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Old June 12th 17, 03:33 PM posted to rec.aviation.soaring
Tango Whisky
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Default Gap seals effectiveness study?

Le lundi 12 juin 2017 07:38:22 UTC+2, Bret Hess a écritÂ*:
Hi, we see lots of mylar gap seals and read lots of discussion of them. Does anyone know of an engineering study that quantifies their effect on sailplane wings or other wings? Nothing pops up quickly in Google. I'm wondering how much science there is to this practice.

I'm hoping for more than anecdotal comments. Saying that top racers all use them doesn't tell us much because so do almost everyone.


There is quite a number of gliders which require the seals in place to be airworthy.

Apart from the obvious loss of performance without seals, the air flow escaping through this area might induce flutter (which in turn will induce a loss of performance of 100%).

Bert "TW"