Wednesday, August 20, 2025

Delta Force


Great thing about the 'net is that it's Darwinian evolution on steroids: people ask to be video'd say, walking around a cliff-face hundreds of feet up and whoops, they're gone.

Likewise these shorts are titled 'Is this safe' and... if you have to ask the question?

They do though demonstrate the aerodynamic stability of delta planforms, which is admittedly not what the average viewer is thinking. Put any form of multihull in that situation, for example, and it's a back-flip you're watching instead: triangular wings simply 'mush' where squarer ones might stall or somersault.

If ever the drone gets on the water, the proof of the watery pudding will be stability in and around situations like these. Whichever way you look at it, however, critical dynamics of hydrofoil and aerofoil surfaces will be much more to the fore as vessels get smaller, lighter, faster and uncrewed.

Both of these videos required constant manipulation of the controls by each jackass, though a computer would make light work of stabilising such angles of attack: as it does with fourth and fifth generation fighter jets.