Blended wing bodies and sailplanes...?

On Tue, 23 Dec 2003 07:00:59 +1300, Bruce Hoult
wrote:

In article ,
(chris) wrote:

My guess is that a Blended Wing Body is a superior trade off if you
have a huge fuselage - as is the case for a large cargo jet such as a
C-5 or a big passenger jet. This allows the huge fuselage to also
generate lift, it appears to have a lot more wetted area.

NZ's CT/4 Airtrainer is a 2-seat piston powered basic trainer reputed to
get something like 20% of the lift from the cockpit canopy. It's in
service in NZ and Australia and also Hong Kong and Thailand.

http://www.kiwiaircraftimages.com/atrainer.html

Those who were at the '95 Worlds in Omarama may recall an aerobatic
display by an RNZAF team in CT/4s.

-- Bruce


The BD4 we fly gets 13% of its lift from the fuselage which just
happens to be about what the missing bit of wing would produce.

Mike Borgelt