PPRuNe Forums - View Single Post - Does Aileron setting increase drag ???
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Old 28th Jun 2007, 10:26
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Mad (Flt) Scientist
 
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As always, the answer is "it depends"

And what it depends on is how good a job the original wing designers did in optimising the design, and whether the conditions you are specifically considering were one of the design conditions they worked with.

If you consider the wing to be rigid, then what you're really doing is redefining the section of the outboard wing (where the ailerons are). Add in aeroelasticity, and you're also effectively changing the designed washout. If both of those were well chosen, then any change will take you off the design point, and will increase drag (as Ghengis mentions, you're changing the spanwise lift distribution; that may or may not be a positive or negative effect). You will get a bit more drag from the discontinuity at the edge of the aileron, but it may be a secondary effect. You'll also get some changes in pitching moment, especially if the wing is highly swept (which is also likely to exacerbate any twist effects). The actual lift distribution change will NOT affect the trim drag (same amount of wing lift at 1'g' flight) but a pitching moment change may affect trim drag; again I'd expect this to be secondary at best.

If I had to guess, I'd say "more drag" based on the assumption Convair knew what they were doing. But it's just a guess.
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