Jason Kottke live blogged last night’s, presumably, now infamous episode of Mythbusters when an airplane on a conveyor belt defied conventional logic and took off. It’s a really complicated matter of physics going on here, but the jist is this… An airplane is not like a car, it’s wheels are not where the power from the engines goes. They are free spinning with very little frictional contact to the rest of the plane, the power from the engines pulls/pushes the air around it allowing forward momentum. The conveyor belt could have been going a million times the speed of light in the opposite direction to the plane and as long as the engine was going at “take-off” speed, the plane would take off… Awesome huh?
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One response to “Airplane on a Conveyor Belt”
It only shows that “conventional logic” is a flawed phrase, The science was easy, but it’s beyond the comprehension of too many people. Anyone who said it would never take off, or that the test was flawed, should go back to 5th grade physics.
(Looks to me like just another example of the flawed educational system here in the USA)
It’s just that easy. Forward motion is generated by the PROP PULLING THE AIRFRAME THROUGH SPACE. The wing generates lift, but only at a certain airspeed.
The prop brought the airframe up to the necessary airspeed and the plane left the ground.
The wheels had nothing to do with it. Period.