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open design practices and homebuilts.



 
 
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  #1  
Old August 27th 10, 07:52 PM posted to rec.aviation.homebuilt
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Posts: 32
Default open design practices and homebuilts.

I googled "open source aircraft" today, and got quite a few hits.

It appears that open source practices and hard-engineering
(engineering that ultimately transcends from digital into physical,
unlike software) are still pretty far apart from each other. There
are several sites that refer to themselves as "open source" aircraft
development sites. Widening the search shows that there is obviously a
broad desire to adopt some of the best practices from software
engineering into other engineering disciplines.

I've seen lots of "we're hip because we are open engineering" garbage
floating around, and after much revision of the wheel, it is still not
rolling any better or straighter. I'd like to point out to anyone who
is interested, that the grain of advantage in Open Source that most
applies to other disciplines, is: effective distributed revision
control. This is what products like Bazaar, and Apache Subversion do,
and it is the primary reason why tens of thousands of hours of prior
work, can be consolidated into a single project in a matter of
minutes.

While software like Wiki's and web forums work well for indevidual
projects with simple file sharing, they do not permit cross
collaboration between unrelated projects. If aircraft design was like
software, you'd be able to take a wing design from any airplane, copy
it, make some revisions, and save it into the design of a totally
different aircraft, all without impeding the development cycles of
either the original, or the new design. (yes I know, you can do this
with some very expensive CAD software packages, but if you pay that
much for software, your not going to publish outside of the
corporation) You would also retain the option of including any new
features added at later dates to either design into the other in a
trivial way.

Note that this _is_ possible to a large degree in homebuilt aircraft
design. But only in the case that good revision control practices are
observed.

IMHO there should be NO MORE "open source" aircraft projects, until
somebody gets around to implementing a public, vendor-neutral RCS
(revision control system) for aircraft development, so that _any_
designer can submit and begin new projects and contribute to those of
friends and peers.

This is something that perhaps the EAA could sponsor?
  #2  
Old August 27th 10, 10:02 PM posted to rec.aviation.homebuilt
Morgans[_2_]
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Posts: 3,924
Default open design practices and homebuilts.


wrote

IMHO there should be NO MORE "open source" aircraft projects, until
somebody gets around to implementing a public, vendor-neutral RCS
(revision control system) for aircraft development, so that _any_
designer can submit and begin new projects and contribute to those of
friends and peers.

This is something that perhaps the EAA could sponsor?


I doubt there is enough interest to make it worth EAA's while, or anyone
else.

If you are designing your own airplane, you probably (or most do) want to do
a clean sheet design. If you know enough to be attempting your own design,
then you probably don't need to slow yourself down trying to adapt someone
else's details. You just do it yourself.

Plus, many that are designing and building their own are not capable, or
don't desire to put it all down in a computer. What does that really gain
them? A couple good shop sketches, and start building, is their most likely
course of action. If they do find the need to vary the design to
accommodate some needed change, why would they want to take the time to go
put the change into the computer. Only someone who is planning to publish
the design, or otherwise go into business would do that, and they sure are
not going to be interested in publishing the changes, and giving the whole
thing away for free!

I won't call you and others like you cheap *******s (g) because I don't know
you. That is kinda' tongue in cheek, but I think the basic idea conveyed is
correct. You just will not find a lot of people giving away something as
valuable as an airplane plan for free, when they could be selling it.

If you want to buy plans, there are boatloads of people willing to sell them
to you for a couple hundred per pop. Buy a few plans and change and scale
them like you need them to be, for your needs.

Sorry I'm not more optimistic, and I really don't intend to offend. That
just is the way I see it.
--
Jim in NC


  #3  
Old August 28th 10, 01:53 AM posted to rec.aviation.homebuilt
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Posts: 32
Default open design practices and homebuilts.

On Aug 27, 9:02*pm, "Morgans" wrote:
wrote

IMHO there should be NO MORE "open source" aircraft projects, until
somebody gets around to implementing a public, vendor-neutral RCS
(revision control system) *for aircraft development, so that _any_
designer can submit and begin new projects and contribute to those of
friends and peers.


This is something that perhaps the EAA could sponsor?


I doubt there is enough interest to make it worth EAA's while, or anyone
else.


SNIP


Plus, many that are designing and building their own are not capable, or
don't desire to put it all down in a computer. *What does that really gain
them?


Peer review, CAM support (and everything it implies), known revision
history, peer contributed support documentation, Preexisting
algorithms for doing structural, aerodynamic and flutter analysis,
language portability, a common persistent knowledge base, and
diversification of liability to name a few.


*A couple good shop sketches, and start building, is their most likely
course of action. *If they do find the need to vary the design to
accommodate some needed change, why would they want to take the time to go
put the change into the computer. *Only someone who is planning to publish
the design, or otherwise go into business would do that,


There are quite a few folks who use CAD as a primary design tool. A
cocktail napkin sketch is usually as far as I go before CAD.


and they sure are
not going to be interested in publishing the changes, and giving the whole
thing away for free!


In open source environments intellectual property is considered a
marketing resource, not a product. That doesn't preclude it from
positively effecting revenue. What you typically find is that the
development cycle itself becomes a pre-release marketing campaign,
and subsequently once production is in place you have customers (who
are often also contributors) already standing in line.

If you were going to make a business out of it, the appropriate place
for revenue generation would be in support. So for example, you could
give the plans away for free, and put your cell phone on a 1 900
number to answer builders questions.


I won't call you and others like you cheap *******s (g) because I don't know
you. *That is kinda' tongue in cheek, but I think the basic idea conveyed is
correct. *You just will not find a lot of people giving away something as
valuable as an airplane plan for free, when they could be selling it.


For small runs, (like plans) copyrights generally aren't very
valuable. The ratio of litiigation costs vs. revenue recovered just
don't add up. So the value of a plan is really the exclusive posession
of it (which diffuses as popularity increases, since the probability
of public release increases). It is worth noting that reselling plans
you've bought, unless they are licensed non-exclusively, may be just
as much a violation of copyright as making copies and selling them. It
isn't the paper you pay for when you buy plans, but the ideas on it,
and your license will generally restrict you from transfering the
ideas, even though you own the paper.

There are designs that are out of copyright, but people still sell
plans for them. This is the same thing as reselling copies of Open
Source CDs. You are selling the media only, the intellectual property
isn't yours to sell.


If you want to buy plans, there are boatloads of people willing to sell them
to you for a couple hundred per pop. Buy a few plans and change and scale
them like you need them to be, for your needs.

Sorry I'm not more optimistic, and I really don't intend to offend. *That
just is the way I see it.
--
Jim in NC


No offense taken. Please consider my words with the same grain of
salt.

My interest here is not in saving a few bucks, but rather creating a
means for storing all of this knowledge that is dying off. There
aren't that many people who know how to do this stuff, and a big
honking public repository isn't such a bad idea IMHO. If it can be
done in a way that is consistent with the best available practices in
digital publishing, even better.

There seems to be this assumption around that open source means no
revenues can be generated. That is anything but true. There are
hundreds of open source products that have revenue generating support
infrastructure behind them. Often open source products create markets
for other products that would never have existed otherwise. (a large
percentage of Internet enabled products for example)

Also, there is such a thing as people who WANT to contribute to the
public domain! Should they be denied the right to do so? Some people
think so, which is why the GPL came into existence in the first
place.

The core questions a

1. Would it improve the quality of the available intellectual
property?
2. Would it improve the popularity of homebuilding?
3. Would it positively effect net revenues for business's in
homebuilding?

While there would be some winners and some loosers, I believe the
answer to all three questions, over the long term, is yes.

Matt
  #4  
Old August 28th 10, 05:29 AM posted to rec.aviation.homebuilt
Bug Dout
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Posts: 109
Default open design practices and homebuilts.

" writes:

This is something that perhaps the EAA could sponsor?

Bwhaahahahahah! That's a good one.

The EAA can't even sponser a decent web site. They're so old-fashioned
they yearn for the days of the Brothers Wright.
--
Among creatures born into chaos, a majority will imagine an order, a
minority will question the order, and the rest will be pronounced
insane.
--Robert Brault, www.robertbrault.com
  #5  
Old August 28th 10, 05:57 AM posted to rec.aviation.homebuilt
Lamb
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Posts: 3
Default open design practices and homebuilts.

Matt,

I'm sorry, but I beg to differ.

To start with peer review.

Who are the peers?
How many airplanes have they designed, built, and flown?


Business?
Most of the plans only aircraft are just that - plans only.
Having built and test flown the airplane, selling plans is
not a terribly expensive endeavor to get into.
But it's not a big money machine either.
How many sets of plans do you thing are sold for each design out there?

How many airplanes do you think are built every year - kits included?

Even the simplest airplane takes scads of time and money to develop.
Are the "open source" people going to contribute to that?




The core questions a

1. Would it improve the quality of the available intellectual
property?


Not in the least. You may re-draw the plans in CAD. But what
does that accomplish? You have pretty plans, but has anything
been added in the way of detail? If so, where did that information
come from?

2. Would it improve the popularity of homebuilding?


No.

3. Would it positively effect net revenues for business's in
homebuilding?


No. There are only so many people who will ever build an airplane.
Completion rates are amazingly low.
ANd that's not because the plans are hard to read.


While there would be some winners and some loosers, I believe the
answer to all three questions, over the long term, is yes.


I'm sorry, but I beg to differ...



Richard

  #6  
Old August 28th 10, 02:50 PM posted to rec.aviation.homebuilt
[email protected]
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Posts: 32
Default open design practices and homebuilts.

On Aug 28, 4:29*am, Bug Dout wrote:
" writes:
This is something that perhaps the EAA could sponsor?


Bwhaahahahahah! *That's a good one.

The EAA can't even sponser a decent web site. *They're so old-fashioned
they yearn for the days of the Brothers Wright.
--
Among creatures born into chaos, a majority will imagine an order, a
minority will question the order, and the rest will be pronounced
insane.
--Robert Brault,www.robertbrault.com


Actually, I like the new oshkosh365 site. It looks like they are
migrating to a new content management system. It looks pretty nice,
and there will likely be a solid API available for extending it.

If not EAA, how about the Smithsonian? From what I understand they've
got miles of old drawing and plans, and I'd imagine transliterating
the most popular drawings into CAD would at least offset some
postage.
  #7  
Old September 1st 10, 03:04 AM posted to rec.aviation.homebuilt
Peter Dohm
external usenet poster
 
Posts: 1,754
Default open design practices and homebuilts.

"Morgans" wrote in message
...

wrote

IMHO there should be NO MORE "open source" aircraft projects, until
somebody gets around to implementing a public, vendor-neutral RCS
(revision control system) for aircraft development, so that _any_
designer can submit and begin new projects and contribute to those of
friends and peers.

This is something that perhaps the EAA could sponsor?


I doubt there is enough interest to make it worth EAA's while, or anyone
else.

If you are designing your own airplane, you probably (or most do) want to
do a clean sheet design. If you know enough to be attempting your own
design, then you probably don't need to slow yourself down trying to adapt
someone else's details. You just do it yourself.

Plus, many that are designing and building their own are not capable, or
don't desire to put it all down in a computer. What does that really gain
them? A couple good shop sketches, and start building, is their most
likely course of action. If they do find the need to vary the design to
accommodate some needed change, why would they want to take the time to go
put the change into the computer. Only someone who is planning to publish
the design, or otherwise go into business would do that, and they sure are
not going to be interested in publishing the changes, and giving the whole
thing away for free!

I won't call you and others like you cheap *******s (g) because I don't
know you. That is kinda' tongue in cheek, but I think the basic idea
conveyed is correct. You just will not find a lot of people giving away
something as valuable as an airplane plan for free, when they could be
selling it.

If you want to buy plans, there are boatloads of people willing to sell
them to you for a couple hundred per pop. Buy a few plans and change and
scale them like you need them to be, for your needs.

Sorry I'm not more optimistic, and I really don't intend to offend. That
just is the way I see it.
--
Jim in NC

Agreed, and also a little more that I learned the first time that I
specified a small project to be formed from sheet aluminum.

There's a mildly embarrassing story that I tell on myself from time to time
that illustrates just a little of the problem inherent in drawing up nice,
plans to produce something that could readily just be hammered together and
used. Sometime in the freshman or sophomore year of mechanical engineering,
I took mechanical drafting--and I dare say that I was much above average.
It happened that, in class, we were also taught how we might expect sheet
metal to accept bends in the course of forming on a brake--which were taught
that the determining dimmension would be the center of the cross section of
the material with the result that the material inward from the center would
compress and the material outward of the center would stretch. Some years
later, I needed to specify the dimensions for a custom chassis for an
electronic device. I confidently drew up the plans, using just a little of
the fruit of that earlier education, and when the parts arrived the drill
holes were all misplaced--by (drum roll) about half of the thickness of the
material. Of course, I immediately challenged the folks at the shop that
did the work, and immediately learned that (another drum roll) I had been
taught pure popycock!

The moral of that sad little story is that cad drawings, or really any
drawings, which are supposed to permit a physical product to be accurately
reproduced, need to be drawn and/or reviewed by people who are familiar with
the way that such items are manufactured in the real world. Therefore, if
anyone is serious about creating fabrication drawings, I would strongly
advise that they start out with a few drawings of inexpensive sample parts
that can be used to evaluate some of the discrepancies that could occur; and
then pass the drawings, without any special explanation, to someone
experienced in fabricating from drawings. The result will determine whether
the drawings conform to real world practices.

That is not to disparage the Open Source idea. At least in the case of
computer software, Open Source seems to result in at least as good a product
as closed source proprietary and has the added feature that the program and
everything created from it won't become useless in the event that the
originating company ceases operations.

Just my rather long $0.02
Peter



  #8  
Old September 4th 10, 01:38 PM posted to rec.aviation.homebuilt
[email protected]
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Posts: 32
Default open design practices and homebuilts.

On Sep 1, 2:04*am, "Peter Dohm" wrote:
"Morgans" wrote in message

...



wrote


IMHO there should be NO MORE "open source" aircraft projects, until
somebody gets around to implementing a public, vendor-neutral RCS
(revision control system) *for aircraft development, so that _any_
designer can submit and begin new projects and contribute to those of
friends and peers.


This is something that perhaps the EAA could sponsor?


I doubt there is enough interest to make it worth EAA's while, or anyone
else.


If you are designing your own airplane, you probably (or most do) want to
do a clean sheet design. *If you know enough to be attempting your own
design, then you probably don't need to slow yourself down trying to adapt
someone else's *details. *You just do it yourself.


Plus, many that are designing and building their own are not capable, or
don't desire to put it all down in a computer. *What does that really gain
them? *A couple good shop sketches, and start building, is their most
likely course of action. *If they do find the need to vary the design to
accommodate some needed change, why would they want to take the time to go
put the change into the computer. *Only someone who is planning to publish
the design, or otherwise go into business would do that, and they sure are
not going to be interested in publishing the changes, and giving the whole
thing away for free!


I won't call you and others like you cheap *******s (g) because I don't
know you. *That is kinda' tongue in cheek, but I think the basic idea
conveyed is correct. *You just will not find a lot of people giving away
something as valuable as an airplane plan for free, when they could be
selling it.


If you want to buy plans, there are boatloads of people willing to sell
them to you for a couple hundred per pop. Buy a few plans and change and
scale them like you need them to be, for your needs.


Sorry I'm not more optimistic, and I really don't intend to offend. *That
just is the way I see it.
--
Jim in NC


Agreed, and also a little more that I learned the first time that I
specified a small project to be formed from sheet aluminum.

There's a mildly embarrassing story that I tell on myself from time to time
that illustrates just a little of the problem inherent in drawing up nice,
plans to produce something that could readily just be hammered together and
used. *Sometime in the freshman or sophomore year of mechanical engineering,
I took mechanical drafting--and I dare say that I was much above average.
It happened that, in class, we were also taught how we might expect sheet
metal to accept bends in the course of forming on a brake--which were taught
that the determining dimmension would be the center of the cross section of
the material with the result that the material inward from the center would
compress and the material outward of the center would stretch. *Some years
later, I needed to specify the dimensions for a custom chassis for an
electronic device. *I confidently drew up the plans, using just a little of
the fruit of that earlier education, and when the parts arrived the drill
holes were all misplaced--by (drum roll) about half of the thickness of the
material. *Of course, I immediately challenged the folks at the shop that
did the work, and immediately learned that (another drum roll) I had been
taught pure popycock!

The moral of that sad little story is that cad drawings, or really any
drawings, which are supposed to permit a physical product to be accurately
reproduced, need to be drawn and/or reviewed by people who are familiar with
the way that such items are manufactured in the real world. *Therefore, if
anyone is serious about creating fabrication drawings, I would strongly
advise that they start out with a few drawings of inexpensive sample parts
that can be used to evaluate some of the discrepancies that could occur; and
then pass the drawings, without any special explanation, to someone
experienced in fabricating from drawings. *The result will determine whether
the drawings conform to real world practices.

That is not to disparage the Open Source idea. *At least in the case of
computer software, Open Source seems to result in at least as good a product
as closed source proprietary and has the added feature that the program and
everything created from it won't become useless in the event that the
originating company ceases operations.

Just my rather long $0.02
Peter


Thanks for the input Peter,

I understand your point, that there are caveats in fabrication that
are often overlooked in the design phase. But that is common in the
design of everything really. Experience mitigates this over time,
which is part of the reason for a good revision control system (RCS).
Even with experience, a large project is going to have some revision,
and this may simply be a matter of diversification in fabrications
techniques from shop to shop.

As you mentioned above you were tought wrong. But perhaps there is a
fabrication process where what your were taught does apply?
(invariably, there are some cases where different shops would produce
differing products based on the same CAD, if only for a lack of
exactitutde on the designers part)

If you were using a revision control system, you would fork
(duplicate) the design of the effected part only, and would
subsequently maintain two documents, each notated to indicate their
preferred manufacturing method.

In this way, all future development work has the option of selecting
which branch of the design tree applies to their situation. This is
the core purpose of an RCS, which is what the OP was about. The
biggest benefit of Open Source techniques is good revision control.
The primary benefit of good revision control, is that caveats and
exceptions are _retained_ in the design, so problems aren't
experienced more than once.

Incidentally, I've found a few aviation projects in public
repositories that are currentiy using "subversion" as an RCS. So what
I'm talking about is going on already at a seed level. I'm using
"fossil" for some non-aviation related stuff, and hope to eventually
use it for a homebuilt project. If so, I'll likely be converting an
old out-of-copyright design into CAD, and then using that as a basis
for revision. The most likely effect being the revision of a wood wing
into aluminum.

I don't have the experience, but if it's CAD, I can get review from
many experienced designers, and they need not be local. With revision
control, the full evolution of the design work is available, which
will keep the next guy from making the same mistakes I make along the
way. And if the next guy should make a few changes in his revision
thats fine. It doesn't prevent my revision from being reproduced in
it's exact form.

Thanks!
Matt
 




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