Barnaby Wainfan
Barnaby is a Technical Fellow for Northrop Grumman’s Advanced Design organization. A private pilot with single-engine and glider ratings, Barnaby has been involved in the design of unconventional airplanes including canards, joined wings, flying wings and some too strange to fall into any known category.
Wind Tunnel
Aerodynamics Engineer Barnaby Wainfan dissects one of the most common and possibly least understood flight maneuvers: turns.
Flying Qualities and the Horizontal Tail
An airplane's horizontal tail is critical to stabilizing the airplane in pitch, trimming out pitching moments caused by the wing and providing control power for maneuverability.
Wind Tunnel
Multiple engines complicate design, because not only must the airplane be able to maintain flight on one engine, but also the pilot must be able to control it. Lateral/directional stability issues are key;
Wind Tunnel
In order to bank the airplane and execute a turn properly, adverse yaw must be countered or eliminate altogether. The discussion of how to do this includes rudder control, aileron-rudder interconnects, directional stability, differential ailerons, aileron drag and the use of spoilers;
Wind Tunnel
The aerodynamics of an airplane sometimes don't cooperate with the pilots desire to roll, and instead produce both yaw and roll. Contributing factors are aileron parasite drag, induced drag between the wings and changes in the roll rate itself;
Wind Tunnel
Yaw rarely occurs without rolling, and roll rarely occurs without yawing. This month Barnaby Wainfan discusses coupled motion, including adverse yaw, the spiral mode and Dutch roll.
Wind Tunnel
This month columnist Barnaby Wainfan takes a look at how the airplane responds in roll when the pilot is maneuvering. Two key factors are roll acceleration and the steady-state roll rate.
Wind Tunnel
The discussion of lateral/directional stability continues with an examination of dihedral effect and the effect of roll;
Wind Tunnel
Pitch is not the only axis involved in making an airplane fly well. Yaw and roll are also important, and this month Barnaby Wainfan turns his attention to lateral/directional stability and its effect on flying qualities.
Wind Tunnel
When is an airplane in trim? At least to the pilot, the airplane is trimmed when no stick force is required to maintain equilibrium. So how do we achieve this? Barnaby Wainfan explains any number of ways to go about it, including the use of trimtabs, spring systems, sparrow strainers and variable incidence tails.
In Case You Missed It
Simple Green
Extreme Simple Green - Aircraft is a new product designed to clean your aircraft safely without damaging finishes. Its effective in removing oil and other dirt from the exterior surfaces as well as the interior, and is used by Boeing on its family of airplanes. Its available at specialty stores and aviation supply houses.
