Author: Powell M. Lovell

Publisher:

Published: 1957

Total Pages: 42

ISBN-13:

An investigation has been conducted to determine the effects of wing position and vertical tail configuration on the stability and control characteristics of a jet-powered delta-wing vertically rising airplane model. A ducted-fan powerplant was used because there was no hot-jet powerplant of sufficiently small size and adequate reliability available. In addition to conventional flap-type control surfaces on the wings and vertical tails, the model had jet-reaction controls provided by movable eyelids at the rear of the tail pipe and by air bled from the main duct and exhausted through movable nozzles near the wing tips. The investigation consisted of flight and force tests of three model configurations: a high wing with a top-mounted vertical tail, a high wing with top- and bottom-mounted vertical tails, and a low wing with the top-mounted vertical tail. The flight tests, which were made in the Langley full-scale tunnel, represented slow constant-altitude transitions from hovering to normal unstalled forward flight.