Jeff Hill's latest claim

apathoid said:
Might he be referring to the spoilers? Which deploy on touchdown to kill lift - pinning the plane to the runway... And perhaps I'm wrong, but flaps and slats actually just increase surface area and camber, allowing the plane to fly slower. I think that, if anything, they increase drag, which is evident by the need to increase thrust after flap extension....

Alot of non-aviation folk seem to seem the the flaps slow the airplane down. They do, but that's not their intended purpose. The spoilers are what you'd expect to see if the plane is too high or too fast......

eta: I suppose it's possible for flaps to increase both lift and drag....
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Yes, spoilers are the only device that I can think of that would actually "kill lift", but he's not knowledgeable enough to know that. Symmetrical spoilers would NEVER be deployed except for short duration as a speed brake device while airborne as they disrupt airflow over the wing. Asymmetrical spoilers are used as a flight control device on some aircraft to aid in roll control. The best example of those would be on delta wing aircraft.

Everything else is right except that flaps and/or leading edge slats DO NOT increase lift. As you said they change the chamber of the wing shifting the vertical lift component allowing a slower stall speed and they do increase drag, as well.
 
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Reheat said:
The 767 or any other aircraft, for that matter, will go as fast as the pilot is willing to fly it AND the airframe/engines will allow. I thought the myth of "ground effect" precluding low level flight was put to bed a long time ago.

15 and more years ago, during the Cold War, B-52's flew at extremely low level rather routinely. Essentially, there is nothing that would preclude a large aircraft from flying low enough to tie the world record up to the max operating speed which in the case of a 767 is well above 250 KIAS. Hani Hanjour proved the 767 could even go well beyond it's design limiting speed and stay intact. Well, until it hits a building.

This subject is not even a matter for debate or conjecture. Period.
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Avro Vulcan's and Handley Page Victor's also flew at extremely low altitude, as did Vickers Valiant's. Although Valiants were designed for high altitude low pressure flight, and the extra stress to their wings from low level higher pressure flight, proved problematic, however the Valiant's WERE able to fly at low altitude.

And as for ground effect, this Spitfire proves just how low an aircraft can fly:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HX629ZjWD68

spitfire.jpg
 
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Reheat said:
This has to be stundie material.....

From LCF
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he seems to have the same misconception i once held, that fixed wings produce fixed lift, and the only way to reduce lift is to slow down

when you build on that error, everything else they say about f77 not being able to fly that fast that low makes sense


of course after learning more about aeronautics i learned i was completely wrong....
 
If you'll read that LC thread, you'll see that Jeff's source wasn't talking directly about ground effect, but about the resonant stability of the airframe at high speeds and low altitudes. He said that the planes that hit the Twin Towers would have not been able to withstand that speed at the altitudes they were flying.

He says he worked on the shakers at Boeing that tested the airframes. I don't doubt that he could have played a minor role in working on those systems, even though he seems to have a poor understanding of it. I do know a little about that, the company I work for made equipment in the 80s that measured the signals from accelerometers placed around a structure and did the number-crunching to let engineers visualize the various modes of vibration.
 
You guys have all taken the blue pill!!!! Human flight is not possible. It's a lie create by the airspace companies that just want your tax dollars to use in cross dressing cattle experiments!

LLH
 
CurtC said:
If you'll read that LC thread, you'll see that Jeff's source wasn't talking directly about ground effect, but about the resonant stability of the airframe at high speeds and low altitudes. He said that the planes that hit the Twin Towers would have not been able to withstand that speed at the altitudes they were flying.
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He's so full of crap that he smells through my monitor. He uses the British Comet as an example of metal fatigue which is a ridiculous comparison. The Comet was the earliest jet airliner and they were plagued with design flaws due to the many unknowns of the day. The metal fatigue was caused by pressurization/depressurization, not low altitude flying.

http://www.centennialofflight.gov/essay/Commercial_Aviation/Opening_of_Jet_era/Tran6.htm
 
leftysergeant said:
The latest YouTube posting by the notorious crank caller Jeff Hill, posting as pumpitout, claims that it is impossible for a 767 to fly at over 250 mph below 1000 ft. I don't know enough about the physics of flight to answer this. We have pilots here. Maybe they can answer this.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x2upl977dsy
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I have flown a KC-135 at max speed, 355 KIAS at 500 feet above the ground, there is no reason why the plane could not fly at 10 feet above the ground. Those who make up the "can't fly a plane close to the ground" are idiots.
 
Wasn't the starfighter also known as the widowmaker ?

I was always a fan of the English Electric lightning myself, it is a bone of contension, but some people reckon it may have been as fast if not faster, than the Lockheed SR 71 (as the lightning was basically an engine with wings).

And as it was standard policy of the RAF, lightnings often flew low flying training flying at just above rooftop height. AS DID AVRO VULCANS, AND USAF B52'S ASWELL!!!!
 
peteweaver said:
Wasn't the starfighter also known as the widowmaker ?
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Probably, as it did make a lot of West German widows. :(

peteweaver said:
I was always a fan of the English Electric lightning myself, it is a bone of contension, but some people reckon it may have been as fast if not faster, than the Lockheed SR 71 (as the lightning was basically an engine with wings).
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The Lightning had two engines mounted over/under. It was a Mach 2 Interceptor whereas the SR 71 was a Mach 3 aircraft. The Lightning's big limiting factor was fuel. It was very limited in that respect. I am amused ever time I see the fuel tanks on top of the wing of the last model.

http://freespace.virgin.net/pbratt....ning F6 3D Aircraft Model 3DS MAX LWO C4D.htm

peteweaver said:
And as it was standard policy of the RAF, lightnings often flew low flying training flying at just above rooftop height. AS DID AVRO VULCANS, AND USAF B52'S ASWELL!!!!
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During the Cold War virtually every NATO combat type aircraft practiced low level tactics because of the Soviet Sam defenses.
 
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peteweaver said:
I was always a fan of the English Electric lightning myself, it is a bone of contension, but some people reckon it may have been as fast if not faster, than the Lockheed SR 71 (as the lightning was basically an engine with wings).
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The Lightning was a remarkable, if odd-looking, plane -- the first Mach 2 level-flight interceptor to enter service, if my copy of Jane's can be trusted. I never got past those funny-looking wings, myself.

However, it was not even remotely close to the SR-71 in speed. There is a world of difference between Mach 2 and Mach 3+ flight, the killer being inlet geometry. Mach 2 can be reasonably achieved even without adaptive inlets, such as the F-15 Eagle, if you throw enough engine at it. Mach 3, not so much. The SR-71 relied upon very careful shaping and shedding of the shock off the nose and streaming into the engines, whereupon those large moveable cones nearly blocking the inlets provided a sensitive ramjet effect. The flow is easily disturbed at top speed, and engine unstarts usually resulted in the complete destruction of the aircraft.

At low altitude, the Lightning would stroll away from the Blackbird, but up where the SR-71 was designed to run, nothing could touch it, not even the MiG-25.
 
peteweaver said:
Wasn't the starfighter also known as the widowmaker ?
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The F 104 was designed to go out and meet in-coming aircraft and engage them before they reached their targets. You don't so much fly a 104 as aim it.

The Germans figured that they would make it serve all their purposes, rather than have a variety of different planes for different missions.

I was sort of under the impression, when i watched 104s coming out of Wilhelmshaven that they were hunting moles for gunnery practice. At those speeds, that close to the ground, you don't really have a lot of time to correct mistakes.

The Tornado is a much better idea.
 
peteweaver said:
Wasn't the starfighter also known as the widowmaker ?
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The problem with the F-104 is that the Germans tried to use it for something other than for what it was suited. It was a very good Interceptor, however, the Germans tried to use it in a Close Air Support attack type role for which it was ill suited. It had very high wing loading making it very non-maneuverable in a Close Air Support role. To put it bluntly they operated the 104 like they drive their Mercedes on the autobahns, very fast and somewhat carelessly. Most of their problems were pilot error CFIT (controlled flight into terrain) type accidents. The role combined with careless flying in the very deplorable weather in Europe resulted in a lot of these type accidents and they retired the Starfighter as soon as the Tornado was ready to go.

The Canadians were successful doing this, but the Germans were not. I think caution and proficiency was the key to the Canadians' success.

Both the US and Japan had no major problems with the aircraft, as well, but it was used as an Interceptor as it was designed and well suited.
 
Hitler kind of blew his advantage with the Me 262 by trying to make it an attack aircraft as well.

Bad ideas are conservative, I guess.
 
Several aircraft had the distinction of the "widowmaker" the B-58 Hustler, and the A-26 Maruader both were also known with that term, I thought the 104 was also known as the "Flying coffin".

I had heard that Hitler was so foccused on building a long distance jet bomber that he ended up delaying the production of the ME-262. If he had let them build it it could have been in full production in 1943. It would have made a huge difference in the war. Nothing could get up to the 600 knots the aircraft was capable of achieving. It did have limited range, and it could have prolonged the war, but not change the outcome. There was a 50 mm cannon version, I guess when it fired it kicked the plane pretty good.

The real widowmaker was the ME-163 Komet. Some would blow up on the ground if the two fuel mixtures touched during the fueling process.
 
Reheat said:
The C-133 was also known as the "Widow Maker" after so many disappeared over the Atlantic....

http://www.sponauer.com/candlestick/index.html
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B-26s were called the same. ( Due to the rotund fuselage, the B-26 engines were placed far outboard, and loss of power on one side resulted in a violent snap roll flipping the aircraft on its back. This led to a high number of accidents during takeoff, thus earning B-26 the nickname "Widowmaker" by its pilots. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/B-26_Marauder)

They don't look too far out.
 
leftysergeant said:
Hitler kind of blew his advantage with the Me 262 by trying to make it an attack aircraft as well.
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That's mostly a myth. Hitler's insistence that the Me-262 be able to drop bombs meant little in the way of actual delays to the jet's development. The real problem were the engines — the Germans just couldn't get those very complicated pieces of machinery into mass production successfully for quite a long time. By the time they did, it was too late.

Cheap Shot said:
I had heard that Hitler was so foccused on building a long distance jet bomber that he ended up delaying the production of the ME-262. If he had let them build it it could have been in full production in 1943.
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The He 280 jet fighter prototype flew on jet engines 16½ months before the Me 262 prototype did. But nothing came of it, even after Heinkel arranged a mock dogfight with a Fw 190 in early 1942 which the He 280 easily won. The leadership was too focused on quick, blitzkrieg victories and wasn't interested in a fighter that couldn't be brought into production straight away.

As to the Me 262, the real problem in its development, as mentioned before, was the mass production of the engines. The hand-built turbines in the early engines had a lifespan of 75 to 100 hours; in the first batches from mass production, that had dropped to just five hours. These production problems took a long time to iron out, and as a result there just weren't any significant numbers of Me 262s until June of 1944. Even without Hitler's meddling, there still wouldn't have been meaningful numbers of Me 262s earlier.
 
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