OldLurker
3rd May 2019, 07:42
BAE Systems in the UK are flying a UAV, 4 meter wingspan, with no moving control surfaces, using blown air for flight control. It's called Magma. (They had a previous smaller one called Demon – PPrune discussion here (https://www.pprune.org/military-aviation/475630-bae-pilotless-demonstrator-flies-caa-auth-d-nil-control-surface-movement.html) in the military aviation forum.)
It's produced silly mass-media headlines like Could this plane end bumpy landings? Britain trials the world's first aircraft without wing flaps (https://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/2019/05/02/could-plane-end-bumpy-landings-britain-trials-worlds-first-aircraft/) (Daily Telegraph, story behind pay-wall after first 2½ paras) although in the paper's partial defence, BAE themselves (https://www.baesystems.com/en/article/first-magma-flight-trials) and The Engineer (https://www.theengineer.co.uk/magma-uav-bae-systems-flapless/) talked about flaps in their stories. In fact it seems to be not only flapless but also aileron-less, rudder-less and elevator-less, no moving parts.
Obviously there's a long way to go, but might this technology have potential for commercial aircraft one day?
It's produced silly mass-media headlines like Could this plane end bumpy landings? Britain trials the world's first aircraft without wing flaps (https://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/2019/05/02/could-plane-end-bumpy-landings-britain-trials-worlds-first-aircraft/) (Daily Telegraph, story behind pay-wall after first 2½ paras) although in the paper's partial defence, BAE themselves (https://www.baesystems.com/en/article/first-magma-flight-trials) and The Engineer (https://www.theengineer.co.uk/magma-uav-bae-systems-flapless/) talked about flaps in their stories. In fact it seems to be not only flapless but also aileron-less, rudder-less and elevator-less, no moving parts.
Obviously there's a long way to go, but might this technology have potential for commercial aircraft one day?