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National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics, Technical Notes - Qualitative Simulator Study of Longitudinal Stick Forces and Displacements Desirable During Tracking

A qualitative study has been made by use of an airplane simulator
with one degree of freedom (pitch) to determine the longitudinal stick
forces and displacements desirable during tracking. In the simulator
the operator, or subject, was stationary and, therefore, was not sub-
Jected to any of the forces and motions associated with airplane accel-
erations that occur in actual flight. These tests are a continuation
of those of NACA TBchnical the 5L28 and were performed with the same
simulation equipment. For the present tests this equipment was modi—
fied to give a better representation of the pitch response of an air-
plane and also to give the subject a tracking task which better simulated
air-to-air tracking.

The modified simulator was used to reexamine a phase of the previous
study and to expand these tests to two other conditions of airplane
dynamics. The conditions investigated were an airplane undamped natural
frequency of 1/2 cps with danping ratios of 0.8 and 0.18 and an airplane
undamped natural frequency of l cps with a damping ratio of 0.11.
Additionally, limited tests were made to determine the effects on
tracking performance of viscous and static friction on the stick.

For a heavily damped airplane, low longitudinal stick forces and
displacements are desirable. This conclusion is in agreement with the
results of NACA Technical the 5&28. For the lightly damped airplanes,
moderate longitudinal stick forces and displacements are desirable.
Viscous damping on the stick, which was tested only for a lightly
damped, low-frequency (1/2 cps) airplane configuration, caused a decrease
in tracking performance. Static friction on the stick, which was tested
only for a heavily damped, low—frequency (1/2 cps) airplane configuraa
tion, also caused a slight decrease in tracking performance.