Microaeronautics is a term coined by Parnell Schoenkey of the "Kirkwood Thermaleers". He was an engineer with the then McDonnell Aircraft Company in Saint Louis, Missouri. A thoughtful man and well-known competitor and designer, he used the term back in the 1950's before "micro" was cool.
I borrowed the word because it is just right. This little selection of articles is about a few aspects of the kind of aeronautics that are associated with small airplanes, or "model airplanes" as has been a popular term over the years.
With the increased government interest in small, autonomous aircraft that can collect information,the term "model airplane" is no longer a universal descriptor. These aircraft are called "Unmanned Aerial Vehicles" (UAV) in some circles. You can search for UAV on the web and get all kinds of hits.
In 1998 I consulted on the design of a roughly 0.7 meter span UAV being built by a major US aerospace contractor. An example of this new brand of microaeronautics.
The selection of articles here and their tone is fairly technical, but certainly not at the aeronautical engineering level. If your interests lie in the analytical and quantitative, or if you like to understand the physics of microaeronautics, they may be of interest.
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| The Atmosphere An article on the atmosphere with emphasis on properites that affect the flight of small aircraft. Requires a modest amount of physics and is supported by a Winows computer program describe below: |
Atmosphere Properties PC Program A windows proram companion to the article above. This link is to the user's manual and a download link |
Mach Number, Records, and Propellers The story of the role of Mach Number in the American jet speed record set in the years after WWII in extreme heat, and how to tell if your model propeller is likely to have Mach Number problems. |
Scale Airplanes and Scale Speed Why you can't have a truly scale airplane. The right way to understand scaling and what factors can be scaled. |
| Gyroscopic Propeller Effects Measuremnts of many propeller weights and rotory inertia. How this affects flight, in particular for control line aircraft. Gyroscopic torques, only this time with real measusred data |
Line Drag/Offset program for Windows Download a program that runs under Windows95/98 or Windows NT. Now modified to accept 1, 2, or n line models with full atmospheric property control. Computes line rake, power required and many other parameters measusred data |
Propeller A longish set of notes covering many aspects of model aircraft propellers from the viewpoint of aircraft engineering propeller experience. Many terms are defined and the notion of 'slip' as a measure of efficincy is shown to be fatuous. A table of flight helix pitch for many control line events and records is suppied. |
Cheap Aero Books A collection of technical books on aerodynamics and fluid mechanics of interest to primarily to engineers and physicists. These fine books are republished by Dover in paperback and offer the chance to get some classics worth the bucks. |
How Thick is the Boundary Layer? A fundamental property of model aircraft airflow is a boundary layer that is, in proportion, substantially thicker than that of full size aircraft and far more likely to separate. How thick is it and how good must the finish be to keep drag down? |
Constants and Unit Conversion A Unit conversions from 'English' i.e. the US Cusotmary System, to SI and Sea Level Standard Atmosphere constants from NASA standards documents |
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