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Old 3rd May 2001, 17:57
  #10 (permalink)  
OzDude
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Talking

Hang on a minute! Isn't this about a month overdue? I thought April fools was only done on the 1st of that month.

For those of you who want to see Bernoullis principle in action just go to your kitchen and find a spoon, hold it with the tips of your thumb and forefinger at the tip of the handle so the spoon is dangling downward and able to sway. Go to the sink and turn on a tap so the water is running smoothly but not too forcefully and gently move the back of the spoon into the flow of water.

Now those of you who have not studied aerodynamics might expect the spoon to be deflected away from the flowing water and if that is what you expected you will be suprised to find that the opposite happens. All you have to do now is turn everything 90 deg so that you imagine the water is flowing horizontally and the curved back of the spoon is the curved upper surface of a wing. Whether the water is moving and the spoon is stationary or vice verca doesn't matter as the principle is the same and you can apply fluid dynamics to air or water, the only difference really being the density.

I see nowhere in the article mentioned anything about the dynamics of drag and that would play a HUGE part of any theory to do with air 'sticking' to a surface! As for throwing Bernoullis theory out of the window... well it was some American who wrote the original article and just like the film U571 where history is re-written... well you know. (No offence intended to my American cousins who may think that this is a yank bashing exercise).