NASA Open Sources Aircraft Design Software 116
First time accepted submitter sabre86 writes "At the American Institute for Aeronautics and Astronautics Aerospace Sciences Meeting in Nashville, NASA engineers unveiled the newly open sourced OpenVSP, software that allows users to construct full aircraft models from simple parameters such as wing span and fuselage length, under the NASA Open Source Agreement. Says the website, 'OpenVSP allows the user to create a 3D model of an aircraft defined by common engineering parameters. This model can be processed into formats suitable for engineering analysis.'"
Foamies Anyone? (Score:5, Interesting)
As someone who is into foam-built RC aircraft I am excited by the possibilities of this software. Electronics not included, a plane costs me about $10 to build. While I've built enough planes that I can just 'wing it' (See what I did there?), It would be fun to use this software to design RC planes...
Re:Give away, give it away now... (Score:5, Interesting)
Not affiliated, just a VERY impressed user.
Re:rethink plane designs for safety in emergencies (Score:5, Interesting)
What do you think that the airplane designers are doing? The aircraft industry is incredibly safety conscious. That's one of the reasons that everything is so expensive. The whole plane parachute is used on Cirrus airplanes and has saved some lives. Seats have been designed to protect people in impacts up to 26Gs. You can get seatbelts with airbags installed.
Every aircraft accident (at least in the U.S.) is investigated. The goal is to find out what caused the accident and how to prevent it. NASA has a program called ASRS which encourages pilots to report anything that might impact safety.
Please do a little research and see what is being done before accusing people of dragging their heels in the dirt.