Profile Design for RC Sailplanes

Philosophy for legalized soaring. We are shocked to find so many politicians who are involved with criminal activities these days, but we refuse to look at ourselves and realize that we do the same thing; just at a lesser extent. We are so brainwashed that we honestly believe that freedom means an open ended existence; i.e. without limits; which stimulates our egomania into a belief that we have the right to trespass. Our government is the generator of misinformation and propaganda, that is linked to marketing in order to gain the most circulating capitol it identifies as, economic growth. This effort ended with the destruction of the modern light plane industry, private airports for commuting, while alleviating control of airspace below 3500 feet AGL (Above Ground Level). Yes, it was a boost for the automakers and similar marketing agencies. It also seems to justify hobbyists to climb model sailplanes to the limit of their vision without any regard to others by flying off field, and over everybody else's property. American society tends to destroy talented individuals to support, and protect, the nobility of marketing theatrics and its promotion of money makers. One artist that is adored by millions, represents greater financial control by fewer managers, then 1000 artists adored by thousands. With this in mind, one can see the manipulative events assembled by a controlled democracy (communism), to create god-like hero's to be worshiped. Individualism is healthy, and was the prime foundation of America before Karl Marx was born. Society through education tends to destroy ingenuity, the same as pecking order as applied onto the poor 'sad sack' chicken. Example: I love field archery. I have a 30 lb lemon-wood bow, and homemade wooden arrows. Getting into a group of Archers at George Levit's Archery shop, I get dunned for using such meager equipment. Going to Tinley park's outdoor range I find a 'religious' group following some superstar's practice regimen of shooting at targets greater then 60 yards away. Glory to the long shot! I am then convinced to spend the money to get a 50 lb Grizzly; and learn to shoot it. This was stupidity. I would have been better to follow the teachings of Florance Lily (the Olympic champion) who had her bow custom built with a 20 lb pull. She was an older woman that wanted competition in comfort. Indoors she shot a 6 lb kid's bow that I found to be very accurate with a 2 finger release. But no, I was propelled to use my Grizzly by my peers, without realizing that if I stuck with my cheap 30 lb lemonwood bow, and learned to nail targets less than 40 yards away, my score would end up being closer to 350, and I would be very competitive, just not a world champion. Since I 'tricked into believing the long shot was important, and I focused upon it; I also ended up believing that I am just not an archer! This is not a boo-hoo! Society trashed me; but this is a demonstration on how one cheats oneself by listening to supporting peers instead of just playing the game your best way; without regard to others. I would have had a lot more fun not listening to the expert competitors, by doing my thing, perfecting my indoor archery with the teachings of Zen, and building my confidence to perform within my personal universe. Truly a message here taught by a champion martial artist; Bruce Lee. The reason for the political comments is to demonstrate the kind of illogical stimulation that seems to conform with a perverse attitude about the rational definition of freedom. Morally, there should be a regard to not trespass, and this is the limits I have proposed for the designs of my soaring profiles, that are different than current practice of 'open ended' attitudes; that the current intensely competitive 'free spirits' insist upon. RC Soaring Definitions: CL = coefficient of lift; the ratio of lift induced by Alpha @ reference velocity. Alpha = Angle of attack of the profile chord to direction of profile in air. CD = drag; the resistance of the profile to the motion of travel.

25% MCL = neutral oscillatory location of a profile. CG = center of gravity; the balance point that insures the program for desired alpha. Damping = the stabilizing force used to guarantee regulation of alpha. LD = CL/CD [@ 6 degrees alpha typically] however, is a family of curves affected by V. Turbulation = a natural, or induced energizing of air to break up stagnant laminations of air. Wing Loading = velocity index for a profile application. V= WL^0.5/CL Gravity = the prime key to performance; the force that drives a sailplane down its glide slope. Speed Range = The usable family of airspeeds controlled by alpha. Limits: CL & CD re = Reynolds number. A QC value showing wing efficiency; factors are wing chord and V Air Sludge = bubble that low airspeed generates; it sits atop profile. Spiral Diameter = Its only control is velocity (where size is meaningless). The first major concept to my system is that the words bad and good are non existent; replaced by, misapplied, and/or correctly selected for the attributes of the application. This is totally foreign to the modern fraternity that has praises for Dr Drela - who is an aeronautical genius at building models that are light and strong, so he can fearlessly use a lower CL then us klutzes that have to employ a different form of ingenuity; that I am describing here. Also, my concern at profile design is basic, with flaps and aileron components to be added by more sophisticated 'engineers.' Interestingly, my system has strong concerns for speed range, meaning heavier models (by intent) then Dr. Drela's designs. My view allows more comfort at adding ingredients for wider speed ranging, and the telemetering of soaring information back to the pilot in command. Another concern is to have you honestly answer several questions: 1. Who/what are you to compete with? Your buddies or Mother Nature? I choose to wrestle with Mother Nature, for the thrill of learning to dance with her; while evaluating my buddies information to see if applicable. When I fly in a model airplane contest I truly care not whom the experts of the day are, but enjoy observing the skill that they demonstrate. This identifies me as a sport flier that sees contests as social events, rather then a battle of knights seeking favor and status. 2. Do you wish to follow the crowd, or be an individualist that wishes to learn technology at your own pace, using feedback from others as guidance, instead of demands. Hear me out, I am not demanding that you do things my way, but suggesting instead that there are many different ways to win against Mother Nature. Especially if you limit yourself to use 5th grade math to solve problems that may pop up; especially if your interest lies in the 'weird' stuff like flying wings or canards. Within my philosophy these designs have much greater potential; and would widen the scope of both competition and fun. 3. Are you a conservative socialist, or a gang member of the open ended wild bunch. Conservatives stick with me, wild and lawless stage right to avoid your definitions of drivel. 4. Can you handle the Zen discipline that I have applied to soaring, and avoid nature's methods to spectacularly draw a model sailplane to cloud base [because you conservatively realize that you are too light to navigate the voracious upper air?] Let's get into the trespass concept: The AMA [Academy of Model Aeronautics] specifies that its members are not to exceed an altitude of 600 feet AGL. FAA places a recognized limit for lightplanes to stay above 1000 feet AGL. The TCA floor of modern airports happens to be 3500 feet AGL, and that means airliners can operate down to that level when ferrying from service area's, or when stacked up. Why can't modelers morally respect those limits, and if a violation occurs by curiosity, just don't compound the abuse by sitting at trespass altitude for more than 10 minutes. Modelers should share the air because they just do not own it! The flight time at most AMA contests happens to be about 10 minutes, and with 20 years of competitive flying, I can honestly say that 800 feet AGL is a very realistic altitude limit, and 1000 feet

a very generous one. My Legionair did lots of cross country work without wasting time for high altitude climbing, and I probably nipped at 1000 ft altitude; but not 3500 feet that would have burned up time hauling the ballast up to really make it zip (in order to make up for climb time). My Legionair @ 10 oz/ft hit close to 40 mph in cruise, and that was a bear for the chase car to keep up with. Make it weigh in at 20 oz/ft (just not enough ballast room to accomplish that feat) and cruise would be closer to 60 mph. I guess it would be usable if chase driver was Mario Andriette! So, attempting to design/select a profile to work effectively for 600 ft AGL one has to weigh attributes that will make the task easier. Lets start with a high start of 50 feet of rubber and 200 feet of line. Typical launch altitude would be 240 feet. Low speed becomes important, and is limited by surface breeze. A good profile should be 9% typically, for a wing loading of 7 oz/ft. Sport winch available? 600 ft to turnaround with stoutly built wings, and the machine ballasted up to 10 oz/ft [Note: airspeed changes by the square root of a weight change]. In fact if the air is breezy you may have to add a lot more ballast. In fact, all of soaring can be expressed simply, for the wise employment of profiles: 1. Natures star-gate for peak L/D is approximately 6 degrees alpha. 2. To center airspeed for the profile's L/D performance, mass is the main ingredient. 3. Attempting to use the lower C/L by reducing alpha reduces L/D, So. 4. The ingenious magic of Dr. Drela is that he is forcing modelers to fly instinctively at close to 6 degrees alpha. [Humorous comment: This is like soaring with training wheels.] AMA club winch [3hp] with stout wings and a loading of 15 oz/ft+ will give you an 800 ft launch. Here is the point that Dr. Drela's profiles become very effective requiring only 8 to 10 oz/ft to zip about, while hungering for the upper air trespasses that in all honesty changes a sailplane's title from model; to miniature aircraft! Yes, there is a slew of competitive thin sections 6 to 7 % that can be used that will change the game to needed flaps; however, the demonstration here is to show life can exist below 1000 ft AGL, rather then stress the secrets for going into the stratosphere. Remember this keynote: Dr Drela and Dr. Selig's academic contributions are primarily centered at flight on Mars, or at 200,000 feet (near space) at high airspeed on Earth, whereas my viewpoint is only 400 feet AGL, for the thrill of climbing to <1000 feet, while doing less than 20 minute flights. [I have a short attention span, and enjoy start overs] So that other egotists can preen their feathers, while basking in their boredom. Thanks to computers and simple programs, one does not need wind tunnels and calculus to customize a working profile to fit their skill level. This is especially true if one has no interest in trespassing into the upper air. The concept of perfection should be scrapped, as Dr. Grant proved by flopping a fish on a drafting table, and using its outline for his world famous profile. Seriously, a 10% family of Spica, Drela, Selig, Legionair, Goldberg, and crudely mimicking hand-drawn profiles would perform so very close to each other, that only a very gullible Dumbo would believe his featherprofile was the reason for his success. Roll up your sleeves and take a skinny Dr. Drela profile, and copy it to a word processor. Expand the vertical to 10% of the chord length and you have a profile that will still perform like the skinny version, but with a more usable low end of velocity at 9 oz/ft loading instead of 6.5. This then forces one to escape the Drela paradigm, and also fattens up the fuselage design, along with adding wing ballast tubes, to gain performance by gravity. In my point of view ballast is the best way to index airspeed. Using a wide speed range profile 9 to 10% thick, with entry point fiddled with via Phillip's entry (or tripping) is far better then thinning the profile for a higher airspeed for a given (lesser) weight; while then reducing cross sectional area for drag reduction (that happens to restrict ballast to a meager amount). Am I the only one that has flown a 5 lb Gentle Lady? Obviously it is not the standard kit version that the experts recommend to be built at

1.25 lbs, but mine at 2 lbs empty, was greatly embellished with a fatter glass reinforced fuse to handle 3 lbs of ballast, rugged (airfoiled) tail feathers replaced the sparless flimsy ones, geodetic truss in the wing under upper surface sheeting. At 10 oz/ft I was able to dive (vertical) out of lift to make my landings on time at social events. [NOTES: A 5 lb GL is hard to spot land with or without spoilers unless wind is at least 20 mph! I did go vertical with it for about 200 feet, for a speed run afterward to get it home in a 45 mph gale. Also, the GL design is very clean, so sliding down at higher airspeed due to ballast increases re for greater lift efficiency thus improving LD, along with greater sensitivity to roll rate. To put it in simple terms, the GL was still flying when Bubble Dancers sat in vans waiting for the weather to improve.] So my little grasshoppers, the bottom line is don't get bamboozled by marketing and egotistical experts. Stick with what you can afford, while using imagination to improve upon the concept. If you want a soaring Park Flier build an inexpensive light machine with a 10% profile (2mtr or 100 inch Drifter or Olympic). Don't be deluded with sailplanes below a 6 ft wingspan (the little hand launchers are an expert's machine). Be sneaky, like use an I beam with a balsa lower spar for a light park flier, enlarge tail feathers so ballast to gain control power via airspeed, is not needed. Shorten the tail boom for the larger tail surfaces. No matter what you fly, RC soaring is a lot of fun, and I hope this article spurs you onto this great adventure - that truly doesn't need any coloring with 'mumbo jumbo'. Al Sugar 10-11-06