Concorde question
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I always thought "100" was the "bare" production aircraft definition, "101" and "102" were the AF and BA specs (equipment, cockpit, cabin), "103" being PanAm, etc. and I've never seen a mention of a "5100/5101/5102" definition.
Would be nice to get this sorted in my ancient brain...... thanks in advance!
CJ
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Dude, can I join Christiaan in requesting more information on that '5000' series numbering; I have never come across it before.
Also, I have asked the CAA surveyor who was most likely to have made that reskinning decision for more data. Perhaps he can remember the problem with the forward fuselage skins. Certainly when we were standing together inside 102 last week and talking about fuselage modifications for relifing the aircraft the problem of Component 30 was not mentioned!
I'll keep you in touch.
CliveL
PS: You were going to get a lot for your £30
Also, I have asked the CAA surveyor who was most likely to have made that reskinning decision for more data. Perhaps he can remember the problem with the forward fuselage skins. Certainly when we were standing together inside 102 last week and talking about fuselage modifications for relifing the aircraft the problem of Component 30 was not mentioned!
I'll keep you in touch.
CliveL
PS: You were going to get a lot for your £30
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Originally Posted by Mike-Bracknell
I think even in 1985, at the age of 14, I could have possibly scraped £30 together if you'd told me i'd get a trip in her
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Dude
I have now asked two senior CAA surveyors about this, and neither remember anything but the crown modifications that went with RELIFE. Sounds like somebody didn't want to do the conversion 
CliveL
The production series aircraft had a thicker skin here, and we were told that the CAA insisted on this being done as part of any conversion to airliner standard.
CliveL
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I hate to go back several pages, but I still have a basic question about the lift generation when the AoA was more moderate.
When not generating vortex lift, was the airflow attached over both the upper and lower wing surface?
The mental picture I have is that during supersonic flight and also during subsonic but high-IAS phases, the wing was generating lift in a way Newton and Bernoulli would have immediately recognized. As the IAS decreased and AoA increased, the vortex started at the leading edge, and gradually grew in both size and contribution to overall lift until the vortex (or vortices) accounted for all the lifting force.
When not generating vortex lift, was the airflow attached over both the upper and lower wing surface?
The mental picture I have is that during supersonic flight and also during subsonic but high-IAS phases, the wing was generating lift in a way Newton and Bernoulli would have immediately recognized. As the IAS decreased and AoA increased, the vortex started at the leading edge, and gradually grew in both size and contribution to overall lift until the vortex (or vortices) accounted for all the lifting force.
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When not generating vortex lift, was the airflow attached over both the upper and lower wing surface?
As the IAS decreased and AoA increased, the vortex started at the leading edge, and gradually grew in both size and contribution to overall lift until the vortex (or vortices) accounted for all the lifting force.
As the IAS decreased and AoA increased, the vortex started at the leading edge, and gradually grew in both size and contribution to overall lift until the vortex (or vortices) accounted for all the lifting force.
The vortices never provided all the lifting force. Up to about 6 or 7 deg AoA there was no vortex lift, just the usual wing tip vortices. Above that AoA the non-linear (vortex) lift grew steadily until at stall (about 23 deg AoA) the vortex lift was around 45% of the total.
CliveL:
Was the vortex lift characteristic of the ogee wing aerodynamics fully understood before the aero configuration of Concorde was finalised?
How much did the BAC 221 (the Fairey Delta II analog of Concorde) contribute to the understanding of vortex lift of this wing?
TwoChai
Was the vortex lift characteristic of the ogee wing aerodynamics fully understood before the aero configuration of Concorde was finalised?
How much did the BAC 221 (the Fairey Delta II analog of Concorde) contribute to the understanding of vortex lift of this wing?
TwoChai
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twochai
I would say that it was. Remember that the design went through several phases before it was finalised and we did an awful lot of testing and tweaking of the detailed geometry to eliminate a gradual pitch-up and to increase the vortex lift at any given AoA, so by the time we defined the production aircraft wing we knew pretty well all there was to know about vortex development from the AoA at which it started right through to the AoA at which the vortices burst.
The BAC221 didn't contribute much to the details of this understanding as it was rather too late to help in prototype definition and the production development was all about the details of planform, camber and twist. But then the 221 wasn't intended to study vortex development; it was built to examine the handling characteristics of slender ogee wings at supersonic speeds.
CliveL
Was the vortex lift characteristic of the ogee wing aerodynamics fully understood before the aero configuration of Concorde was finalised?
How much did the BAC 221 (the Fairey Delta II analog of Concorde) contribute to the understanding of vortex lift of this wing?
CliveL
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CliveL, correct me where I'm wrong.
* Most deltas develop some vortex lift, and there were several deltas flying long before Concorde, so the phenomenon was not unknown.
Shaping the wing, and in particular the leading edge, optimised the effect on Concorde.
* The ogee (slender delta) wing was original proposed by NASA (possibly still NACA at the time) as best suited for a supersonic transport. The information was in the public domain by the time the "BAC223" and "Super Caravelle" were first revealed (they later "merged" into the Concorde design).
The Tu-144 design used the same information, which is a major reason for its resemblance to Concorde, rather than espionage...
How much the full advantages of the 'vortex lift' were understood at the time, is still an open question, IIRC.
I'll have to look for the original NASA TN (Tech Note)... it may be on the web somewhere.
* I would think the Handley Page HP115 slender-delta low-speed test aircraft must have contributed some details about vortex lift.
Sorry, I can't find my own photos of the beast.
It's now in the Fleet Air Arm Museum at Yeovilton (UK), together with Concorde 002 and the BAC-221.
It still has the "smoke tube" on the left wing leading edge, that was used to visualise the vortex over the wing (not yet fitted when the photo above was taken).
CJ
* Most deltas develop some vortex lift, and there were several deltas flying long before Concorde, so the phenomenon was not unknown.
Shaping the wing, and in particular the leading edge, optimised the effect on Concorde.
* The ogee (slender delta) wing was original proposed by NASA (possibly still NACA at the time) as best suited for a supersonic transport. The information was in the public domain by the time the "BAC223" and "Super Caravelle" were first revealed (they later "merged" into the Concorde design).
The Tu-144 design used the same information, which is a major reason for its resemblance to Concorde, rather than espionage...
How much the full advantages of the 'vortex lift' were understood at the time, is still an open question, IIRC.
I'll have to look for the original NASA TN (Tech Note)... it may be on the web somewhere.
* I would think the Handley Page HP115 slender-delta low-speed test aircraft must have contributed some details about vortex lift.
Sorry, I can't find my own photos of the beast.
It's now in the Fleet Air Arm Museum at Yeovilton (UK), together with Concorde 002 and the BAC-221.
It still has the "smoke tube" on the left wing leading edge, that was used to visualise the vortex over the wing (not yet fitted when the photo above was taken).
CJ
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Slender wings
Christiaan
Quite true, and I hope I didn't give the impression that it was otherwise. On this side of the Atlantic France had the Mirage series, UK the Javelin, the two Avro aircraft and of course the FD2. However these all had relatively rounded leading edges which reduced the effect somewhat.
I must admit that I was not aware that NACA had proposed an ogee wing for supersonic transports, although all the US SST designs featured 'double deltas' . Ken Owen's book says that US firms had been working on SST research and design studies since the late 1950s, and since the UK equivalent, the Supersonic Transport Advisory Committee (STAC) ran from 1956 to 1959 and definitely included sharp-edged slender wings amongst their studies, I would say UK work was at least in parallel.
But to be frank, the basic idea sprang from German research done during WW2. They were well ahead in knowledge of the aerodynamics of delta wings as part of their research into aircraft suitable for the higher speeds that went with those new-fangled jet engines. Then, after the war's end, the German scientists migrated to either the UK and US (if they were lucky) or got carried off to Russia. They brought with them all the knowledge they had gained (and of course there were specific trained teams whose job it was to search the German research establishment records for any useful data. On the UK side certainly the idea of exploiting vortex lift for use on an SST was generated by German researchers working at the RAE (Kuchemann and Weber in particular). My guess (I don't know for sure) is that similar things happened in the US, although "their Germans" seemed to be more interested in rocketry.
Not as much as you might think, because like the 221 it was too late to have much influence and it also was built to study slender delta handling, in particular a possible problem known as 'Gray's oscillations' rather than vortex lift as such.
Clive
Most deltas develop some vortex lift, and there were several deltas flying long before Concorde, so the phenomenon was not unknown.
Shaping the wing, and in particular the leading edge, optimised the effect on Concorde.
Shaping the wing, and in particular the leading edge, optimised the effect on Concorde.
* The ogee (slender delta) wing was original proposed by NASA (possibly still NACA at the time) as best suited for a supersonic transport. The information was in the public domain by the time the "BAC223" and "Super Caravelle" were first revealed (they later "merged" into the Concorde design).
The Tu-144 design used the same information, which is a major reason for its resemblance to Concorde, rather than espionage...
How much the full advantages of the 'vortex lift' were understood at the time, is still an open question, IIRC.
I'll have to look for the original NASA TN (Tech Note)... it may be on the web somewhere.
The Tu-144 design used the same information, which is a major reason for its resemblance to Concorde, rather than espionage...
How much the full advantages of the 'vortex lift' were understood at the time, is still an open question, IIRC.
I'll have to look for the original NASA TN (Tech Note)... it may be on the web somewhere.
But to be frank, the basic idea sprang from German research done during WW2. They were well ahead in knowledge of the aerodynamics of delta wings as part of their research into aircraft suitable for the higher speeds that went with those new-fangled jet engines. Then, after the war's end, the German scientists migrated to either the UK and US (if they were lucky) or got carried off to Russia. They brought with them all the knowledge they had gained (and of course there were specific trained teams whose job it was to search the German research establishment records for any useful data. On the UK side certainly the idea of exploiting vortex lift for use on an SST was generated by German researchers working at the RAE (Kuchemann and Weber in particular). My guess (I don't know for sure) is that similar things happened in the US, although "their Germans" seemed to be more interested in rocketry.
* I would think the Handley Page HP115 slender-delta low-speed test aircraft must have contributed some details about vortex lift.
Clive
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Dare I ask for the more complicated version?
I had thought I might have some pretty pictures but I haven't got anything for low AoA. I find it difficult to respond to such a general quetion though. Could you be a little more specific as to the bits that interest you?
Sidebar: in a supersonic wind tunnel test, do you get a sonic boom?
I THINK the answer is no. You will get the bow shock of course and this will be reflected off the tunnel walls so you must have a big tunnel or a small model to avoid these reflected waves interfering with the flow over the tail of the model, but the pressure rise on the tunnel floor is 'static' and the tunnel walls are massive steel construction. I may be wrong here, but I associate sonic booms with a rapid rise in pressure and a 'movement' of that pressure rise past the observer. In a tunnel you don't get this 'dynamic' effect (unless of course you can arrange to walk past the working section at 660 mph
CliveL
Edited after some thinking
Last edited by CliveL; 22nd Apr 2011 at 21:15.
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CliveL (And ChristiaanJ)
Sure can Clive. These are the BA 5102 numbers, Air France 5101 numbers were corespondingly identical chronologically.: G-BOAC - 5102-01. G-BOAA - 5102-02. G-BOAB - 5102-03. G-BOAD - 5102-04. G-BOAE - 5102-05. Although G-BOAG (G-BFKW) and G-BOAF (G-BFKX) were originally Variant 192 (British Unsold) aircraft, these correspondingly became 5102-06 and 5102-07. I wonder if anyone here remembers G-BOAF doing her pre-delivery flying at Filton registered as G-N91AF? I remember when I was at Filton doing one of my Concorde type courses in 1980, and there was good old Foxy Lady with her 'Branniff' registration. She was re-re-registered 
to G-BOAF prior to delivery to BA.
The Component 30 skin thickness issue was not relevant for RELIFE 2; you and I know that the major 'skin' issue here was the centre fuselage crown area. The issue of Component 30 was a 201/202 issue only. (Assuming that the French had the need/desire/capability of adding another airframe to their fleet.
And sorry everyone about the £30 cost of converting 202 into an airliner, I meant (dumb ass that I am) £30 MILLION.
Best regards
Dude
Dude, can I join Christiaan in requesting more information on that '5000' series numbering; I have never come across it before.
to G-BOAF prior to delivery to BA.
Also, I have asked the CAA surveyor who was most likely to have made that reskinning decision for more data. Perhaps he can remember the problem with the forward fuselage skins. Certainly when we were standing together inside 102 last week and talking about fuselage modifications for relifing the aircraft the problem of Component 30 was not mentioned!
And sorry everyone about the £30 cost of converting 202 into an airliner, I meant (dumb ass that I am) £30 MILLION.
Best regards
Dude
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The vortices never provided all the lifting force. Up to about 6 or 7 deg AoA there was no vortex lift, just the usual wing tip vortices. Above that AoA the non-linear (vortex) lift grew steadily until at stall (about 23 deg AoA) the vortex lift was around 45% of the total.
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In the book The Concorder Story (5th edition) on pages 138 / 139 it talks about the crown modification with pictures of what was done. In précis it states that the crown modification was to strengthen the top of the fuselage at rotate, it states that this was a candle sticked task which required the a/c to be jacked up so the skin has zero stress. The crown modification also included an additional strap over the fuselage just to the rear of the Center door. Appologies for the précis of the text but I hope that this is of use. Oh yes the pictures of the modification are on page 140.
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Dude,
Agreed on crown issue, but I am getting completely negative responses from CAA guys regarding any 201/202 differences such as you describe - nobody remembers it!
(Check your PMs)
SSD
By "Stall" in this case I meant the maximum ift we could use. There was in fact a small 'hiccup' in the lift curve against AoA, but the lift went up again afterwards. However, there was a definite nose-up 'break' in the pitching moment which we took to be the limiting AoA and regarded as a 'stall'
CliveL
Agreed on crown issue, but I am getting completely negative responses from CAA guys regarding any 201/202 differences such as you describe - nobody remembers it!
(Check your PMs)
SSD
By "Stall" in this case I meant the maximum ift we could use. There was in fact a small 'hiccup' in the lift curve against AoA, but the lift went up again afterwards. However, there was a definite nose-up 'break' in the pitching moment which we took to be the limiting AoA and regarded as a 'stall'
CliveL
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May I ask you guys another question relating to the book I mentioned earlier, in the same book it shows a Concorde with a Airbus sidestick control. I wondered if anymore information is known on this modification I suspect t must have been quite an systems integration exercise.
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No, I probably couldn't.
Let me ask it this way: Could a student in Aeronautical Engineering calculate the lift and drag for (non-vortex) Concorde using the same equations he would use to calculate lift and drag for say, a 777?
In other, other words... I understand that there's a very different phenomenon developing a chunk of lift at high AoA. But the wing still has a very unique shape and camber, so I wonder if-- when the AoA is *not* as high-- phenomena responsible for our 777 staying up fully apply to Concorde.
If I'm just missing the boat completely here, just give me the stern eye and ask me to reread some physics.
Let me ask it this way: Could a student in Aeronautical Engineering calculate the lift and drag for (non-vortex) Concorde using the same equations he would use to calculate lift and drag for say, a 777?
In other, other words... I understand that there's a very different phenomenon developing a chunk of lift at high AoA. But the wing still has a very unique shape and camber, so I wonder if-- when the AoA is *not* as high-- phenomena responsible for our 777 staying up fully apply to Concorde.
If I'm just missing the boat completely here, just give me the stern eye and ask me to reread some physics.