3 ms·

Good question! Here's some information from aviation.stackexchange: http://aviation.stackexchange.com/questions/9975/do-additional-passengers-impact-on-weight-a

Good question! Here's some information from aviation.stackexchange: http://aviation.stackexchange.com/questions/9975/do-additional-passengers-impact-on-weight-and-balance-of-a-domestic-airliner http://aviation.stackexchange.com/questions/9975/do-addition... Checked luggage is weighed when you drop it off, so presumably the exact weights are available to the pilots. For passengers themselves and their carry-on baggage, accurate weights aren't available so statistical averages are used, based on the number of passengers and their baggage allowances. Airliners do have "squat sensors" in the landing gear, but they're not capable of accurately measuring the aircraft's weight. They're just binary-valued sensors that check whether the gear struts are under stress, to prevent the gear from accidentally being raised while the plane is on the ground.

WalterBright 12y ago
I wonder if gluing strain gauges to the landing gear struts would be accurate enough once calibrated. There has been at least one crash due to mis-estimating the weight of the passengers + luggage + cargo. A strain gauge on the struts, even if inaccurate, could provide a backup sanity check for the weights.
- DanBC 12y ago
  They could put something in the ground - a weigh station - that the plane travels over before getting to the runway. That avoids the need for modifying airside equipment which is a bureaucratic nightmare.
- graycat 12y ago
  As I joined FedEx, I was told that they had already worked out sensors, of some kind (I never saw details), on the landing gear that would give the data needed for knowing and controlling weight and balance. For balance, right, e.g., don't want all the weight near the tail and, instead, want the weight more evenly distributed in the cargo area along the length of the plane, that is, want the load in balance. So, yes, FedEx did think of having sensors, of some kind, in the landing gear. But I never heard more about such sensors, and, for the times I rode the jump seat in the planes, I never saw pilots working with weight and balance from data from the landing gear. Maybe later, after I went to grad school, FedEx did do something with such sensors. So, right, the sensors are a good idea and were considered and, maybe, eventually implemented.

WalterBright 12y ago

I wonder if gluing strain gauges to the landing gear struts would be accurate enough once calibrated. There has been at least one crash due to mis-estimating the weight of the passengers + luggage + cargo. A strain gauge on the struts, even if inaccurate, could provide a backup sanity check for the weights.

DanBC 12y ago
They could put something in the ground - a weigh station - that the plane travels over before getting to the runway. That avoids the need for modifying airside equipment which is a bureaucratic nightmare.
graycat 12y ago
As I joined FedEx, I was told that they had already worked out sensors, of some kind (I never saw details), on the landing gear that would give the data needed for knowing and controlling weight and balance. For balance, right, e.g., don't want all the weight near the tail and, instead, want the weight more evenly distributed in the cargo area along the length of the plane, that is, want the load in balance. So, yes, FedEx did think of having sensors, of some kind, in the landing gear. But I never heard more about such sensors, and, for the times I rode the jump seat in the planes, I never saw pilots working with weight and balance from data from the landing gear. Maybe later, after I went to grad school, FedEx did do something with such sensors. So, right, the sensors are a good idea and were considered and, maybe, eventually implemented.