> there are no benefits to making a civilian craft less stable (Slightly) less fuel consumption? That's for longitudinal stability influenced by center of grav

> there are no benefits to making a civilian craft less stable (Slightly) less fuel consumption? That's for longitudinal stability influenced by center of gravity. [0][1][2] > Most airplanes are designed so that the wing's center of lift (CL) is to the rear > of the center of gravity. This makes the airplane "nose heavy" and requires that > there be a slight downward force on the horizontal stabilizer in order to balance > the airplane and keep the nose from continually pitching downward. So moving CG aft decreases stability but also decreases induced drag (drag produced by producing lift) because the downward force required to keep the nose up is reduced, which in turn requires less total lift and a lower angle of attack. [0] http://www.airliners.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=761755 http://www.airliners.net/forum/viewtopic.php?t=761755 [1] http://avstop.com/ac/flighttrainghandbook/longitudinalstability.html http://avstop.com/ac/flighttrainghandbook/longitudinalstabil... [2] http://www.pprune.org/tech-log/357859-cofg-induced-drag.html http://www.pprune.org/tech-log/357859-cofg-induced-drag.html