Quote:
Originally Posted by ChazInMT
Ya know, for someone who's been around a while you still aren't getting it. Believe what you want about the front end needing to be not flat, fact is, the air creates its own aero shape in the front. In the back of a shape, the air gets really stupid and needs much help. Intuition tells us the air gets "spilled out", fact is, it does not. Granted, an aero front end does help some, but not as much as the back. I'd say it's a 20/80 split at best, 20% front and 80% back as far as how much you can improve the aerodynamics of something by improving its shape.
We aren't saying the carriers would be optimal by reversing them, only better, because that nice aero taper on the "Front" would bring the air back together much more efficiently, if reversed, than the big wide flat back it has now.
I made a simple drawing to illustrate what I mean.
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Hucho's got a beautiful wind tunnel image regarding this sort of thing.I don't have it in my image file yet.
From memory,there is complete separation with zero reattachment until the body length reaches about 1.6X the body width,then there is complete reattachment.But we do pay for the separation,to the tune of Cd 0.85-.88.
With subtle rounding of the leading edges,the drag falls to Cd 0.45.
The Grumman OV-1 Mohawk Side-Looking-Airborne-Radar (SLAR) pod nose would be a good compromise
Here's a link
http://www.161recceflt.org.au/airfie...B%20Mohawk.JPG