Wind-Tunnel-Lift-Data-Analysis

Processes wind tunnel data, calculates lift with error propagation, and compares general method and Monte Carlo results for uncertainty analysis.

---

Overview

This repository contains MATLAB scripts for analyzing wind tunnel lift data. The project processes raw lift measurements, removes startup and invalid data, computes lift using two approaches — a general analytical method with error propagation and a Monte Carlo simulation — and compares the results with clear visualizations.

---

What’s Included

• WT_Lift_Data.xlsx — Raw wind tunnel lift measurements for three groups.
• MATLAB Script — Cleans data, computes weighted averages, calculates lift using both methods, runs the Monte Carlo simulation, and generates comparison plots.
• Flowchart — Visualizes the full workflow: from data cleaning to final result saving.
• answers.mat — Output file storing all final lift values and uncertainty estimates.

---

Core Steps

Load & Clean Data

• Read WT_Lift_Data.xlsx
• Remove rows with NaNs and filter out startup regions below a lift threshold
• Plot raw vs. cleaned data to verify

Compute Weighted Average

• Calculate means and standard deviations for each group
• Compute the weighted average lift and its uncertainty
• Plot lift profiles with weighted mean and ±1σ bands

General Method Calculation

• Use air density, free-stream velocity, angle of attack, and wing area
• Apply lift equations with uncertainty propagation
• Plot contributions of each source of error

Monte Carlo Simulation

• Randomly sample input parameters within their uncertainty ranges
• Calculate lift for 10,000 samples
• Plot histogram of simulated lift results with mean ±1σ

Compare Methods

• Plot PDFs of Monte Carlo and General Method results side by side
• Create error bar plots to compare group means, weighted average, general method, and Monte Carlo lift estimates

---

Save Results

• All final lift values, uncertainties, and figures are saved to answers.mat for easy reuse and reporting.

---

Key Features

• Automatically cleans noisy wind tunnel data
• Calculates lift analytically and statistically
• Visualizes uncertainty clearly with multiple plots
• Compares multiple methods for validation
• Saves all results for reproducibility

---

How to Run

• Clone this repository.
• Place WT_Lift_Data.xlsx in the project folder.
• Open MATLAB and run the main script.
• Review the generated plots and check answers.mat for all final lift results and uncertainty values.