Most people would look at the AD-1 Oblique Wing aircraft and think it's crazy.
Why is the wing at such a strange angle relative to the fuselage? If you think that's weird, get ready for the Oblique Flying Wing, basically the same as the AD-1 but with no fuselage -- a wing that points at an oblique angle relative to the direction of flight. DARPA is requesting proposals for a program called Switchblade that will explore the feasibility of building and controlling an OFW at low supersonic speeds.
The trick is that the optimal sway angle depends on the speed of the craft, which means that it has to change during flight... which means that the engines and any sensors/weapons systems on the aircraft have to pivot. Ultimately, there's talk of building a wing 400 feet long to carry passengers across continents at supersonic speeds.
I'm not an engineer, so I have no idea what the advantage of an oblique wing would be. Can you elaborate?
it's to do with dealing with the bow wave created in supersonic flight. Supersonic fighters like the F111 have variable sweep, its wings tuck in closer to the fuselage as speed increases. The oblique wing also swings open and shut, but I think it's cheaper to have a fixed wing swivel than to have a pair of wings fold up. More difficult to fly, but passenger and freight pilots don't need fighter manheuvering. (sp)
There's another advantage of OFW over variable geometry wings that sweep back, like on the Tornado: Because they have to form a delta triangle with the fuselage when they fold back, these variable geometry wings have very low aspect ratios, which makes them inefficient at low speeds and during takeoff, when the optimal wing is long and narrow. OFW uses a narrow wing with a high aspect ratios, which can then fold back at high speed, allowing the leading edge of the wing to break the sound barrier and direct the cone away from the trailing end of the wing.
Hello. it's not a comment what will i do but a question about variable geometrie wings (swivel wings). Why they never been used in civil aviation and can I have some information about this technology or some internet adresses. thank a lot again.