Print Page - How wings really work

I've read three different theories on how wings work. My understanding is they work by a combination of all of them. The actual combination can only be understood by the craft (provided it has "brains"/sensors of its own) but only approximated by humans. So here are the three that I know of:

1. Bernoulli's theorem - Pressure decrease on the dorsal side of the wing
In favour: Air flow patterns
Against: Symmetrical aerofoils fly.

2. Newtonian Physics - Incoming air has two components; sin(AOA) component * airspeed provides lift.
In favour: All aerofoils fly
Against: Semi Symmetrical provide greater lift in one direction.

3. I dont know who gave this but the guys explanation was quite well presented (I find this related to Einstein's space and time explanations)- Imagine there are a number of cubes suspended in a line and you jump on one of them, the cube will start to move down. Before it moves completely down, you move on to the next cube. Now the next cube starts going down, but before it actually "falls" down, you jump to the next cube, you go on and on like this at a very fast speed, and one would sustain flight. Very much like a ninja is said to run on water/fly in the air. Now, imagine the cubes to be air particles. This also explains why reducing the wing span can be partly compensated by increasing speeds and vice versa. But this doesnt't work alone; Add to this theories 1 and 2, and seems to answer to most fixed wing characteristics.

Really don't know what's complete but I feel the third explanation has a large part to play in aerodynamics and flight ultimately is a combination of all the above rather than a single one.

@i11sawank: You probably posted in the wrong thread. Posting your LiPo question in an electronics thread/board will get you more responses.

RC India

General Topics => Chatter Zone => Topic started by: anwar on January 26, 2012, 11:19:53 AM