Updated: October 17, 2011
Aircraft Performance
By Wayne Olson
Air Force Flight Test Center [Retired]
AFFTC-TIH-99-01
"Aircraft Performance Flight Testing"
By Wayne Olson
September 2000 [last update June 03]
[Note: The "updates" since Sep 2000 were some minor corrections-no new material]
A Very Preliminary Performance Report Based Upon Just Two Flights
of VANS RV-6:
Technical Files\5Feb-09-Flight Test Memo.pdf
Technical Files\Air Data Calibration from Turning Flight-June1999.pdf
A 1976 AFFTC Office Memo On Airspeed Calibration Using Radar
A Sept 98 SFTE Paper on the
"Cloverleaf Method" of Airspeed Calibration:
(Identical Method to The Above 1976 Memo, Except Using GPS Instead of Radar)
An informal memo:
2002 SFTE Paper: Embraer Engine-Out Climbs
2003 AIAA Paper: Piper Comanche Ground Effect
The primary reference for Ground Effect paper:
Added (16-Aug-09): SFTE Paper - 1983
Technical Files\Fighter Aircraft Dynamic Performance - 1983.pdf
A primary reference for above 1983 Paper:
Technical Files\Olhausen-AIAA 75-32.pdf
The document for the earth model used by GPS Technical Files\WGS84.pdf
A paper by T.Vincenty which defines the algorithm used to compute distances and directions between pairs of
latitude/longitude points Technical Files\Vincenty Memo.pdf
Wayne Olson: 
Write to Wayne at : wayneperf@aol.com