Thin Airfoil and Climb Performance
On Mar 28, 2:02 pm, wrote:
I am curious what kind of performance in climb I
might see with a 14% airfoil section.
Thanks,
Brad
The amount of camber in the airfoil, flaps/no flaps, wing loading and
aspect ratio are also important factors...
Bill
Probably the 17% airfoil has a higher CL number but that would occur
in a unusable angle of attack. Generally speaking the thicker the
airfoil the broader is the low drag bucket (for laminar sections of
course).
Basically the climb ratio is governed by the wing loading, the aspect
ratio and the wing planform. The main enemy here is the induced drag.
Getting a low wing loading and high A/R is the way to go up. Given no
variable camber (ie flaps) the airfoil characteristics have a small
impact. Otherwise in the high speed section of flight having a high
wing loading and an airfoil tailored for hi-speed (thin and low
camber) is desirable. Thatīs why the sailplanes are in the cutting
edge of aircraft design, since they have to accomplish a very broad
mission envelope with a light empty weight and a high relative payload
(water+pilot).
wladimir
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