Why don't wings have dimples?

Capt. Geoffrey Thorpe wrote:


oops, didn't read far enough:

"The dimples also help in the generation of lift. By keeping the flow
attached, the dimples help promote an asymmetry of the flow in the wake.
This asymmetry can be seen in Figure 5. In this figure, the smoke shows the
flow pattern about a spinning golf ball. The flow is moving from left to
right and the ball is spinning in the counter-clockwise direction. The wake
is being deflected downwards. This downward deflection of the wake implies
that a lifting force is being applied to the golf ball."

This is inconsistant with my thinking and inconsistant with the top of the
ball moving towards the golfer as described earlier on the page...

--
Geoff
The Sea Hawk at Wow Way d0t Com
remove spaces and make the obvious substitutions to reply by mail
When immigration is outlawed, only outlaws will immigrate.



Somebody (NASA/University?) built a "tube wing" thing once.

The wing was a large dia tube mounted - well - like a wing.

The tube rotated - "leading edge" up to create a circulation effect.
(as the aircraft moved forward - no hovering allowed this area)

It worked, but drag was a real drag...


Just a suspicion that the lift vector of a golf ball changes in flight.

Any flight path deviation due to rotational lift vectors would be strongest
early in the flight, but decrease as velocity decays below Re(crit)(combined
forward motion plus rotational effects) and the path becomes more ballistic.

Also didja catch the "Happy Non-Hooker" ball?


Richard