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Old 01-20-2010 | 11:18 AM
  #37  
bruce88123
 
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Default RE: Hot wire cutting tips?

This is a Delta http://www.btemodels.com/vortex.html
From http://www.grc.nasa.gov/WWW/K-12/airplane/geom.html :
Aspect ratio is a measure of how long and slender a wing is from tip to tip. The Aspect Ratio of a wing is defined to be the square of the span divided by the wing area and is given the symbol AR. For a rectangular wing, this reduces to the ratio of the span to the chord length as shown at the upper right of the figure.

AR = s^2 / A = s^2 / (s * c) = s / c

High aspect ratio wings have long spans (like high performance gliders), while low aspect ratio wings have either short spans (like the F-16 fighter) or thick chords (like the Space Shuttle). There is a component of the drag of an aircraft called induced drag which depends inversely on the aspect ratio. A higher aspect ratio wing has a lower drag and a slightly higher lift than a lower aspect ratio wing. Because the glide angle of a glider depends on the ratio of the lift to the drag, a glider is usually designed with a very high aspect ratio. The Space Shuttle has a low aspect ratio because of high speed effects, and therefore is a very poor glider. The F-14 and F-111 have the best of both worlds. They can change the aspect ratio in flight by pivoting the wingslarge span for low speed, small span for high speed.

The U-2 spy plane was an example of a high aspect ratio wing.