FlightpathOBN;
PJ2...I really dont think this experiment explains lift, as there is no load on the airfoil. It may explain airflow, but not lift.
Thank you for your response.
After reading, (and finding it a distinct challenge!), a bit in Gentry, Shevell and Stinton as kindly pointed out by some posters and finding this discussion so interesting, I decided to do the experiment, and set it up more or less as advised by the paper.
The lift and trailing vortices generated, even at lower AoA's, were as described in Gentry's work (I have to return to Stinton though!), and the downwash visible here in the tray of standing (static) water until "disturbed" by the movement of the airfoil from which I definitely felt "lift", and in the descending vortices that I've seen (and been hit by!) in cruise by opposite direction aircraft 1000ft above, to me demonstrates downwash and the fact that lift was created.
I would disagree that there is no "load" on the airfoil. Wouldn't load be a resistance against a force whether something is held in place or whether it is dead weight plus Nz?
The airfoil is held "against its will", (if you will!) by the metal handle and my arm. That is as valid a "load" as is the sophisticated fastenings to models one sees in wind-tunnel work. If it works and is valid there, it works and is valid here, I believe.
PJ2