{"id":9963,"date":"2025-07-29T07:38:15","date_gmt":"2025-07-28T23:38:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/tommykwan.com\/blog\/?p=9963"},"modified":"2025-07-29T07:57:01","modified_gmt":"2025-07-28T23:57:01","slug":"whats-standard-mean-chord-smc-mean-chord-line","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tommykwan.com\/blog\/aviation\/whats-standard-mean-chord-smc-mean-chord-line\/","title":{"rendered":"Standard Mean Chord (SMC)\/ Mean chord line v.s Mean Aerodynamic Chord (MAC)?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>SMC \/ Mean chord line<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>often used in aircraft design, is a geometric parameter representing the average chord length of a wing. It&#8217;s calculated by <strong>dividing the wing&#8217;s surface area by its span<\/strong>, effectively representing the chord of a rectangular wing with the same area and span. While SMC relates to the wing&#8217;s overall geometry, it&#8217;s not typically used in aerodynamic calculations<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>MAC (Mean Aerodynamic Chord)<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>By definition, MAC is the average&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/skybrary.aero\/index.php\/Chord\">chord<\/a>&nbsp;length of a tapered,&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/skybrary.aero\/index.php\/Wing_Sweep\">swept wing<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The calculation involves Integral (\u6578\u5b78\u7a4d\u5206\uff09  <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In terms if application, in large aircraft,&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/skybrary.aero\/index.php\/Centre_of_Gravity\">centre of gravity<\/a>&nbsp;limitations and the actual centre of gravity are often expressed in terms of percent MAC.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>It\u2019s not only the length but also the position of MAC is often important. In particular, the position of the centre of gravity (CG)&nbsp;of an aircraft is usually measured relative to the MAC, as the percentage of the distance from the leading edge of MAC to CG with respect to MAC itself.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Summary:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The Mean Aerodynamic Chord (MAC) and Standard Mean Chord (SMC) are both ways to represent the average chord length of a wing, but they are calculated and used differently!<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>MAC is a more aerodynamically relevant measure, especially for swept and tapered wings, while SMC is a simpler geometric calculation useful for basic wing geometry.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Ref:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/skybrary.aero\/articles\/mean-aerodynamic-chord-mac\">https:\/\/skybrary.aero\/articles\/mean-aerodynamic-chord-mac<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>SMC \/ Mean chord line often used in aircraft design, is a geometric parameter representing the average chord length of a wing. It&#8217;s calculated by dividing the wing&#8217;s surface area by its span, effectively representing the chord of a rectangular wing with the same area and span. While SMC relates to the wing&#8217;s overall geometry,<a class=\"read-more \" href=\"https:\/\/tommykwan.com\/blog\/aviation\/whats-standard-mean-chord-smc-mean-chord-line\/\" title=\"Read More\"> <span class=\"button default\">Read More<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[64,78],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9963","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-aviation","category-principal-of-flying"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tommykwan.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9963","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tommykwan.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tommykwan.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tommykwan.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tommykwan.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9963"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/tommykwan.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9963\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9966,"href":"https:\/\/tommykwan.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9963\/revisions\/9966"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tommykwan.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9963"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tommykwan.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9963"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tommykwan.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9963"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}