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Old 13th Jan 2014, 10:27
  #17 (permalink)  
dublinpilot
 
Join Date: Feb 2002
Location: Dublin
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Imagine a small windmill poking out the top of your wing.



How fast it's spinning obviously reflects how fast the air is moving past it. This is obviously the same as what the wing experinences.

It's obviously spinning quite fast if you're on the ground pointing into a 50kt head wind. The wing is experiencing the same wind.

Now you use your engine to speed up the aircraft by 10kts so that your airspeed increases from 50kts (standing still on the ground) to 60kts.

What happens to the windmill on top of the wing? It speeds up a little as it experiences the air moving over it just a little faster.

Now the aircraft, having reached 60kts airspeed (50 from the wind, while stationary, plus the 10 extra from the ground run) lifts off. What happens to the wind mill? Nothing changes. It's still experiencing wind passing it at 60kts so it still spins at the same speed.

I hope that helps.

dp
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