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Old 12th November 2002 | 22:38
  #53 (permalink)  
Nick Lappos
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For the Ground Effect is Pressure advocates:

Take care that the physical analogies you construct to help you understand the aerodynamics don't overpower the real factors. What about the behavior of any aircraft makes you think that the machine pushes on anything, exerts any pressure, to fly? This whole construct is not even true in the simplest little experiment. Look at a heavy bomber moving across the water at 100 knots, its wing within 1/3 of a span of the water, using much less power due to ground effect. Its wake is hundreds of feet behind it, yet you say it rides on a bubble of pressure. Wrong! It is going 115 miles per hour, yet you say ground effect disappears at forward speed. Wrong!

If you are going to conduct thought experiments to help understand the physics of flight, at least use real data!
 
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