Rear Wings

[coysht]

Originally posted by JustBringIt
I'm still reading but I don't know if I agree with the diagram on that link. Isn't lift and drag usually given as parallel and perpendicular to the chord?

If you look, Lift and drag are parrallel and perpendicular to the direction of travel of the wing (angle of attack) no the chord.

[JustBringIt]

Ahh, yes. That's right. But I'd be a bit concerned about the plane that wing is attached to. It seems like its doing a bit of a nose-dive.

[coysht]

Originally posted by JustBringIt
Ahh, yes. That's right. But I'd be a bit concerned about the plane that wing is attached to. It seems like its doing a bit of a nose-dive.

Maybe its the observer that is actually at an angle (ie the bloke who drew it was falling off his/her chair)

[JustBringIt]

Originally posted by coysht
Maybe its the observer that is actually at an angle (ie the bloke who drew it was falling off his/her chair)

I thought about that but if you look at where the weight force is, you'll see that its not like that.

[JustBringIt]

Originally posted by coysht
Since vorticity is only a mathematical concept used to describe fluid flows, I'd say no.

Have a look at this description of how lift is generated:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lift_(force)

The section on circulation explains how a vortex is formed in the boundary layer of the air around an aerofoil


edit: i've made it link directly to the exact page i was looking at

Ok, I've read that link but I'm not totally sure what it means without a diagram. It almost sounds like its talking about separation and wake at the trailing edge of a 2D wing section.

Its interesting the bit on the equal transit time thing. I did have that notion in my head but I could never really understand why it was like that - clearly its not. But now I'm left wondering what does cause the air to be quicker on one side of the wing to the other.

[coysht]

Originally posted by JustBringIt
Its interesting the bit on the equal transit time thing. I did have that notion in my head but I could never really understand why it was like that - clearly its not. But now I'm left wondering what does cause the air to be quicker on one side of the wing to the other.

I could never work it out at school and stuff, then I turned out that it was wrong! (nearly the same with how an internal combustion engine works - only ever found one description of that, which is accurate!)

I'll see if I can dig out the explaination I was given a few years back which explained it all very well.