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Old January 5th 11, 12:00 AM posted to rec.aviation.soaring
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Default poor lateral control on a slow tow?


So, in between level flight and vertical flight, there must be a region
where the wing lift is less than in level flight, right? I'm saying
there is a continuous reduction in the lift the wing must provide as the
climb angle increases.

Only two months till March flying starts...gotta solve this problem
while we still have time!

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Eric Greenwell - Washington State, USA (change ".netto" to ".us" to
email me)


Yeah....you got it......the lift is the cosine of the climb angle
times the weight.........

level.....0 degrees climb.. Cosine 0 = 1 so lift =100% glider
weight

5 degree climb (reasonable tow climb angle) Cosine 5 = .996 so
lift = 99.6% of glider's weight

45 degree climb (unlikely but just for demonstration) cosine 45 = .
707 so lift would be only 71% of glider's weight

90 degree climb Cosine 90 = o so lift would be zero.

If we keep the airspeed constant, the drag shoud be constant....so the
only variables are lift and thrust. as the thrust vector gets
bigger, the direction of flgith gets steeper climb, and the lift
vector gets smaller.

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