helps to tilt the resultant force vector forward.


What is the main source of yaw stability?

Wing sweep does affect yaw stability, but all planes with a vertical tail will "weathervane" into the wind.  It seems you are on the right track considering angular drag as a mechanism of stability, angular lift works even better.  A vertical stabilizer can act as a vertical wing.  Symmetrically, it can generate lift against either deflection.

Secondly, the "overshoot" is a real concern in design, but will be a function of weight as well as "angular drag". Much harder to stop a piano on ice compared to a light cardboard box.  A tail will typically be light, pivoting around the center of gravity.  Ample tail area will make it easier to control.

Finally, as far as "damping" is concerned, one must realize the "viscosity" of air will resist motion as well.  Once a force is removed, drag will help it slow to a stop, so the opposite "correcting force" need not be as large.


What procedures exist to take control from an "unsafe" pilot?

This is a true "nightmare scenario" and really approaching -- if not beyond -- the limits of the realm of CRM.  The assumption of CRM is that while pilots can get task saturated, focused on "making it (the approach) work out", and otherwise lose track of the situation, everybody is willing to listen to reason, if it is just presented with sufficient clarity.  If a pilot is so far gone beyond that point that he is absolutely determined to take his approach to its completion, you're approaching a different scenario.

Let's stipulate at the outset that this sort of a scenario is incredibly rare. Good pilots can get so focused on making things work that they lose situational awareness, but a clear statement like "we're 40 knots fast & two dots high on glide slope, GO AROUND" will typically snap pretty much everybody out of it.  The captain who is so wrapped up in his authority that he's willing to ignore an FO's repeated direction to go around is pretty rare.

That said... in the nightmare scenario, the FO's options become:

Keep making callouts, more directive, more urgency, yell louder.
Tell ATC that "we need to go around" on the hope that ATC directing "Flight 123, go around, fly runway heading, maintain 3000 feet" may accomplish what the callouts didn't.
Raise the landing gear.
Push the power up or otherwise fight for control of the aircraft.
Attack the flying pilot, perhaps with the aircraft logbook (metal cover) or a heavy flashlight or some other improvised weapon.

At this point, the FO is in the awful spot of having options that have a limited chance of success and in several cases, huge risk of making a bad situation even worse.  There is no "policy" solution to this sort of a scenario.  That a captain would have ignored repeated GPWS callouts and FO callouts is beyond the realm of what policy ever imagines.

As I said before, this sort of scenario is almost unimaginably rare.  Pilots just don't often reach the level of being an airline captain without sorting out the need to accept a "Go Around" callout from their First Officer.  Are there arrogant pilots out there?  Absolutely.  Arrogant enough to get to the situation mentioned in the OP?  Very, very, very few, and very far between.


What kind of material should I use for rudder skins?

Some aircrafts have had fabric tails over the years that held up just fine. The Mooney Mite (M18) comes to mind. It topped out around 140Kts but flew just fine with a fabric covered empennage. The Vought F4U Corsair also had a full fabric empennage and operated well in excess of your quoted speeds so there is no problem using fabric for speeds you speak of. The FAA has a decent resource on fabric covering here thats worth reading through.

The problem is less about interfering with yaw and perhaps interfering with everything else. Fabric is not as widely used anymore now that we have engine power to compensate for heavier airframes as well as the ability to work with metals consistently and accurately. Fabric also requires routine maintenance as well as periodic replacement. Fabric has a habit of ripping and needing repairs as well as simply sagging over time causing it to require a potentially full replacement. Since a great deal of aircraft are metal skinned now the people left to work on fabric coverings are slowly dwindling as well.


Are the communications between captain and flight attendants standardized?

Again, since there has been a sparsity of answers, I'll try to add to Simon's excellent answer and give a bit of a different perspective. My answer is dated in that it comes from flying 747-100 and -200 aircraft in the 1990s at the last airline I worked for. Given what I am sure is a wide variability of cockpit crew & cabin crew communication practices around the world, it may still be relevant. Remember, though, this is pre 9/11.

The cabin crew typically would arrive at the airplane before the cockpit crew. The first interaction other than a quick hello as we came onto the airplane was usually the upper deck flight attendant coming into the cockpit within a few minutes of the cockpit crew (captain, first officer, flight engineer) getting settled. Company policy was that the upper deck flight attendant was to check with the cockpit at least every 20 minutes to see if they wanted anything. It's the captain's airplane, though, and she/he could set the tone. I always declined anything until we had reached cruise. Additionally, I would tell the flight attendant that checking every 45 minutes to an hour would be sufficient but that if they just wanted to come up to chat at any time that would be fine. We were usually flying 8 to 12 hour legs. I would also tell them that I preferred to be called Terry rather than Captain, though more often than not they still called me captain.

Company policy was that the purser (chief flight attendant if you like) was to personally come to the cockpit to inform the captain that "all doors are closed, all passengers seated." That was my cue to call for the before-start checklist. Likely the purser had already been to the cockpit earlier to let me know how the loading was going, who was in back, and any problems. I in turn would give the purser the expected flight conditions, estimated time en route and such. I wasn't big on the captain making announcements to the cabin. My policy was to give the info to the purser and let them handle cabin announcements as much as possible.

The next company-required communication was hitting the button that sounds the beep throughout the cabin when we climbed through 10,000 feet, and I'd turn off the seat belt sign then as well. If there were no weather/turbulence problems en route, the next usual communication was a call to the purser shortly before the start of descent. However, typically the purser would have come to the cockpit every couple of hours during the flight to chat.

Descending through 10,000 feet I'd hit the cabin tone button twice and turn the seat belt sign on.

Last cabin communication was hitting the cabin tone button and turning off the seat belt sign after the parking brake was set.

Hajj flights were a special case. The purser was always one of our people, but the flight attendants were supplied by the national airline we were doing the flights for under contract. The requirements included that the captain be notified if anyone became seriously ill. All Hajj flights were required to have at least one doctor onboard, who would be a Hajji as well. The purser would come into the cockpit to tell the captain, and the captain would ask if the doctor wanted to land for a medical emergency (they never did). The captain was also to be notified if someone died. This was not unusual on Hajj flights, and we carried body bags for that contingency. A death was not a cause for landing short of the destination.

There is an area that starts before descent that has religious significance to Muslims because of the proximity to Mecca. It was marked on the IFR en route maps. We were supposed to announce entering that area. I always did that personally because I had learned how to properly pronounce it's name (well, as close as I could). The irony of the situation was that here was a 747 from a Jewish-owned airline, captained by an atheist, telling a plane load of Muslims they were approaching Mecca, Islam's holiest city.


What helicopter is this in The Walking Dead?

(Source)

It is a UH-1 Huey.

  ... in the first episode of this sci-fi horror TV series about zombies in Atlanta, we see a pair of US army UH-1 Huey transports, painted with 'air cavalry' insignia, have been abandoned in a hospital car park.— rotaryaction.com

Looks like the main rotor has sunk down, should be higher up. Maybe a salvaged gearbox caused it to drop. Otherwise it's the same aircraft.


Why is it, with less airflow, you'll have less control effectiveness?

When deflected, the control surfaces (ailerons, elevator, rudder) cause an aerodynamic moment about the Aerodynamic Centre. A moment has a moment arm and needs to have a length reference - the aerodynamic moments are defined with reference to wing dimensions: wing span for rolling and yawing moments, and Mean Aerodynamic Chord for pitching moments. If we have a look at the pitching moment P:

$$ P = C_{r_{\delta e}} \cdot \delta_e \cdot q \cdot S \cdot MAC$$

With:

$C_{r_{\delta e}}$ = elevator coefficient (dimensionless)
$\delta_e$ = elevator deflection
$q$ = dynamic pressure = $\frac {1}{2} \cdot \rho \cdot V^2$
$A$ = wing area
MAC = Mean Aerodynamic Chord

$C_{r_{\delta e}}$, A and MAC are constants. So: pitching moment of the aircraft is proportional to elevator deflection, and to the square of the airspeed. Fly twice as fast, and the pitching moment from a certain elevator deflection will be four times as high.


What radios are airliners / large aircraft equipped with?

Numbering the radios that I can think of offhand in the old 747-100 and -200 aircraft that I used to fly produces:

2 VHF voice communications radios.
2 VHF navigation radio receivers for receiving VOR and LOC signals. The LOC frequencies are paired with UHF frequencies for receiving glideslope signals.
1 ADF (automatic direction finding) receiver.
1 HF (high frequency) voice communication radio.
2 transponders to send whatever the "squawk" is when interrogated. #1 was used on odd days of the month, #2 on even days. There are a number of standard codes, but ATC assigns a 4-digit code to each aircraft during flight under their control. There is never an 8 or a 9 in the code because it's an octal code.
1 SELCAL (selective calling) receiver, which will sound an alert if it receives a signal sent by a ground station. It may not be a separate radio but just a box listening for a tone on one of the voice communication radios.
1 weather radar, and, yes, radar is a radio (radio detection and ranging) employing both a transmitter and a receiver.
1 radar altimeter for use in the final stages of the landing approach. Some were "talkers" in that starting around 50 feet, they would announce your altitude in increments of 10 feet.
1 GPWS (ground proximity warning system). I'm not sure whether it and the radar altimeter shared a box/circuitry/antenaes.
1 GPS receiver, which we got only in the last few months before I retired in 1999
1 ELT (emergency locator transmitter)
life raft locator beacons. I can't remember how many life rafts there were.
life raft voice communication on 121.5 and maybe 243.0.

I may not have remembered them all.

Modern transport category aircraft would also have SATCOM. Military aircraft would have UHF voice communications and mission appropriate weaponry radios.


Do ducted fans have a future in forward flight aircraft? Can they be made more efficient than open rotors?

Fan shrouds are a fix for a problem that can normally be designed around in other, more efficient ways. They do reduce tip loses, but usually the tip loses are smaller than the weight and drag penalty of the shroud.

The fundamentals of prop/fan/rotor design is that thrust is proportional to the increased momentum of the air flow, but the power required to get that thrust is proportional to the added kinetic energy i.e. the ''square'' of the speed increase.

Therefore small, highly loaded fans will always be inefficient compared to a traditional helicopter rotor. The fact that they suffer from large tip losses only makes things worse.

So no, we won't see lots more ducts on future aircraft - except that jets already use ducts because the size of their fans are limited by ground clearance and keeping the fan blades subsonic.


Is my understanding of a gas turbine engine compressor correct?

..the rotors add dynamic pressure to the airflow..

  ..this dynamic pressure airflow is transformed into static pressure in the stator vanes.

are both incorrect partially correct statements, but can be open to confusion. Dynamic pressure is transformed into static pressure continuously, by narrowing the passage through the compressor. The rotors add total pressure to the airflow, some of which is extra dynamic pressure and some extra static pressure.

The rotor vanes increase the energy contents of the gas stream. Another name for the energy contents of a gas stream is enthalpy.
Energy contents can be transformed into gas speed when allowed to expand (dynamic pressure) or into static pressure when you keep the volume confined.

For ease of reference, just take a car tyre as an example. Some little rotating implements in an air pump at the gas station provide a pressurised air stream into the tyre. Stop pumping and measure the tyre pressure: what you're measuring is static pressure. The weather news talks about high pressure and low pressure systems, that is static pressure as well. It's energy contents that has not been converted into a velocity yet, like increasing potential energy of a rock by lifting it up further.

Now get a match stick and press on the tyre valve. The air streams out of the tyre, this air stream can be called dynamic pressure. You can use the outflowing air to inflate another flat tyre, you're then converting static pressure in tyre 1 into dynamic pressure into static pressure in tyre 2. End pressure in tyre 1 is lower than when you opened the valve: total energy contents of tyre 1 is now divided over 2 tyres. No energy was added, only pumps can do that, by converting electrical energy into air pressure energy.

For the axial compressor in a jet engine:
* The rotor vanes act as the air pump, and add energy into the air stream: total pressure is increased.
* The stator vanes do nothing with the energy content of the air stream: total pressure stays the same. The swirl is removed, and some dynamic pressure is converted into static pressure.

From The Jet Engine issue 5 by Rolls Royce: notice how the total pressure rises in the rotors, and the static pressure rises as a function of the passage narrowing.


What are the legal requirements for me to purchase an airplane that I will provide instruction in?

The requirement for 100 hour inspections is probably the biggest regulatory/legal item you'll come up against.

As for other regulatory items, there's some fuzz on the subject of whether providing the aircraft used in flight instruction and receiving compensation makes that aircraft "for hire" and triggers all the other FARs that come into play when operating an aircraft "for hire" (like the requirement for a working landing light, or the requirement for approved flotation devices if you're beyond power-off gliding distance from shore).

I could argue pretty convincingly either way (and there are some convincing arguments on the internet both ways), but I've not seen anything from the FAA that I would call definitive.
The safe interpretation would be to treat the operation as "for hire" unless you can get something in writing from your local FSDO or the FAA Chief Counsel's office saying that it isn't.
(Honestly the additional regulatory burden is really not that onerous - I mean don't you want a working landing light and life jackets anyway?)

As far as liability goes you're going to want to talk to an aviation insurance broker about at least three kinds of policies:

Insurance for yourself, as a CFI.
Insurance for the aircraft, as a rental aircraft/aircraft used for instruction.
"Renter's Insurance" for your students.

The first two cover you.  The third protects your students in case they damage the aircraft on a solo flight: your insurance company may try to recoup their loss from the student responsible for the damages (subrogation), and a (good) renter's insurance policy would cover such an occurrence, as well as paying for any other things which may have been damaged like airport lighting, parked aircraft, etc.

These insurance policies may also have additional requirements above and beyond those in the FARs.

Depending on your personal assets and the level of risk you're comfortable with an umbrella liability policy - either through your aviation broker or another broker/agent - may also be something worth considering (if you have such a policy written by someone who does not specialize in aviation make certain the policy does not have an aviation exclusion).


Are there standard ground-tether systems for unpowered aircraft?

In the United States moored balloons (or kites) are governed under Part 101 of the FARs (a much neglected and very short corner of the regulations that also covers amateur rocketry and "unmanned free balloons" -- looking at your profile it's probably a section you'd find very interesting!).

In this particular case you're probably looking for Subpart B - Moored Balloons and Kites.

The FAA is mum on the specific engineering requirements of mooring systems - I expect they anticipate you will work with structural and mechanical engineers to design a tethering system that can safely hold the loads your moored object will place on it (or just tie it to the biggest, most structurally secure thing you can find, with a nice heavy rope and a proper knot).

There are a few things they ARE pretty specific about though.

Some operating limitations (altitude, size, location, visibility).
The fact that you have to tell them about it in advance
(At least if it's more than 150 feet AGL, per 14CFR101.15)
Lighting and marking requirements for the tether(s)
(14CFR101.17, which basically says the mooring line must have pennants (daytime) and/or lights (nighttime) to ensure visibility)
What happens to Balloons if the tether breaks
(14CFR101.19, which basically says if the balloon breaks free of its moorings you need a "rapid deflation device" that gets it down in a hurry so it's not just wandering around up there).

Interestingly they don't seem to care so much if a kite escapes its moorings.


How is the cruise speed of an aircraft chosen?

The speed of the aircraft in cruise is determined by the forces in the horizontal axis: thrust and drag. Weight and lift are forces in the vertical axis; they do pop up in the horizontal axis, but are relatively tiny in cruise.

Image source

At low airspeeds, induced drag is the dominant factor: this is the drag that is proportional to lift and weight. At cruise speeds, induced drag drops off and parasite drag rises quadratically with airspeed. It is drag associated with the aerodynamic shape of the aircraft. At any weight, the most beneficial shape is the one that aligns the fuselage best with the free air stream: tilt the nose up or down from the Angle of Attack for minimum parasite drag and drag will increase, at any speed and weight. Wind tunnel tests and Computed Fluid Dynamics are the tools used for establishing minimal form drag.

However, for straight and level flight the vertical component of lift must indeed match the weight, so one of the parameters of the flight state must be tuned in order to get zero climb rate. Changing cruise speed is indeed one of the degrees of freedom to change lift, but not the best one. In the aircraft aerodynamic axes, lift L is given as $$L = C_L \cdot \frac{1}{2} \cdot \rho \cdot V^2 \cdot S$$

S is wing area, usually a constant that cannot be changed during cruise. So the degrees of freedom to change lift are:

Change lift coefficient $C_L$: this is done by changing Angle of Attack, by pitching up or down. Doing so creates extra drag and fuel burn, the least amount of drag is generally with the fuselage aligned with the free stream.
Change air density $\rho$: fly higher or lower. This is what is done when the aircraft gets lighter due to fuel burned: at higher altitude there is less air resistance and less thrust needs to be delivered by the engine, improving fuel burn without slowing down.
Change V. Flying slower as fuel is burned is beneficial for fuel burn per hour - but it takes longer for the aircraft to arrive, so fuel is burned for more hours.

So for varying weight, it is best to vary lift by varying altitude. Long range cruise aircraft would have the least fuel burn if they could gradually climb as fuel weight diminishes, however there are air traffic corridors which the aircraft needs to stay in. Cruise climb is done in steps instead.

From this lecture, which also provides equations for cruising at constant altitude (varying velocity) and at constant velocity (varying altitude). The latter wins.


What should I do to become a commercial pilot?

If you plan to train and fly in the US...

You should spend that money on an MSE or MBA, get your private/instrument, and then buy your own plane and fly whenever you want.

However, if you feel you must become a commercial pilot you should find a local flight school and lay out a plan with someone who has authourity to negotiate pricing.

-lay out your objective.  You are paying for a private license, instrument, all of the time building for commercial, and then commercial.  That's a minimum of 250 flight hours plus a lot of billable hours for a very lucky CFI.  You can negotiate an awesome rate if you guarantee the school that business in s short amount of time.

-DO NOT pre-pay more than $1000 at a time.  Keeping funds on account is fine, just don't give them more than you're comfortable losing if suddenly they close.  It happens.

-stick to a schedule.  Fly a lot.  It's cheaper to knock it all out at once.  You have to relearn stuff if you only fly once or twice a week.

-don't get caught up comparing part 61 and part 141 schools.  Just go with the most affordable option.

-research airline minimums.  A commercial cert won't necessarily get you a job.  If fact, a commercial cert means very little wothout hours to go with it.  Think about adding a CFI cert to your shopping list.


How to determine the thickness of an airfoil?

Factors for determining the wing thickness during the aeroplane design procedure:

Determine the required structure height, which follows from the aspect ratio determined by the aerodynamicists: the cantilever ratio, which is the structural wing semi-span divided by maximum root thickness. Statistical analysis has found that transport aircraft usually have a ratio between 18 and 22, lower means a lighter wing but more drag.
Stall behaviour: for thin wings the leading edge stall dominates, for thick wings trailing edge stall which is more gradual. This imposes a minimum thickness.
For aircraft cruising at M > 0.5: the wing thickness must be such that dive Mach number remain subcritical. Imposes a maximum thickness.
For good max $C_L$ a value from the sweet spot between 12 and 15 should be selected, see below = fig 7-9 from Torenbeek.

Torenbeek then concludes:

It is concluded that the root section thickness of transport aircraft should be chosen such that a good cantilever ratio is obtained. For a given taper ratio this implies that the thickness ratio at the root will increase proportionally to the aspect ratio. A thickness ratio of between 15 and 20 percent is in the interest of good performance when using relatively simple trailing-edge high-lift devices and provides adequate room for retracting the undercarriaqe. Thickness ratios above 20 percent may show diminishing returns due to the increasing profile drag and the relatively low maximum lift and this, in turn, limits the aspect ratio to a maximum of approximately 13 for cantilever wings.
Tip sections (without flaps) should be between 10 and 15 percent in order to attain a high maximum lift. This reduction relative to the root is also in favor of low structural weight.


During takeoff, why throttle forward then raise hand from throttle to push a button, instead of pushing button then throttling?

Actually he does push the button before selecting takeoff thrust.

Often1 the procedure on jets during take-off is to move the thrust levers about half way, wait for the engines to spool up and only then select TO/GA or Flex thrust as desired. In the video the pilot switches the display during this intermediate step. So the engines are not even spooled up yet and the aircraft is still moving slow. Plenty of time to stop if anything fails.

In fact even when nearing v₁ the reaction does not need to be that fast. The calculation of v₁ includes 2 s reaction time and correct response is more important. Look e.g. on this training video (it's A330, not A380, but the procedure is the same). The reaction is not that fast; they only retard the throttle after checking and calling the fault ("engine fire").

1It used to be that the engines could flame out if you added fuel too quickly, but that's no longer the case now when engines are managed by FADEC (full authority digital engine computer). Some manufacturers/airlines/pilots maintain the procedure, most likely to avoid applying full power if one of the engines manifests some problem early. Or at least the pilot in this video does it.


What do these temperature data listed in the EASA Type Certificate Data Sheet mean?

The Maximum Permissible Indicated Turbine Temperature (ITT) is the maximal operating temperature that you can accept without reducing power or shutting down the engine. This temperature is taken at the turbine entry and the limit is there to ensure good cycle endurance of the turbine blade. Higher temperatures and you will have increased fatigue degradation due to reduced mechanical properties. Now your question is why are there 3 different ones:
The maximum continuous is the maximal operating temperature of the engine for infinite life cycle endurance. At that temperature the engine turbine should not wear for the whole life of the engine. But in certain condition it might happen that the temperature exceed this value and in specific cases it was taken into account during the design.
The take-off temperature is what is going to dictate your power input, obviously you want 100%, but high AOA, slow relative speed means that your engine is not max performing and as you are applying full power, you might end up with a richer air-fuel ration than normal condition and see a temperature above your maximum continuous quite often. But the 5 first minutes of the flight at takeoff are critical so reducing power would be not good for safety, thus you allow for slightly higher temps, for a short amount of time.
And for the Maximum starting temp is the absolute limit you should never exceed. During startup the airflow inside the combustion chamber is not perfectly installed and it might happen that the combustion flame come closer to the turbine in addition to the richer air-fuel ratio than in normal condition, thus seeing increased temperature. But this should not extend for more than a few seconds or you'll have to shut down the engine.
Concerning the sea level static thrust this is the maximum output you can ask from the engine and only up to the max temperature indicated. Above that temperature you would see a decrease in performances to prevent exceeding ITT. This would then resume in reduced takeoff performances.


Why are fuel tanks in the wings filled first, and why are they used last?

It's for wing bending relief (for cantilevered wings). As the generated lift bends the wings upward, the weight of the fuel will counter that.

As the plane loses weight in-flight due to burning fuel, so does the need for wing bending relief (less weight → less lift), that's why the wing tanks are the last to be used.

For context, a Boeing 777-200ER can hold 29 tonnes of fuel in each wing, and each wing measures ~27 metres and is self-supported.

Example:

Let's say in our airliner each wing tank holds 100 units (200 total for both tanks), and the center tank holds 200 units, and you have a flight that needs 200 units of fuel.

Correct scenario: By filling only the wing tanks, the weight of fuel in the wings will counter the bending of the lift.
Incorrect scenario: By filling only the center tank, the wings will bend a great deal (maybe even beyond their design limit). This is not good, and even if it is within the design limits, the repeating [avoidable] stresses will shorten the plane's lifespan.

Example for order of use (schedule):

Our flight needs 300 units, based on the above, we will fill the wing tanks, and fill half the center tank.

Correct order: By emptying the center first, we have extended the duration of the wing bending relief.
Incorrect order: By emptying the wings first, we lose the wing bending relief, while the plane is still heavy.

Related: How is fuel stored and routed on a trijet with one engine at the tail?


The overwhelming majority of major airlines do lease at least some of their aircraft. And most airlines who choose to buy do not end up paying that full price tag.

In the case of Easyjet, around half their fleet is leased (as of 2013). Leasing allows airlines with weak balance sheets or with poor future prospects to increase capacity without locking capital.

In fact, the largest aircraft owners are aircraft leasing companies. For example, GECAS (General Electric Capital Aviation Services), the largest aircraft lessor, currently owns around 1,700 aircraft, being operated by 230 airlines around the world.

There are other (not state-owned and generally low cost) airlines, such as Ryanair, who are fond of owing most of their aircraft. What Ryanair does is negotiate very good procurement deals with Boeing (by buying large packs of planes, all being B-737s), use them for around 5 years, and then sell them before their price has gone down too low. This takes a burden on their debt levels, but seems to work for them so far on the long run.

This aircraft resell value is an important aspect to consider when comparing leasing vs purchasing, as well as tax incentives derived from amortization.

Legacy carriers (many of them state owned), on the other hand, have a tendency to purchase most of their fleet, and keeping them around for the full lifespan of the machine (around 30 years).

The actual price a company pays for a given aircraft is not public (understandably) and most figures you would be able to find are related to "list prices". However, in 2005 Ryanair was forced to disclose facts about one of the massive (by the time) purchases of Boeing aircraft. Apparently, they paid less than half of the public list price.

More current data on the actual price airlines pay for Boeing planes can be found here, where Javier Irastorza analyses the discounts Boeing is applying to their aircraft based on a balance sheet assessment.


Is it legal to overload a plane in Alaska?

Under some conditions, FAR §91.323 allows for a 15% increase (up to 12,500 lbs) in max gross weight in Alaska:

  (a) Notwithstanding any other provision of the Federal Aviation Regulations, the Administrator will approve, as provided in this section, an increase in the maximum certificated weight of an airplane type certificated under Aeronautics Bulletin No. 7–A of the U.S. Department of Commerce dated January 1, 1931, as amended, or under § 91.325 14 CFR Ch. I (1–1–05 Edition) the normal category of part 4a of the former Civil Air Regulations (14 CFR part 4a, 1964 ed.) if that airplane is operated in the State of Alaska by—

  A certificate holder conducting operations under part 121 or part 135 of this chapter; or
  The U.S. Department of Interior in conducting its game and fish law enforcement activities or its management, fire detection, and fire suppression activities concerning public lands.

  (b) The maximum certificated weight approved under this section may not exceed—

  12,500 pounds;
  115 percent of the maximum weight listed in the FAA aircraft specifications;
  The weight at which the airplane meets the positive maneuvering load factor requirement for the normal category specified in § 23.337 of this chapter; or
  The weight at which the airplane meets the climb performance requirements under which it was type certificated.

  (c) In determining the maximum certificated weight, the Administrator considers the structural soundness of the airplane and the terrain to be traversed.

  (d) The maximum certificated weight determined under this section is added to the airplane's operation limitations and is identified as the maximum weight authorized for operations within the State of Alaska.

One possible reason for this is that Alaska Statute Section 02.35.110 requires aircraft operating to/from and within Alaska to carry additional emergency and survival equipment:

  (a) An airman may not make a flight inside the state with an aircraft unless emergency equipment is carried as follows:

  the following minimum equipment must be carried during the summer months:

  rations for each occupant sufficient to sustain life for one week;
  one axe or hatchet;
  one first aid kit;
  an assortment of tackle such as hooks, flies, lines, and sinkers;
  one knife;
  fire starter;
  one mosquito headnet for each occupant;
  two small signaling devices such as colored smoke bombs, railroad fuses, or Very pistol shells, in sealed metal containers.

  in addition to the equipment required under (1) of this subsection, the following must be carried as minimum equipment from October 15 to April 1 of each year:

  one pair of snowshoes;
  one sleeping bag;
  one wool blanket or equivalent for each occupant over four.

  (b) However, operators of multi-engine aircraft licensed to carry more than 15 passengers need carry only the food, mosquito nets, and signalling equipment at all times other than the period from October 15 to April 1 of each year, when two sleeping bags, and one blanket for every two passengers shall also be carried. All of the above requirements as to emergency rations and equipment are considered to be minimum requirements which are to remain in full force and effect, except as further safety measures may be from time to time imposed by the department.


My windsock is erect, what does this mean?

Windsocks come in various sizes and speeds, but an FAA Standard Wind Sock aligns with the wind at 3 knots, and is fully extended at 15 knots like CGCampbell pointed out.

A typical wind sock (at least around here) looks something like this:

The stripes are actually useful:

The first stripe indicates a 3-knot breeze
(The wind sock has turned and aligned with the wind - usually you should look for an anemometer near the wind sock to determine if there's any appreciable wind because often the first segment is held open by the frame.)
The second stripe is ~ 6 knots
The third stripe is ~ 9 knots
The fourth stripe is ~ 12 knots
The last stripe is 15 knots or higher
If the windsock is missing you probably shouldn't be at the airport.
If the pole is missing you're probably on your way to Oz.

(You can actually get a far more precise estimation if you're willing to do some trigonometry, but this works well enough for most purposes.)


Is a flying wing optimal for high altitude craft?

For maximum altitude, the primary distinction to be made is whether the airplane flies at subsonic or supersonic speed.
Subsonic speed
There are several factors for maximum altitude, but the maximum altitude of specially developed high altitude airplanes is determined by the coffin corner which in turn depends on the product of lift coefficient and Mach number squared. With a given $c_L\cdot M^2$ of about 0.4, which is as good as it gets, now altitude only depends on wing loading which has to be as low as possible for the best altitude. Note that the best subsonic performances were reached with electric propulsion because combustion engines will not work anymore with the low partial pressure of oxygen at altitude.
A high $c_L\cdot M^2$ can best be achieved with generous rear loading on the airfoil. This will upset the longitudinal stability of flying wings - using rear loading at the center will require generous downforce at the tips, and it is the overall $c_L$ that has to be counted for $c_L\cdot M^2$. Reflex airfoils are poor in that respect and do not come close to the value of 0.4 for $c_L\cdot M^2$ which is easily possible with rear loading.
That the altitude record holder is a flying wing shows that low wing loading is the most important feature for high altitude, but the Helios had neither crew nor a serious payload, so its practical usability was very limited. Add to that the fact that the structure was too fragile to survive even moderate gusts and it becomes obvious that a super lightweight span loader is not a practical design.
Supersonic speed
High means fast, and fast means draggy. As can be seen from the envelope of successful designs, they need to fly in a small range of dynamic pressure and have to fly faster to climb higher. Now thermal peak loads will limit what is possible and electric propulsion is out of the question. As a rough estimate for the possible drag at supersonic speed, Dietrich Küchemann once gave this approximation:
$$\left(\frac{L}{D}\right)_{max} = \frac{4\cdot(M+3)}{M}$$ which can be improved for waverider configurations to:
$$\left(\frac{L}{D}\right)_{max} = \frac{6\cdot(M+2)}{M}$$
Regardless which version you choose, both show that L/D suffers with increased flight Mach number $M$. At Mach 5 your best hope for L/D would be 8, only bit more than what Concorde reached at Mach 2. Partial oxygen pressure is of no concern since recompression at the intake will raise the pressure sufficiently - now flow speed and gas temperature in the combustion chamber will set limits to what is possible. The high level of thrust also means that the engine will determine the configuration. Sustained flight at more than Mach 5 has so far only been possible with rockets.
This means your optimum configuration is a slender Delta wing with a lot of internal volume for the hydrogen fuel required by the scramjet or it is a cylindrical pressure vessel with fins.


Why do Boeing aircraft have serrated engine nacelles, but Airbus does not?

It doesn't appear to be a patent thing. The main work on the chevron (shaped nozzles) was done by NASA. Every design decision in an aircraft is a compromise and this was no different. The addition of chevrons for noise suppression leads to a (small) increase in specific fuel consumption and Airbus considered it not worth it. Flightglobal quotes Dougie Hunter, A350 chief engineer as saying:

  We didn’t get a noise advantage from chevrons, and there is a specific fuel consumption penalty, so we’ve not adopted them.

Airbus seems to have gone in the insulation and high bypass route for reducing noise. From the same article:

  Goodrich is to build the engine nacelle for the A350’s GEnx engine, with Airbus supplying the composite inlet, which incorporates a “zero splice” acoustic inner barrel to provide a new level of fan-noise reduction.

As an example of the acoustic treatment of nacelle in A320 family, Airbus says:

  The thrust reverser structure was acoustically treated along approximately
  half of its internal surface. It was clear that increasing this acoustic area would increase the acoustic sound absorption and hence decrease the overall measurable exhaust noise. The inner fixed structure was redesigned with increased acoustic area. In addition, the support struts and several fairings were also modified to include acoustic treatment. The result was an increase in the acoustic area of the thrust reverser by approximately 2 square meters (21.5 sq ft).

Airbus does use chevrons in some of the aircraft, like A321 along with nacelle acoustic improvements; however, the chevrons are available only in the inner (core) nozzle. The package is available as standard for CFM powered A321 aircraft and options are available for A320. The image below shows a A321 with chevron nozzles.

Image from pprune.org

According to Airbus:

  The noise reduction package is currently offered as the basic standard on all CFM powered Airbus A321 aircraft. It is also optional on all the other A320 Family aircraft.


Can the V-22 carryout vertical takeoffs with shorter blades?

The rotor size helicopter (or a tiltrotor, in this case) is determined by its aerodynamic requirements, most importantly, its hover characteristics. The main constraint is the weight that has to be lifted by the helicopter at a give a altitude.

In this context, it can be seen that the blades of V-22 are actually smaller. For example, V22 has a Max. TOW(Take-off Weight) of 27,400 kg. For achieving this, the V22 twin rotors of 11.6 m diameter, giving a rotor disc area of 212 m². A CH47, which has a Max TOW of 22,680 kg has a rotor disc area of 520 m² using twin rotors.

If we take single rotor helicopters, the CH 53 Super stallion has a 24 m dia. rotor having a disc area of  460 m² to lift a max TOW of 33,300 kg.

This lesser blade disc area of V22 limits is ability to hover at higher altitudes. The V22 rotor blades will have been optimized for required performance parameters. So, if the blade length is reduced (assuming airfoil is kept the same), vertical takeoff is possible though other performance characteristics will be severely affected.

The V 22 uses two Rolls-Royce Allison T406/AE 1107C-Liberty turboshafts, which do not produce any thrust.


Helicopter flight: Does the rotor disc plane and hub plane rotate along axis perpendicular to rotational axis?

The shaft does not tilt, but the disk does.

You understand the function of cyclic control correctly. It indeed changes the pitch of the individual blades, shifting the centre of lift.

However, the blades are not strong enough to take that much bending load. If the rotor was completely stiff, they'd quickly break off. So instead the blades are allowed to flap up and down. That allows the plane of rotation of the blades to change first when you apply cyclic input and the body attitude follows.

The body attitude follows. When the rotor tilts, the action like of lift gets tilted with it, so it no longer passes through the centre of gravity, which will create a moment that will try to pull the body into the attitude corresponding to the rotor. With individual flapping hinges or flexing there is additional, more direct torque on the rotor hub trying to do the same, while on teetering rotor this is the only effect and the way cyclic is rigged prevents the rotor from trying to tilt too far relative to the body.

See also How are pitching and rolling moments transferred from rotor to the body?


"All exterior lights" when crossing a runway? Landing light, too?

This is discussed in this question: Should landing light be off during line up and wait position?
When crossing a runway, you do use landing lights along with everything else, and since you're on a taxiway, the presence of the landing lights in this case isn't understood as intent to takeoff since you aren't lined up on a runway.
For an aircraft that is at the end of the runway, lined up & in a position to take off, that's when the idea of "landing lights on = intent to take off" applies. When on-to-hold, everything else is on, mainly to make the aircraft visible in a "please don't land on me" sort of way, but the landing lights off provides an assurance to Tower controllers & anybody who is crossing the runway down-field that you really are planning to remain stationary right now. Then, with takeoff clearance, the landing lights come on. And if I thought that I'd been cleared to cross the runway but the other aircraft (lined up) has landing lights on, I have an earlier cue that he is powering up, so I'll hold short & ask the controller what's up. Matters not if he was wrong, I was wrong, or controllers were wrong; we're all better off if the taxiing aircraft doesn't enter the runway ahead of somebody accelerating toward takeoff speed, and the concept of "landing lights on = intent to takeoff" helps there.
And, conversely, if I'm starting to advance power for takeoff & somebody with all lights on seems to be rolling toward "my" runway, all those lights (A) helps me see him all the better, and (B) gives me a cue as to his intentions.  So I might reconsider continuing the takeoff until things get resolved.
Conflicts like that are (thankfully) quite rare, but because the consequences are so grave, keeping everybody aware of everybody else's intentions is a really good thing.


Why can't we use APU bleed air for wing anti ice on the A320?

On multiple PPRUNE threads they incorrectly say:

  The APU bleed is much cooler than the engine bleed system, and would be ineffective for WAI.

But the reason is:

  The APU bleed temperature is unregulated and thus could damage the wing slats if used for anti-ice.

Highlight shows regulation of engine bleed temperature.


Can an FAA Pilot Examiner accept BasicMed in place of a medical certificate from a checkride applicant?

I think you may be confusing Basic Med with No Medical At All, some operations do not require any sort of medical exam

  (b)Operations not requiring a medical certificate. A person is not
  required to hold a medical certificate -

  (1) When exercising the privileges of a student pilot certificate
  while seeking -

  (i) A sport pilot certificate with glider or balloon privileges; or

  (ii) A pilot certificate with a glider category rating or balloon
  class rating;

  ...

  (8) When taking a practical test or a proficiency check for a
  certificate, rating, authorization or operating privilege conducted in
  a glider, balloon, flight simulator, or flight training device; or

Basic med can be accepted if you comply with the Basic Med regulations. However you need at least one valid medical (that can be expired) to be eligible for basic med, since a Class III medical is valid for 5 years (under the age of 40) its more than likely your training will be accomplished before it expires and thus you will have a valid medical when you sit for your check ride.

The FAA address this in this Q/A document

  Q17: Do student pilots need to hold a medical certificate when they go
  for their private pilot checkride?

  A: Individuals who are new to
  aviation will need to get one medical certificate if they want to fly
  under BasicMed. After that, they can fly under BasicMed forever, as
  long as they fly a BasicMed-compliant aircraft and never fly for
  compensation or hire. Most student pilots will still hold their first
  medical certificate when they apply for their private pilot
  certificate.

To trace the legislation exactly:

As you note for some student pilot operations as per 61.23

  (c)Operations requiring either a medical certificate or U.S. driver's license.

  ...

  (v) Exercising the privileges of a student,
  recreational or private pilot certificate if the flight is conducted
  under the conditions and limitations set forth in §61.113(i); or

This would potentially allow it but sends you over to 61.113(i) for more info

  61.113 Private pilot privileges and limitations: Pilot in command.

  ...

  (i) A private pilot may act as pilot in command of an aircraft without
  holding a medical certificate issued under part 67 of this chapter
  provided the pilot holds a valid U.S. driver's license, meets the
  requirements of §61.23(c)(3), and complies with this section and all
  of the following conditions and limitations:

which just bounces you right back to §61.23(c)(3) one section down from where we were earlier

  ...

  (3) A person using a U.S. driver's license to meet the requirements of
  paragraph (c) while operating under the conditions and limitations of
  § 61.113(i) must meet the following requirements -

  (i) The person must -

  (A) Comply with all medical requirements or restrictions associated
  with his or her U.S. driver's license;

  (B) At any point after July 14, 2006, have held a medical certificate
  issued under part 67 of this chapter;

So at some point you will need to get at least one medical. Most students do this along with either student pilot certificate (allowing them to fly solo) furthermore most complete their training within 5 years of that date although there are other cases. For example, you started your training in early 2006, got you class III medical/student pilot on July 15th of 2006 which is good for 5 years. Life gets in the way and you stop training for a while. Your medical expires in 2011 but you now decide to get back into the left seat. Since you never lost your medical and once held a valid medical you are legal to fly and train under basic med (and even sit for a check ride).


Is this test question correct about the causes of detonation?

Yes, the writers of test questions are human too.  It would appear B and D are the correct answers.

According to the Lycoming website, for pilots, the greatest danger for detonation in aircraft engines is too lean a mixture.  Running rich at full throttle keeps cylinders cooler. Answer B is correct. Excessively lean mixtures can also be caused by clogged fuel injectors or air intake leaks.

Lower octane also increases risk of detonation because it's "autoignition" temperature is lower than higher octane fuel.  Autoignition can happen without spark due to higher temperature and pressure.  This throws the "timing" of piston power stroke and ignition off, causing a "ping" or "knock".  Engine damage may result. Answer D is correct.

So running rich at high power settings, while producing slightly less peak power, greatly extends the life of your all important engine.


What is a weight-shift-control category aircraft?

Basically, it's a powered hang glider.

  Weight-shift control (WSC) aircraft means a powered aircraft with a framed pivoting wing and a fuselage controllable only in pitch and roll by the pilot’s ability to change the aircraft’s center of gravity (CG) with respect to the wing. Flight control of the aircraft depends on the wing’s ability to deform flexibly rather than on the use of control surfaces.

— FAA H-8083-5 Weight Shift Control Aircraft Flying Handbook

They're commonly called "trikes" and are literally big delta-wing hang gliders with a lot more structure and an engine. Check out a cockpit video of one in flight!


How could a turbocharger experience over-boosting due to cold oil?

The wastegate system uses engine oil pressure to drive the wastegate actuator, and this oil pressure is metered to the actuator by a controller that senses manifold pressure and throttle position and admits more or less oil to the actuator to drive the wastegate butterfly valve, to achieve the manifold pressure commanded by the throttle opening.

The responsiveness of the control system is sensitive to oil viscosity.  When the oil is cold, the controller and actuator is sluggish and laggy because of the thick oil, which can lead to overboosting when the throttle is opened quickly and the wastegate is unable to keep up, resulting in excess flow through the turbine and excess boost.


Why is Schaumberg Airport (06C) in Chicago an uncontrolled field?

Most likely, the airport was formed in the early-mid part of the 20th century as a small country airport outside of the Chicago metro area.  The city grew around it, similar to Compton-Woodley airport in Los Angeles or Cross Keys or Camden Co. in the Philadelphia metro area.  With the introduction of the modern airspace systems for commercial air travel the Class B shelves covered these airports but did not include them.


List of aircraft which are not certified to be flown by one pilot

I dont know of any list off hand but the FAA publishes all their type certificates here which do contain the relevant information needed to compile such a list. As mentioned in the comments most small GA planes are single pilot certified so if we start with that assumption you will find a lot of lists that cover the topic of "the largest single pilot certified aircraft" like this one. These lists provide you with the ones that are on the fence size/speed wise.


How does the nozzle diameter affect the thrust of a ducted propeller?

Welcome. I'm afraid your theory wasn't actually working. Reducing the duct's exit diameter led to an increase in its internal pressure, increasing load on the propeller, and likely even causing some reverse flow.

Nozzle design is a complex subject. I can't think of a way to condense it, even limited to one specific case, into a suitable answer; maybe I don't get it enough myself. Keep that in mind; the below is just one small shard of the whole and by no means the full picture.

In general, the job of a nozzle is to match the pressure at jet engine exit to that outside it. If the pressure is different, it gets matched outside the engine, where it doesn't produce thrust.

When the engine is a rocket, which creates high pressure, the nozzle needs to expand the gas, converting pressure to thrust through acting on the nozzle. When the engine is a cold fan, which accelerates air, it's the opposite - the nozzle needs to compensate for the loss of pressure with a bit of compression, so that the air stream can exit without fighting the pressure of outside air at the back.

It's important for a convergent nozzle not to compress the exhaust to a higher pressure than the outside air, else it will destroy thrust. That was your case, the nozzle was too narrow, so it compressed the air to above ambient - which caused it to try and blow back through the fan.

To give a practical answer, an optimal nozzle at these velocities would be very similar to a simple duct, narrowing just a percent or two at the end, with a smooth exit shape.


What is the difference between AHRS and ADIRS?

The most important difference is that an ADIRS contains an inertial system, which gives a position estimate and can be used for navigation. This is done by aligning to a known position on the ground and then integrating all changes in orientation (measured by ring laser gyroscopes) and velocity (measured by quartz accelerometers) to update the position. As a by-product you also get the orientation (attitude and heading).
The AHRS only gives this orientation information, but no position. It therefore replaces conventional gyroscopic instruments like a directional gyro and an artificial horizon. An ADIRS can usually be switched to ATT mode (instead of full NAV mode) in flight and then function as an AHRS without navigation capabilities:

(source: 737 NG FCOMv2 (11.10.21 - Flight Management, Navigation - Controls and Indicators))
The ADIRS also performs all computations done by an Air Data Computer (ADC), which usually comes installed separately next to an AHRS for glass cockpits, and therefore replaces the conventional pitot-static instruments.


How could "aggressor" pilots fly foreign aircraft without speaking the language?

A couple of things come to mind that enable this:

you don't become a fighter pilot if you are not intelligent and highly motivated
you are not learning a new skill, just doing what you are already trained to do in an environment that just looks different (this would somewhat exclude Russian helicopters)
the list of things to learn is really not that long, I'm taking the liberty to throw in a guess of 100 items
you have a huge organization backing you up (translations as mentioned in comments, intelligence data etc.)

So: You are a person that is able to fly fighter jets, most probably you are damn good at it if you are given the opportunity to fly a fighter caught from the enemy.

You learn new stuff easily, and you are thrilled to do this, which of course helps in the learning process. Your organization provides you with pretty much every bit of information about the task you are about to undertake, translated manuals etc.

Regarding the cockpit language barrier, it's not that hard to learn the labels on switches and gauges. For example the picture in the question: I took a not-so-wild guess that it's an altimeter, checked with translator and yes: высота is altitude in English (pronounced something like vysota but that really doesn't matter). From now on, when I see text that says высота, I know it means altitude. On Russian planes the pilot just has to remember the altitude is in meters, but since the label looks "weird" I don't think there's much chance of a mix-up.

Anyways, when operating a fighter jet, you learn the location and operation of the critical switches and systems by heart, you do not browse around the cockpit searching for switches when you need to do something.

Once you've become familiar with the user interface, the basic flying will be pretty much the same as in any western fighter.

P.S. There's one thing that really helps: Cyrillic numbers are not used anymore :)

P.P.S. this short film on Air&Space Magazine website tells very nicely and in a compact package of the findings made by Chuck Yager (Major at the time) and General Albert Boyd during test flights of the MiG-15. Thorough testing gave USAF critical information of the capabilities and weaknesses of the enemy fighter, giving them strategic and operational advantage.


Can short buildings near an airport affect runway winds?

Buildings near or on an airport are generally only restricted in height for obstacle clearance purposes.  I've never heard of a wind related planning limitation that would apply at Pearson (although there may indeed be other airports with building restrictions of some kind due to some kind of unusual wind effects).
The buildings on the north side of 24L's threshold end at Pearson can certainly produce a fair about of "burble" below 300 ft that would bounce light aircraft around pretty good on a day with strong winds.  They don't have to be all that tall; the area and complexity of the structures will produce plenty of turbulent flow in the surface boundary layer.
Anticipating this is a basic part of airmanship. Usually it's having an awareness of wind shadows caused by trees and hangars at small airports, but situations like Pearson with all the hotels and big hangars on the windward side of the threshold take it to another level. If I was landing there on a strong wind day on that runway and saw all the structures, I'd approach high and land farther down the runway to try to avoid the burble; same thing you do to avoid wake turbulence from a heavy that landed ahead of you.
If someone in an aircraft that only needs 1500 ft to land insists on landing on the threshold of a 9000 ft runway in spite of the turbulence generators to the right, they haven't been trained very well.
At the other extreme, if you were flying a Paramotor, you'd have to give the same consideration to small trees and houses on the upwind side of your landing area.  It's all the same pretty much, just different in scale.


Why are two-stroke engines nearly unheard of in aviation?

Several issues:

As you mentioned, high specific fuel consumption.  About to that of turboprops, but without the reliability. If you're going to live with that SFC, you might as well as go with turbines.

Poor reliability.  They are very sensitive to tuning and timing.  A 4 stroke piston aircraft engine will run with all kinds of things wrong with it.  Cam lobes worn down to nearly nubs.  Loose valve guides.  Horrible compression.  They can have compression readings that will cause most mechanics to ground them, but they will still make rated horsepower (Continental did testing to find this).  They are very "under-tuned", like a tractor or industrial engine.  You want this in aviation.  About the only thing that will make a 4 stroke aircraft engine blow up in your face is something like a thrown rod from a spun bearing or a cylinder that cracks open, and that requires bad maintenance or criminal neglect in the vast majority of cases.  2 strokes, in the ultralight world where they are widely used, have a reputation for letting go at any time (the only 2 stroke aircraft engine that even comes close to 4 stroke reliability is the Rotax 582 - but only close, and they're only reliable for a few hundred hours).

2 strokes require pressed together cranks with ball bearings because they have to depend on lubrication from oil mixed in with the fuel charge. So you can't have a forged one-piece crank (radials get away with ball main bearings but there is only one or two crank throws, and they still have dedicated oil lubrication).  With the only oil coming from what's diluted in the fuel in a 2 stroke, piston ring lubrication is marginal and ring life is poor.

Which gets us to longevity.  Although it has an official TBO of 2000 hours, if you take decent care of it, a Lycoming O-320 will run 3-4000 hours.  The plain bearings in a 4 stroke only see wear on startup; there is zero wear once they are pressurized because there is no metal to metal contact, and if you never shut it down and changed the oil on the go, the bearings would theoretically last forever.  Ball bearings lubricated with diluted oil have a finite life, and that and the barely lubricated rings limit longevity. You would never dream of a 2 stroke lasting that long in any galaxy in this universe.

2 strokes are popular in the ultralight world almost totally because they are cheap and have a superior power to weight ratio. You almost get a turbine's power to weight, and minimal cost, and that's worth living with the crappy reliability.  Ultralights get away with it because they crash going 30 mph not 70.

Problem is, a lot of the issues are baked into the configuration and can't be designed out.  Combine with with a business that is conservative by necessity, because your life depends on the conservatism, and it's no surprise.


What is the aspect ratio of T-tail for common twin turboprops?

Hmmmm.

[Source]

ATR42=6:1

[Source]

Dash8Q400=4:1


Why is the normal operating airspeed so much lower than the cruise speed in this table?

You really answered your own question. Vne is based on IAS, the actual aerodynamic pressure at any given altitude and speed.  This is why the Mach number is included too, as approaching transsonic adds additional stresses to the airframe.

TAS, as mentioned in previous threads will be much higher than IAS at 35000 feet.  It is fun to enter speeds and altitudes into the TAS calculator to see how close one gets to Mach 1 at 250 IAS when you climb.

TAS is groundspeed without wind speed and direction factored in.  It is the actual aircraft airspeed relative to the airmass. Notice 480 is Max Cruise.


What effect does the angle of attack have on lift and drag?

As angle of attack increases, both lift and induced drag will increase until sometime after L/D max is achieved.  Beyond that the lift will decrease dramatically.  This fundamental principle is the same for Doolittle's raiders as it is for a Cessna 150.


Will we ever see a single-engined airliner?

There are two major problems I see.

Even if you have an incredibly reliable engine how do you prove it is incredibly reliable. I can't seem to find figures for the target IFSD rate for the current higher ETOPs levels, but I find figures for early ETOPs of one per one hundred thousand hours. Lets say you improve that to one per billion hours, how exactly do you demonstrate it's that low? fly for a billion hours? Thats a hundred planes flying for a thousand years. This is why redundancy is the route taken for many safety critical systems, you can argue that the individual components are merely very reliable and then argue that the chance of two of them failing at once is extremely low
Where do you put the engine? If you have a single engine you want it on the centerline. That is not such a problem for props or low bypass turbofans, but it's difficult for high bypass turbofans.

Because of these two factors I doubt we will see airliners move to a single engine configuration unless we see fundamental changes in airliner design and regulation.


Is there an API to retrieve airport departure and arrivals?

It appears that Flightaware does have an API (both SOAP and REST) that would satisfy your needs.

Here is the documentation, see "arrived", "departed", "en route", and "scheduled".

Here's a code example from that page that gets data on flights en route to JFK and KSMO (this fits your arrivals criteria no?):

That said, you'll probably want to experiment with the API once you create an account and get a key to see if it meets all of your requirements.


Is it possible to embed CL, CD, dCLda, etc, into a tensor?

Yes, actually the vector of the nondimensional aerodynamic coefficients is related to the nondimensional forces using a coordinate transformation tensor. Then, this tensor depends on your coordinate system (stability axes, wind axes) which in turn depends on which coordinate system is more convenient for your job. For example
\begin{gather}
\begin{Bmatrix} C_{D_i} \\ C_Y \\ C_L \end{Bmatrix} = \Bigg[ \bar{\bar T^s} \Bigg] \begin{Bmatrix} \overline{F}_x \\ \overline{F}_y \\ \overline{F}_z \end{Bmatrix}
\end{gather}
where $\bar{\bar{T^s}}$ is your stability axes coordinate transformation tensor which incorporates the sines and cosines of the rotation angles and the right hand side vector is the nondimensional force components. For detailed derivations regarding this coordinate systems and their use you may want to check Chapter 6 of the book of Mark Drela, $\textit{Flight Vehicle Aerodynamics}$ from MIT Press.


What are the FAA's requirements for an experimental type certificate?

Found it. It's easy to get lost in the FAR's, but in case you're curious I managed to find the requirements I was looking for under 14 CFR 21.193:

  An applicant for an experimental certificate must submit the following
  information:

  (a) A statement, in a form and manner prescribed by the FAA setting
  forth the purpose for which the aircraft is to be used.

  (b) Enough data (such as photographs) to identify the aircraft.

  (c) Upon inspection of the aircraft, any pertinent information found
  necessary by the FAA to safeguard the general public.

  (d) In the case of an aircraft to be used for experimental purposes—

  (1) The purpose of the experiment;

  (2) The estimated time or number of flights required for the
  experiment;

  (3) The areas over which the experiment will be conducted; and

  (4) Except for aircraft converted from a previously certificated type
  without appreciable change in the external configuration, three-view
  drawings or three-view dimensioned photographs of the aircraft.

  (e) In the case of a light-sport aircraft assembled from a kit to be
  certificated in accordance with §21.191(i)(2), an applicant must
  provide the following:

  (1) Evidence that an aircraft of the same make and model was
  manufactured and assembled by the aircraft kit manufacturer and issued
  a special airworthiness certificate in the light-sport category.

  (2) The aircraft's operating instructions.

  (3) The aircraft's maintenance and inspection procedures.

  (4) The manufacturer's statement of compliance for the aircraft kit
  used in the aircraft assembly that meets §21.190(c), except that
  instead of meeting §21.190(c)(7), the statement must identify assembly
  instructions for the aircraft that meet an applicable consensus
  standard.

  (5) The aircraft's flight training supplement.

  (6) In addition to paragraphs (e)(1) through (e)(5) of this section,
  for an aircraft kit manufactured outside of the United States,
  evidence that the aircraft kit was manufactured in a country with
  which the United States has a Bilateral Airworthiness Agreement
  concerning airplanes or a Bilateral Aviation Safety Agreement with
  associated Implementation Procedures for Airworthiness concerning
  airplanes, or an equivalent airworthiness agreement.

  [Doc. No. 5085, 29 FR 14569, Oct. 24, 1964, as amended by Amdt. 21-85,
  69 FR 44862, July 27, 2004]


How do aircraft windshields not crack when flying at supersonic speeds through precipitation?

The Concorde had 2 discrete windshields for different stages of flight. During subsonic flight (mainly take off and landing) the nose was drooped and the inner windshield was exposed. For supersonic flight the Concorde would raise its drop nose which also contained an outer windshield that would cover the inner windows. This outer windshield was made of special heat resistant glass that was also tinted. It can be assumed that this outer windshield could also withstand any pressure exerted during supersonic flight. The bigger problem in the Concorde was heat: the nose had to have fuel pumped through it just to keep it cool enough. For what it's worth the Concorde flew at about 50,000ft when it was supersonic; this is well above most weather systems.

Drooped

(source)

In Place

(source)

If you are interested, there is an old paper you can find here that covers windshield failures and lists the Concorde as the #2 aircraft for it (747 comes in at #1) over the years the paper covers. Interestingly enough here is a table of causes:

Heat fatigue and manufacturing defects (what I assume they mean by saying the windshield itself is the issue) are the primary cause of the issue according to this data. Here is one of the patents filed for what appears to be the Concorde windshield; it's an interesting read!

Going further, if we look at the most extreme case of supersonic planes, the SR-71 Blackbird, the inside of the windshield was in excess of 120°C and the exterior of the nose area would be closer to 260°C during supersonic flight. This would turn any water into vapor if it came into contact with the surface. While I don't know the specifics of that, the Blackbird flew at close to 80,000ft, so it too was above most (if not all) weather. I can't yet find an official quote of what that windshield was made of, but heat was still a larger issue than hitting rain.

(source)

Here is an interesting paper on what happens to water droplets when they suddenly encounter a high-speed airstream. It might suggest that such an impact with an aircraft would also cause vaporization, aside from the heat of the surface causing it.

Even subsonic aircraft windshields are extremely strong; they can take continuous hits from solid hail chunks and not shatter.

(source)


Does aeronautical experience ever expire?

As far as the FAA is concerned, they do not expire.

As far as any (reputable) flight school goes, they will probably require a full, recent minimum 40 hours of training before they sign you off for the practical exam.

The good news is that your old training, no matter how rusty, probably means you'll pick up the basics quite quickly, and probably solo (again) faster than the average, and may very well be ready for your checkride close to 40 hours.  (The national average is a checkride around 50 to 60 hours.)


Does ATC use True Course or Ground Track?

A heading is the direction the plane's nose is pointed. A course is the direction it is actually traveling. The difference between the two depends on wind.

A true heading or course is corrected for magnetic variation; a magnetic heading or course is not.

Track and course are often used interchangeably, but technically a "course" refers to what you intend to do while a "track" refers to what you actually do.

ATC can only see your ground track on their radar screens, so logically that would be their reference for traffic advisories--and you may look in the wrong direction if you don't realize that, which I suspect was the point of the question.


Prestige Aircraft Inc describes the process here: http://www.paintaircraft.com/the-process.html

  Upon delivery of the aircraft a thorough inspection will be made with the owner. At this time any details and or problem areas will be defined prior to starting. Items such as windows, plastic parts, dents and corrosion will be discussed.

  All control surfaces, inspection plates, cowlings and fairings will be removed prior to stripping.

  Engine and remaining plastic/fiberglass parts will be covered with protective aluminum tape or plastic as appropriate.

  Airframe will be chemically stripped, removing all old paint and primers using aircraft grade paint strippers.

  Airframe will be pressure washed with hot water to remove any stripper residue.

  Airframe will be acid etched and “Alodyned” to further clean and enhance paint adhesion.

  Airframe will be further cleaned with mineral spirits prior to priming with epoxy chromate primer.

  Aircraft epoxy primer will be lightly sanded. At this time any dents and scratches will be repaired and reprimed.

  All fiberglass and plastic parts will be sanded and repaired as necessary, primed and prepared for top coating.

  Airframe and parts will be top coated with 3 coats Aircraft Grade Jet-Glo or Dupont Polyurethane paint. Trim colors, Reg. #’s and appropriate logos and placards will be applied.

  After painting, control surfaces are checked for balance as per mfg. Instructions. Hinges and control linkages are lubed prior to re-installation with new hardware.

  Freshly painted inspection plates and fairings are installed using new stainless steel screws and nylon washers.

  New stainless steel cowling fasteners are installed at an extra cost where appropriate.
  Wing walk is applied and new rubber wing root moldings are installed,(low wing aircraft).

  Windows are polished, interior is cleaned and vacuumed.

  A final inspection is made with emphasis on detail and overall quality.

  All appropriate log book entries are made and signed.


What would the call sign of a non-standard aircraft carrying the US President be?

This question is unanswerable in its present state. A glider is a certified and registered aircraft in the US. Ultralights are not register aircraft in the US. And, they are not typically in contact with ATC. Autonomous drone taxis have yet to receive FAA certification, airworthiness, and registration. So, the best manufacturers can do with drones at this time is to fly them unmanned or on test flights.
The bigger question is whether the Secret Service would allow the president to pilot any aircraft. Let alone fly in a non-certified, unregistered aircraft. After all, they do not allow the president to drive a car while he is in office.


How is the type of deicing fluid chosen and how much time is required for application?

I'm mainly addressing your "with the software I want to determine if deicing is needed for a flight."

There are three possibilities for whether deicing is needed or not, which are based primarily on actual and expected weather conditions (both at the point of departure, enroute, and possibly at the destination) and the airplane's capabilities:

Deicing is obviously not required
Deicing might be required, but is not obviously required
Deicing is obviously required

No reasonable pilot is going to request deicing in a case where deicing is obviously not required, so that leaves us with the other two. (Remember that deicing costs the airline money, and a pilot who regularly requests deicing for a short local hop in the height of summer is probably going to get talked to by their boss about it.)

If deicing might be required, it's basically at pilot's discretion, likely supported by company standard operating procedures and airplane manufacturer recommendations.

If deicing is obviously required, any pilot who does not request (and wait for) deicing before beginning the takeoff roll is delinquient in their duties, and is putting both the passengers, the crew, and the airframe at risk. Unfortunately, there have been crashes where a decision to not deice in conditions that required deicing were a major contributing factor.

Thus, if deicing is determined to be needed, yet not requested and waited for, then the only safe alternative remaining is to stay on the ground; effectively cancelling the flight.

Consequently, the options are:

Deicing is not needed before takeoff
Deicing is needed, requested and waited for before takeoff
Deicing is needed but not requested, thereby precluding safe execution of the flight

If it is known while the aircraft is still on the ground that a flight cannot be done safely, then the flight should be cancelled.

A flight cancellation can, simplistically, be modeled as an infinite delay.

Therefore, we can conclude that if deicing is needed, then waiting for deicing is required, and whatever this means in terms of additional delay will simply have to be tolerated as a necessity for the ability to safely undertake the flight. It's really not different from inoperative critical flight instruments; if, for example, all attitude indicators or airspeed indicators disagree, you're just going to have to wait to get that fixed, too.

In an ideal world, the choice of whether or not to deice the airplane is entirely unrelated to the time required to deice the airplane.


Why are the cockpit windshields on the A350 black?

The gold tint on the 787 window is a conductive coating for de-icing.

  Dreamliner jet flight-deck crews will view the world through commercial aviation's largest windshields by PPG, kept clear of fog and ice with gold and indium-tin oxide heating systems. source

The A350 also has a windshield anti-ice system. It is referred to in this answer. One thing both aircraft have in common is that they use curved windshields. I'm not sure if that adds to the black look. But what does add to the black sunglasses look is that the window frames are painted black.

Source

Btw: There's a thread on Airliners.net where most of them seem to despise the black window frames.


Which maneuvering speeds are included in the TCDS?

The speeds that they list in your linked TCDS (along with their corresponding V speeds) are:

Never exceed 171 mph (148 knots) CAS - VNE
Maximum structural cruising 140 mph (121 knots) CAS - VNO
Maneuvering 129 mph (112 knots) CAS - VA
Flaps Extended 115 mph (100 knots) CAS VFE

For a list of these V Speeds along with their definitions, see 14 CFR 1.2


Does a constant speed prop deliver max speed at max manifold pressure and max RPM?

For maximum speed, you need maximum power from your engine. This means running it at its maximum rated RPM with the throttle wide open, and maximum manifold boost pressure for a supercharged engine. The prop governor will then adjust the prop pitch to put the biggest possible load on the engine at that RPM.