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"Aerodynamics"
In the early 20th century, a group of German scientists led by Ludwig Prandtl at the University of Göttingen began studying the fundamental nature of fluid flow and subsequently laid the foundations for modern aerodynamics. In 1904, just a year after the first flight by the Wright brothers, Prandtl published the first paper on a […]
Despite the growing computer power and increasing sophistication of computational models, any design meant operate in the real world requires some form of experimental validation. The idealist modeller, me included, wants to believe that computer simulation will replace all forms of experimental testing and thereby allow for much faster design cycles. The issue with this […]
(Caveat: There is a little bit more maths in this post than usual. I have tried to explain the equations as good as possible using diagrams. In any case, the real treat is at the end of the post where I go through the design of rocket nozzles. However, understanding this design methodology is naturally easier […]
One of the key factors in the Wright brothers’ achievement of building the first heavier-than-air aircraft was their insight that a functional airplane would require a mastery of three disciplines:
Lift Propulsion Control
Whereas the first two had been studied to some success by earlier pioneers such as Sir […]
How airplanes fly is one of the most fundamental questions in aerospace engineering. Given its importance to flight, it is surprising how many different and oftentimes wrong explanations are being perpetuated online and in textbooks. Just throughout my time in school and university, I have been confronted with several different explanations of how wings create […]
The name we use for our little blue planet “Earth” is rather misleading. Water makes up about 71% of Earth’s surface while the other 29% consists of continents and islands. In fact, this patchwork of blue and brown, earth and water, makes our planet very unlike any other planet we know to be orbiting other stars. […]
Every aircraft has a certain operational environment, including aspects of flight and ground operations, that it is designed to serve in throughout its lifetime. For example the operational requirements of a fighter jet are much more strenuous than those of a commercial airliner. The flight regime is broadly defined by the range of different flight […]
Understanding the details of the atmosphere is critical for manned flight since it provides the medium through which the aircraft moves. The lift provided by the wings and drag experienced by the aircraft vary greatly with different altitudes. In fact Sir Frank Whittle was largely motivated to design a jet engine due to his insight […]
There is a saying that your audience will halve for every equation you put in a piece of writing. Well, in this case I am going to make an exception and go through the detailed derivation of the Breguet Range equation. The reason for doing this is that the maths is not very difficult but […]
As I described in a previous post, the efficiency of the gas turbine cycle increases as the turbine entry temperature (TET) is increased. Therefore the hotter the combustion gases that enter the first turbine stage the more specific power the jet engine can produce. Of course the TET is […]
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