So full disclosure I personally understand Bernoulli’s principle and understand how a wing works due to it.
Here’ is what I need. My 5 year old son loves planes, and loves watching birds fly. As such he is asking questions of how a bird’s wing works vs how an airplane’s wing works. I can’t seem to simplify down Bernoulli’s to the extent that he can understand how a wing works. So I’m coming to you all for advice.
In: 19
The wings are shaped so that air prefers to flow below the wing than above the wing. This creates a difference in pressure between above and below the wing that results in a force going upwards. That force depends on speed of moving air, or from a different perspective, the speed of the wing.
Fill a box or bath with water and get him to try and drag a playing card through it.
Help him realise that it will naturally want to travel parallel to its direction.
If it’s forced to travel on an angle, then it will push to try and stay parallel, which is generating lift.
Air moving around the wing. In the same distance from front of wing to back of wing, there’s more surface to cover on top than underneath. So, more air pressure per area pushing up than down. Wing go up, plane go up.
Who needs Bernoulli when you have flying lawnmowers?!
A wing works because of the stickiness of air. Air flows over the surface of the wing and is whipped downward slightly. Newtons first law, if air mass is being whipped down a little, the wing doing the whipping is forced up. A frictionless wing could not make lift. The bottom of the wing is not important for lift. If there is a loss in that stickiness, the wing stalls. If the bottom of the wing did anything, turning up couldnt stall a wing. But because the top is what makes the lift, turning up too much creates a seperation of the laminar flow layers of the air over the wing, vortices are created and wind no longer flies downward, lift is lost.
Sailing is a great way to visualize how a wing works.
Latest Answers