Announcement

It's been 49 days since last post. I was in a long vacation, quitting my job, finding new one, settling up etc. I am grateful to all my friends for their support and faith. New job is much more cooler and organized. I am hoping to write more articles for you guys.

Now to the announcement.

I have officially bought and registered theaviationbusiness.com and will host this blog from now on.

www.theaviationbusiness.com

The new .com announcement comes with more surprises:

+ We will be blogging about series of game-changing aircraft.

+ We will be blogging about sentinel planes of world wars.

+ We will be dwelling into aerodynamic design tricks used in aircraft and everyday life.

+ We will discuss what all aviation technology is being used in everyday life.

...and  much more.

Basically , we are reinventing theaviationbusiness.com.

Welcome aboard old champs! I'm tremendously thankful to all my readers.

Thank You Guys!

CK

My Long Vacation

Hey Fellas!

Sorry I couldn't write for couple of weeks. I am on a long vacation. I was and will be very busy with stuffs happening around me.

I am meeting all my relatives who I lost contact about two decades ago. I used to be close, then I migrated and life just happened. Anyway, I am excited to meet them.

Pic from one of my travels in India

For you guys, I have a big surprise. WAIT FOR IT....

Cheers

CK

Why do we use Flaps?

For the past some weeks, I've been playing a mobile game called "Extreme Landings".

It's one of the best aviation mobile game in the market now. I recommend you guys to try it.

Extreme Landings

Anyway, as the name suggests, it is all about landing. Not just any landing but realistically simulated with specific faults. There are times when engines burn out or one of the landing gear won't work or the rudder is jammed - it's fun. 

During these landings, I came to realize how important flaps are. I came to appreciate this marvelous piece of design attribute which makes any flight successful.

Flaps are the piece of wing that extends at the time of landing (and takeoff).

Why does it extend like that? What is the use of it? 

Well at the time of landing and takeoff extra lift is required. Lift as a force depends on the surface area. If you increase surface area, then you increase lift. As you can see from the above pic, the wing just got bigger. That's all. 

Remember this: Lift is directly proportional to speed and surface area. That is, if speed or surface area is increased Lift also increases. If speed or surface area is decreased lift decreases.

If the it gives more lift, then why can't they use it all the way? Why extend it only at the time of landing and take-off?

It's because of speed. Commercial aircraft speed at 35,000 ft is 900 km/hr (560 mph). While the speed at ground level is 240-285 km/h (150-180 mph). Enough lift is not achieved at this speed, so to compensate the low speed, they increase the area so that value of lift remains the same. 

So, if there were no flaps, aircraft would have to land very fast to keep the lift up. Also at takeoff they would have to use the full runway length to achieve the desired lift value by increasing speed. 

Flaps are very important for an aircraft functionality. In fact it is evident with LockheedF-104 Starfighter. It is the first aircraft to achieve sustained Mach 2 flights. Look how small thier wings are. It was designed by the same man who designed SR-71A Blackbird. 

Lockheed F-104 Starfighter

With high speed comes sacrifices. If the area is increased it will increase the lift but at high speeds drag increases tremendously. That's one of the reasons why most of the fighter aircraft have small wings.  Well, with F-104, since extending flaps did very little in increasing the lift; F-104 had to make high speed landings . Many fighters crashed at landing phase due to high speeds. 

Despite that, the performance record of this legendary aircraft still remains one of the best in aviation history. 

After the invention many aircraft didn't have powerful jet engines. They had good old piston engines. So the speeds achieved was low. As speed decreased lift decreased. The only way to increase the lift was to increase surface area. So old timers added extra wing!

Three Wings stacked on top of each other:

Tri-Plane

Then Two wings:

Bi-Planes

They just keep stacking :

Multi Wings Plane

After the invention Jet engines, we compromised on just extending the wings for specific use and called it flaps.


I hope this was informative and entertaining.  Please comment and share. 
Until next time, this is CK signing off.

-CK

Kelly Johnson Quote

"Be quick, be quiet, and be on time." CELEBRATE AVIATION. 

This is our 50th post.  Thanks for support people. You guys are the best.

Chan CK

A Single Lifetime

"A single lifetime, even though entirely devoted to the sky, would not be enough for the study of so vast a subject. A time will come when our descendants will be amazed that we did not know things that are so plain to them."

Helping the Future Arrive

I want to show you guys how Lockheed Martin is pushing our limits.

MH370 : Year One, What happened?

MH370 has turned from a mere flight crash to a legend. The flight which disappeared over Indian ocean on March 8th 2014 will complete its one year coming Sunday. At the time of this writing, no solid clue or evidence have been found. When we think back about this worldwide-propaganda, all everyone wants to know is "What happened?". How can a $300 million Boeing 777 ,with no crash record since its first flight in 1994, disappear with no trace? How did this happen in the first place?

As an aeronautical engineer and an ATC professional myself, I cannot fathom the reasons for this covert enigma. For the public outside aviation industry, it's just another mystery. Something to tangle with crazy conspiracy theories. Even though modern world communication have reduced great distance between people, there are plenty of places on our planet where a commercial aircraft with 239 people can disappear.

Radar technology which was operational in 1940s, are designed to cover the land area. Radar was developed for world war to track enemy aircraft. Soon the technology was commercialized for passenger aircraft. With this technology it is possible to track flights 200 miles off the land. After that, no body cares to track it.

When the Air France Flight 447 crashed in the Atlantic ocean in 2009, talks for a space based tracking was proposed, but none came into effect. Flight 447 crashed while still in its intended flight route, and still it took two years to find the black box.

Promising improvement in the technology was made with ADS-B (automatic surveillance dependent broadcast). But it is not mandatory in all the countries. Since MH370, ICAO has decided to put all commercial aircraft to track every 15 minutes. This will be in effect from December 2015.

The search still continues. It has become the aviation's most expensive search in the history. By now 40% search area has been completed. And this is underwater. Flight has many things that can float. Still the mystery remains on why nothing has been found yet. Not even a single piece.

The transponders went offline two minutes after the radio contact. How? Deliberate? Fire?

And it was headed to the vast south Indian Ocean. Pilots have the option to switch off the transponders for safety reasons. It's ironic though.

The real loss is for the families and loved ones of the 239 passengers/crew who are fated to mourn over bodiless presumed deaths. It's really sad. Our prayers are with them. Also the team searching for the ill-fated flight, they have a job like no-other- we express our gratitude. We put our faith on them, that in time we will know what happened.

Our industry is aviation and we are the safest. We learn from our mistakes, unexpected mishaps. It's not an easy job, its not a perfect system - but it is only one we got. This is what we do. We write the rules with blood.

With high hopes - Chan CK