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Driven by the need to reduce business risk, the next decade will see increasing pressure on vehicle and component manufacturers, not only to improve reliability and reduce costs, but also to provide formal demonstrations of product reliability and safety achievement in advance of product launch. In addition, assessment of product reliability early in the design stage has the benefit of shortening lead times and reducing the need for expensive validation testing. Current tools to support such demonstrations are strongly dependent on the availability of failure data generated in service or from extensive testing. Such data are not always available or easily adapted to meet the needs of the designer, especially when the product is new or contains a degree of novelty. The research described in this paper is funded through the IMI Foresight Vehicle Programme and is focused on the development of reliability tools applicable at the design stage.

Because of the rapid growth of air travel, both cargo and passenger, the payload capacity required for future transport aircraft is too great to be accommodated by fuselages of conventional configuration (that is, single-deck, single-aisle, up to 6 seats abreast). Fuselage design philosophy was therefore re-evaluated in a recent Douglas study, and this paper reviews some of the features of that study. Factors affecting fuselage design are outlined and trends are discussed. It is concluded that the forthcoming wide, single-deck fuselage, seating up to 10 abreast, will have a potential capacity of about 550 passengers. For larger capacities, the greater efficiency of multi-deck fuselages over that of the single-deck becomes increasingly apparent on a per-passenger basis. The use of multi-deck fuselages, however, will raise new problems-particularly those of airport terminal design and passenger evacuation-but these should not prove insurmountable.