Sparless wing

Hi!

I noted on the dianasailplanes.com, that the wing structure of szd-56 Diana is described as: 'Sparless, monocoque wing structure'. How is it made? Actually the question is, how is the necessary rigidity achieved? And is there any other sailplanes that don't carry spars around.

Regards,

Diana is described as: achieved? And is there any Don't know about the Diana, but the wooden Pirat center section was a bit like that, with multiple stringers reinforcing the stiffness of the monocoque structure.

Frank Whiteley

How far into the wing does the Libelle spar extend? I seem to remember that it was no great depth.

root too tip Nyal

Al

Talk of sparless wings go way back. The Sisu 1A used a semi-monocoque metal wing with attachments made of piano hinge material. The wings were attached to each other with about 40cm of 2mm wire threaded through hinges riveted to the top and bottom wing skins. The fuselage hung from the wings by lift pins.

With carbon composites it should be easily possible to build fully monocoque wings if reasonable attachment fittings can be made.

As I see it, the major advantages of composite monocoque wings are:

Lower construction costs, Weight savings, The surface waviness that sometimes develops over the spar caps is eliminated, The wing skins would have to be much stiffer (aerodynamically a good thing) since they must now carry all the bending and torsional loads.

A potential disadvantage is that the load bearing members (wing skins) are exposed and susceptible to damage. I suspect that it would behoove any pilot to very carefully inspect the wing surfaces for nicks and cracks before each flight.

Bill Daniels

It actually isn't that difficult to do. One the aircraft is very light to begin with about 400lbs empty. Two the Center spar arrangement on the fuselage carries the highest bending loads. Three the Wing is made of Carbon Fiber that can be made very Ridged. With a little bit of computer modeling it is not be to difficult to design airfoil shaped tube that can handle the required loads.

ASW17

Spars are very old technology, sparless wings are the wings of the future. Also allows for a much thinner wingsection.

So. In case of Diana. Is it something like in F1 cars where they do the main body or inner structure mainly keeping the sturdiness in mind and then the aerodynamic outer structure? I've seen some images where they fill the wings of Diana with water. There it shows some black (possibly carbon) structure which resides inside of the wing and the wingtip goes above it. It can also be special thing for connecting the wingtip.

Or is it just something that they call 'stressed skin'. If that's the case then i don't get how they keep the wing from collpsing in high bending loads.

Kaido

Foka

language please... this is a family group..

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