This is in direct contradiction to this article (also posted today) on new developments in tech: <a href="http://www.compositesworld.com/articles/aeroengine-composites-part-1-the-cmc-invasion" rel="nofollow">http://www.compositesworld.com/articles/aeroengine-composite...</a>
I really like the simplified explanation of how much energy to takes to move the air out of the way (v)^3 - I've heard this stated for vehicles before which is why roof racks are so bad for mileage.<p>Does anyone know of a similarly simple explanation of how much energy a vehicle must use relative to it's weight?
Ah, nothing like a good old-fashioned brouhaha over angle of attack vs. the Bernoulli principle. This same argument was going on when my Dad was training as a private pilot back in the 60's. Tastes great! Less filling!<p>Personally, I think they're facets of the same thing, but I don't know anything about it. Beyond that the piece seemed a bit of a mess to me. The content has not aged well. I usually expect Wired to do a better job of conserving the state of what they publish.
Well then, how about charging more for faster flights, to account for fuel? I mean, domestic business class isn't that great, but people who pay others people money for it would presumably go for a faster flight.
I remember how happy I was when I firstly made this consideration myself :) --> as racing cars have a back "aileron" which forces air to push them down (and stick to the road), airplanes have the same thing but inverted, which pushes them up. This becomes exceptionally clear when thinking about how flaps change the shape of the wing.
I'm not sure if I agree with the conclusion of the article; if the problem is that the effect of drag increases with speed, then the answer here seems to be to decrease drag (perhaps with a more efficient flight profile). Or would that interfere with lift?
OK, so the plane shoves air out of the way, and that takes energy. But when the plane passes, air will fill the air tube. Is there any way in theory to recover from that air filling the air tube some of the energy that was expended in making the tube?
the article includes the link to the previous HN discussion on this here: <a href="http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4644712" rel="nofollow">http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4644712</a>
Please fix the title!<p>Should be something like "Can We Build a More Efficient Airplane? Not Really, Says Physics", not "Why Cant Commercial Airplanes Go Faster?"
"Planes fly by throwing air down."<p>This is wrong. Planes actually fly by stretching air over their wings (creating low pressure) and the higher pressure air below pushes the plane up (to fill in the void) - So planes fly by moving air up.<p>See Bernoulli Principle (<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bernoulli%27s_principle" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bernoulli%27s_principle</a>)<p>PS: The reason most commercial jets cruise at ~585mph (or 85% of Mach one) is because of the huge amount of energy required to break the speed of sound.<p>Edit: I've you're going to downvote, you can at least comment.