FlyingWolf
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Posts posted by FlyingWolf
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"Our troops have fought valiantly there, but Iraq has deprived them of the support they need — and deserve. As a result, parts of Afghanistan are falling into the hands of the Taliban, and a mix of terrorism, drugs and corruption threatens to overwhelm the country. As president, I would deploy at least two additional brigades to Afghanistan to re-enforce our counterterrorism operations and support NATO's efforts against the Taliban."
-Barack Obama Aug 1, 2007
His stance on Afghanistan (not to be confused with Iraq) has always been to put more troops on the ground. Are your memories that bad? To much bong resin in the cranium?
I think most people are aware of this... just remarking on the irony of extreme left-wing hate for "evil-bloodthirsty" Bush and acceptance of Obama's war plans
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As we are getting ready to crank engines this morning we here an unfamliar callsign on ground. I look over to my left and see a beautiful P-51D rolling into parking right in front of base ops. Jack Roush, owner of Roush Racing, and 'Gentleman Jim' paid a visit to the ole' Selfridge Air patch today. I didn't have my camera with me, but that beauty is burned into my memory. That piece of art looks like it rolled of the line yesterday...
It got me thinking, anybody else have any cool warbird stories? Mine was not that cool, but it was such a great site to see something like that before an eval. I would have given my left nut-probably my right one too-if Jack would have asked for them in exchange for a ride. One more question: Would you forgo sleeping with your fantasy hottie for a 1.5 solo in the airplane of your dreams? Truly a tough choice...maybe.
I actually got my private out of Concord Regional Airport, right by the race track, so I used to see him pulling out of there in P-51 on occasion... and yeah it was freakin gorgeous... the sound was probably the most manly thing I've ever heard. I think I started growing chest hair that day.
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saweeeeet, sign me up
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http://www.whalepower.com/drupal/?q=node/2
Thought you pilot-engineers would find this interesting. This company is looking mostly at applications for turbines, but if what they claim is true (less drag, greater lift, drastically increased stall angle) it could have some pretty interesting application to aircraft.
Thursday, March 06, 2008
Whale-Inspired Wind Turbines
Mimicking the bumps on humpback-whale fins could lead to more efficient wind turbines.
By Tyler Hamilton
Marine scientists have long suspected that humpback whales' incredible agility comes from the bumps on the leading edges of their flippers. Now Harvard University researchers have come up with a mathematical model that helps explain this hydrodynamic edge. The work gives theoretical weight to a growing body of empirical evidence that similar bumps could lead to more-stable airplane designs, submarines with greater agility, and turbine blades that can capture more energy from the wind and water.
"We were surprised that we were able to replicate a lot of the findings coming out of wind tunnels and water tunnels using relatively simple theory," says Ernst van Nierop, a PhD candidate at the School of Engineering and Applied Sciences at Harvard. He coauthored the study with mathematics professor Michael Brenner and researcher Silas Alben.
The advantage of the humpback-whale flipper seems to be the angle of attack it's capable of--the angle between the flow of water and the face of the flipper. When the angle of attack of a whale flipper--or an airplane wing--becomes too steep, the result is something called stall. In aviation, stall means that there isn't enough air flowing over the top surface of the wing. This causes a combination of increased drag and lost lift, a potentially dangerous situation that can result in a sudden loss of altitude. Previous experiments have shown, however, that the angle of attack of a humpback-whale flipper can be up to 40 percent steeper than that of a smooth flipper before stall occurs.
In a paper recently published in Physical Review Letters and highlighted in the journal Nature, the Harvard research team showed that the bumps on the humpback flipper, known as tubercles, change the distribution of pressure on the flipper so that some parts of it stall before others. Since different parts of the flipper stall at different angles of attack, abrupt stalling is easier to avoid. This effect also gives the whale more freedom to attack at higher angles and the ability to better predict its hydrodynamic limitations.
The researchers also found that the amplitude of the bumps plays a greater role than the number of bumps along a flipper's leading edge. "The idea is, you could make an aircraft that's much harder to stall and easier to control," says van Nierop. For example, fighter jets could be designed to be more acrobatic without risk of stall-induced crashes. In the water, naval submarines could be made more nimble.
The Harvard research validates the first controlled wind-tunnel tests of model flippers, conducted five years ago at the U.S. Naval Academy, in Annapolis, MD, where it was shown that stall typically occurring at a 12-degree angle of attack is delayed until the angle reaches 18 degrees. In these tests, drag was reduced by 32 percent and lift improved by 8 percent.
That research was detailed in a 2004 study in collaboration with West Chester University and Duke University. "This [Harvard work] basically shows that theory and empirical measurements are close, and adds greater weight to our original assertion on the function of the tubercles," says Frank Fish, a biology professor at West Chester and a lead author of the original study.
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I took advantage of free air travel this summer using the Space Available program and put together a briefing for the cadets at my det. I figured someone might find this useful... It is a bit dry as all the personally identifying info has been stripped out and the pictures removed to bring down the file size, but there is some good stuff in there for any cadet interested in the program. Feel free to post any questions you may have. Enjoy...
Old Guy Rant
in Squadron Bar
Posted
As long as we're getting mushy...
As a young guy entering the service... thank you. Thank you to everyone that has contributed to the amazing amount of truly valuable information on this site, the administrators for creating and maintaining it, and the "Old Guys" for putting everything in perspective. Most importantly, thank you for fighting the good fight, against our enemies and against issues within our own ranks. It makes it a lot easier for us young guys to not get disheartened by the BS. I hope I can give back as much as I have been given.
Alright, I know that was a little
but I'll take the risk of looking 