In article ,
says...
Could you re-phrase your questions?

Ahhh yeah. Just realised you'd never hit the zero thrust speed. Woops!

The thing that STILL puzzles me though is that the thrust created *by the
propeller* goes down (as measured in Newtons for instance) as the velocity
increases.

As detailed here http://www.mh-aerotools.de/airfoils/propuls4.htm , the
thrust at 252 knots for a theoretical plane is 17.2N, whereas at 108 knots
it's 31N.

That's what's got me confused. Higher speed = more drag, yet the measured
thrust from *just the prop* is less. Is the extra thrust to match drag
coming from the momentum of the already moving airframe?

Or am I looking at this all wrong?

Well *I* think so Yes, the thrust is less at high airspeed - not
much you can do about that (as said, they invented variable pitch and
const. velocity props to help alleviate that) - but you say (admit
that at max airspeed there is still a lot of thrust. Well, whatever
that thrust is, it equals the drag. So starting from velocity = 0, the
aircraft's acceleration goes from high to lower to low to nothing - as
the aircraft goes from 0 to say 'medium' to as fast as it'll go. The
biggest factor isn't so much the lowering thrust though, but the much
increasing drag (someone will have the math but the drag is like,
velocity squared - that sorta graph).

So perhaps think of changing (decreasing) acceleration, rather than just
velocity.

--
Duncan