The earliest known airfoil sections for aircraft concepts were patented in the 1880s by Horatio Phillips, as shown in the figure below, which were inspired by the wings of birds. Understand the differences between subsonic, transonic, and supersonic airfoil sections.
Low speed airfoil how to#
Historically, the design of airfoil shapes for specific applications have proceeded in an evolutionary manner, with wind tunnel experiments, theoretical analysis, and flight testing all being used synergistically to develop the best airfoil shapes for specific types of flight vehicles.
To this end, not all airfoils are created equally, and different airfoils will be better suited for one application relative to another.įor example, airfoils for use on the wings of low-speed airplanes are generally thicker (in terms of their thickness to chord ratio) and have more curvature or camber than airfoils for use on high-speed aircraft, which are much thinner with pointed leading edges and use less camber. Engineers must know how to select or design suitable airfoil shapes (often called airfoil profiles or just airfoils) for use on a diverse range of flight vehicles such as airplanes, various types of space launch and re-entry vehicles, as well as helicopter rotors, propeller blades, wind turbines, UAVs, etc.
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