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Jet-powered Nausicaa Glider Project
Posted by
michael
on Fri Feb 20, 2004 11:13 PM
from the Darwin-award-nominee dept.
from the Darwin-award-nominee dept.
SuperElectric writes "As reported on slashdot.jp, Opensky is a project led by media artist Kazuhiko Hachiya to implement a working, jet-powered version of Moewe, the vehicle (pic) that the heroine rides on in "Nausicaa of the Valley of Wind". They've successfully test-flown (.mov, 8.6MB) a 1/2 scale model, and are moving into phase 2, which includes interviewing for test pilots (women only!). Can anybody knowledgeable in experimental aeronautics speculate on how doable this is? While it's not designed for general production (riders must be less than 50 kg/120 lbs), this would certainly beat Segway any day!"
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Jesrad writes "As was reported two years ago on Slashdot, japanese artists, students and engineers under the lead of Kazuhiko Hachiya have taken upon themselves to build a real-size, fully functional Mehve (japanese website), the small jet-powered glider flying wing ridden by anime heroin Nausicaa. They have made a lot of progress, and are now test-flying the full scale, yet unpowered model by tow-launching it along with its thrilled pilot. They're having a lot of fun, too, judging from the movies of the testing sessions."
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It's a cartoon (Score:5, Funny)
Don't pay any attention to the stacks of Sailor Moon and tentacle porn DVDs under my bed!
Re:It's a cartoon (Score:5, Informative)
she wears white pants. very similar to stretch pants. aerodynamics and all.
Parent
Re:It's a cartoon (Score:3, Funny)
go outside otaku
It's shilashudotsu (Score:3, Funny)
Re:It's a cartoon (Score:5, Informative)
*sigh*
Try the Nausicaa.net FAQ [nausicaa.net]:
Q: I heard that cuts were made in "Warriors of the Wind" to cover Nausicaa's bare bottom. Is it true?
A: That's a nasty rumor which just won't die. Even in a recent article by Reuters, she was called "a bare-bottomed heroine on a glider" @_@; Nausicaa *is* wearing pants. That's not a mini skirt she is wearing. It's her coat. Notice that the men in the valley are dressed as Nausicaa is. And they are not Scottish. ^_^
Parent
Jet-powered Nausicaa Glider Project (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Jet-powered Nausicaa Glider Project (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
Oh man... (Score:5, Insightful)
Well, off to join my buddy Wile E. Coyote, walking off cliffs and holding up little signs and waving bye-bye before I fall and that sort of thing.
Harden up (Score:3, Insightful)
You better have the reflexes of a barn swallow (Score:5, Insightful)
That flying wing sure isn't going to. Just the pendulum instability from the offset between CG and CL (that's center of gravity and center of lift for you 'dotters who never study anything but web engines and FPS technique) is going to drive you bats, and each change in thrust or drag is going to result in pitch moments. If designed badly, these can be fatal; if you have any doubts about this, you should look into the history of "interesting" airplanes like the original Mignet HM-14 Flying Flea [valkyrie.net].
There is a very real possibility of any such craft having serious PIOs (pilot-induced oscillations). Have them in a situation where you have no time to recover, and you can lose the airframe along with the crew.
While I am a firm believer in the value of Darwin Awards, I thnk that such a machine should not be flown with a human aboard. No matter how utterly fucking kewl all those anime fans would think it was, their refusal to recognize the distinction between cartoon physics and reality is not worth someone else's life, or undamaged brain, or functional spinal cord. It's appropriate that such a machine fly with only a dummy aboard; if it cracks up, you've got a hilarious photo-op rather than a tragedy.
Parent
Re:You better have the reflexes of a barn swallow (Score:5, Informative)
Flying wings, even well designed ones that don't have the problems you identified, have 3 instabilities that are more problematical than on conventionally tailed planes.
The first is a lack of pitch stability. To be stable they must have a reflex curve on the trailing edge (or similar) to give a downforce at that point so that as lift is lost approaching a stall the wing pitches down (no longer held up by the reflex). Without this they stall viciously.
Unfortunately the short lever given by the lack of length makes this reflex very sensitive to small changes and the wing 'nods'.
The 2nd problem is directional instability, even with wing tip fins the plane does not fly in the direction it is pointed.
The 3rd is more serious and is conic instability. When the wing banks and turns the outer wing is faster than wing on the inside of the turn. This gives more lift to the outside wing which then causes more banking. This can happen to tailed planes but with flying wings there is insufficient control leverage to avoid going pear shaped and winding up in an inverted spin.
Hang gliders cope with these because they have very large pendulum stability.
Parent
Re:Oh man... (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
MOV (Score:5, Funny)
Re:MOV (Score:5, Informative)
I'm crazy but what the heck:
Site: Site [fibersnet.net]
Movie: Movie [fibersnet.net]
Parent
Doesn't matter (Score:5, Informative)
Slashdot.jp?? (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Slashdot.jp?? (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
Re:Slashdot.jp?? (Score:5, Funny)
If we figure them in, they've been around for about 22 years. So we have (8*6+2*1600+1*22)/13=251 years old. Quite a bit younger than your proposition.
Parent
Re:Slashdot.jp?? (Score:4, Funny)
to wit: This sight (Slashdot Japan), use was started on 2001 May 28th as the Japanese edition of Slashdot which is the popularity sight of US.
Slashdot is news for the high-tech mania which is started in 1997 by Rob "CmdrTaco" Malda and Jeff "Hemos" Bates and the sight for chatting. It is the mammoth sight which starts hitting 3000 ten thousand page views in month, but to tell the truth most is supported by many volunteers and enthusiastic ???? and the user which repeats comment.
It has such enlightening articles that you just can't get in the states. Like:
The mouse which designates "the swallow" as motif
Amendment plan such as virus compilation crime and the criminal law Code of Criminal Procedure which includes mail log 90 day retention
Comet probe Rosetta it launches, or the distance where is long to the comet
I love the fish. [altavista.com]
Parent
Re:Slashdot.jp?? (Score:3, Interesting)
Sure most of the comments are incomprehensible but it seems better than last time I checked a year ago.
Re:Slashdot.jp?? (Score:4, Funny)
Parent
Re:Get a 5 digit user id! (Score:4, Funny)
Parent
I think the Segway would win (Score:4, Insightful)
In shorter: wider (figuratively) audience == good.
Crazy anime fans (Score:5, Funny)
Cool... (Score:5, Funny)
Women only? (Score:5, Informative)
which includes interviewing for test pilots (women only!)
Actually, I remember the FAQ saying that women are preferable, weight and all :) Though I'm not that proficient in Japanese, and babelfish spits out mostly nonsense, so might have missed something. Don't forget, Nausicaa wasn't the only one able to fly such a glider well...
P.S. Please stop with those underwear jokes! See the movie(and watch what people are wearing), RTFF at nausicaa.net and keep in mind the messed up colours, too.(OT: read the manga tooIt will fly (Score:5, Informative)
Would _I_ fly it? (assuming I was the size of an "Anime babe") I would have to say "Maybe." If it had a recovery chute, it would probably be safe enough - and a real hoot to fly.
Though laying on TOP of a running jet engine doesn't seem like fun. Worse than piloting an old style racing sidehack...
Re:It will fly (Score:3, Insightful)
Noise of a jet that close to your head,
An Intake that close,
ditto for hot exhaust gasses
the thought of injesting foreign objects and having a T-wheel cut me open is not fun.
I would rather have the wing above, and not spoil the view, if I am going to lay prone.
What is wrong with a BD-5J with fold up wings as seen in James Bond? At least he can sit like a human.
doable (Score:4, Funny)
Well, all they really need to do now is find a midget to fly the thing and its done!
Wait, Nausicaa? (Score:5, Funny)
Not for the american market :) (Score:5, Funny)
Landing? (Score:5, Insightful)
Next Step... (Score:5, Funny)
Scientists at an unknown and undisclosed location are researching into how to create giant bugs that clean up pollution. Plans have been made for a test run of these bugs in New Jersey. Details at 10!
Extraordinarily dangerous... (Score:4, Insightful)
GJC
Re:Extraordinarily dangerous... (Score:5, Funny)
You just don't get it, do you?
We've got to start training twelve-year-old schoolgirls to pilot advanced military weaponry at some point. Otherwise, who's going to defend us against giant killer robots?!
Oh, Yoshimi, they don't believe me. But you won't let those robots eat me.
Parent
Speculation (Score:5, Funny)
IANAAE (I am not an aeronautical engineer), but I am willing to speculate that it is not doable with legos. Not even with Mindstorms.
Noise? (Score:4, Funny)
...erm?!. (Score:5, Informative)
Then I saw the end of the film.
THAT THING'S FREAKING HUGE!
Seriously, there *is* a dummy pilot on their test model, but she's about the size of a 12-inch Star Wars doll. What's that going to put the full-sized mehve at, like a thirty-foot wingspan?!
It's waycool work and all, I don't deny that, but Nausicaa's mehve was a personal aircraft she could drag about tossed over her shoulder, and it was mostly steered by shifting her body weight, non unlike a hangglider. The big difference was that its jet propulsion gave it enough speed that it didn't need to be so large as a hangglider in order to generate sufficient lift.
That's what made it so amazing, and that's what made too fantastic to replicate in real life. These designers' trick? Make the thing so UNGODLY HUGE that the pilot has a minimal impact upon its aerodynamics and center of gravity.
So, waycool that they built it and all, but not nearly as cool as the tiny personal aircraft in the original manga.
My worry (Score:5, Funny)
It was cool (Score:3, Funny)
score: -1 pun
Aerial seppuku? (Score:5, Funny)
Feasibility (Score:3, Insightful)
IANAAE (I-am-not-an-aeronatical-engineer, yes folks, a new acronym is born) but I think this thing is pretty dang doable.
Which illustrates the point...why would you consult slashdot for aeronautical advice?
Re:Feasibility (Score:4, Funny)
Parent
Inherently unstable (Score:4, Informative)
Sheesh.
Re:Inherently unstable (Score:3, Informative)
Time to think out of the box. Where do you think the CG of a typical airliner craft is? And where are the wings?
Answers:
1) just short of halfway up the fuselage.
2) near the bottom of the fuselage.
Just because hangliders work that way doesn't mean all aircraft do.
It's called a "Mehve" = "Mowe," (Score:3, Informative)
The opening sequence in Nasuicaa where she glides over the desert is really fantastic if you're into flying although you know in the back of your mind something like this would never be stable.
IAAAE (I am an aeronautical engineer) (Score:5, Informative)
First of all, the main thing to notice is the lack of a tail. The main difficulty with the lack of a tail is that you need to balance both Cm (moment coefficient) and AOA (angle of attack) with the trailing edge of the same airfoil, namely the wings. While possible, it's not an easy thing to do. Essentially, for the vehicle to be stable, it needs to have a positive pitching moment at zero AOA (Cmo) and a negative derivative of the pitching moment with respect to AOA (Cmalpha). With a flying wing, the positive Cmo is not difficult to achieve, it's the negative Cmalpha that's difficult. Think of it this way, if the plane is disturbed such that the nose goes up (ie: updraft), the plane needs to have the nose tend down. Tails are really good for this, but without a tail, it's pretty difficult.
The simplest solution is to push back the aerodynamic center (AC) of the wing. Since most wing profiles have an AC at about 1/4 chord (25% from leading edge) for subsonic applications, a profile not used commonly must be used. Once again, this can be done... it's just not very common.
The winglets are a nice touch... helps decrease downwash and therefore overall lift. That, and I think winglets are sexy.
Yes, I'm an aeronautical geek. Deal.
Is it statically stable? (Score:3, Interesting)
It's possible to build very stable aircraft, but they have high drag, because the stabilizing aerodynamic forces are fighting each other. Engine power can overcome this, which is what they're doing. This isn't a glider.
If this thing is ever flown successfully by a human, it's going to be an experienced test pilot who flies the thing. Someone who's flown very unstable aircraft. It's not going to be steered by leaning; it will need a full set of control surfaces. And they'll have to figure out some way to attach the pilot to the craft.
Actually... (Score:3, Insightful)
A lot of technology stems from ideas and designs in science-fiction. Always has always will probably. Submarine, Fax machine, just about everything on my desk.
So, like, yeah. It is only a cartoon, but then some guy went out and built technology from that cartoon, so now it's sitting right there on a football feild. Neat.
Disclaimers: 1] I've never seen the cartoon in question, and I'm not going to rush out to grab a copy... for reasons that are my own, an [xmission.com]
Re:Jet powered glider (Score:3, Interesting)
The U2 spyplane was basically a glider design with a jet engine stuffed into it.
The idea was to have a craft with an overly-large wingspan to be able to fly at the (then) extreme altitudes contemplated by the U2 designers.