MAY 26

Duncan Lockerby, a professor at the University of Warwick, is experimenting with a new way to direct airflow off of a plane's wings to reduce mid-flight drag. Conceptual tests have shown that a reduction in that drag can significantly reduce fuel consumption and subsequently greenhouse gas emissions.

The design concept consists of tiny air-powered jets along each of a plane's wings, or possibly even the length of the entire plane, that redirect airflow in a perpendicular direction from the plane's direction of motion. Lockerby has received $1.6 million from the Engineering and Physical Sciences Council and Airbus to further develop his design and conduct wind tunnel tests.

Lockerby discovered the reduction in drag by waggling a piece of wing from side to side in a wind tunnel. He explains that when a plane is in cruise control mode, it's only really burning fuel to overcome drag, therefore reducing the drag by 20 percent would reduce fuel use by the same percentage. Lockerby believes his design could reduce drag by as much as 40 percent.

His tests will explore ways of pushing the airflow sideways through both active means and passive ones, where no power is required. New wings should be ready for trials by 2012.

via Cleantech

Comments (8)

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stupid comments
written by john, May 26, 2009

there are some stupid comments embedded in this. the plane is obviously overcoming 1 other force - that of gravity. At cruising speed, yes, drag has to be maintained, but also the lift required to keep the plane from crashing to the ground. Soooo, a reduction in drag of 20% will not improve fuel efficiency 20%, but something significantly less. Still every improvement helps, but some of the overlooked issues here are mind boggling obvious.

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@john-huh?
written by shek, May 26, 2009

I think it's obvious that the professor researching this intends to maintain the same amount of lift. However, the drag could certainly be reduced by changing the shape of the airfoil as long as the same amount of lift is generated at typical cruising speeds. There's a reason that the engines on a plane provide thrust forward instead of up, its because all of that force is to overcome drag and get to a velocity where the wing will have enough lift to overcome the weight of the aircraft.

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4 forces of flight
written by Glenn, May 26, 2009

The four forces of flight are Thrust, Drag, Lift and Weight. Lift overcomes weight and thrust overcomes drag. So if you reduce drag, you are making thrust more efficient and therefore uses less fuel.

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Old tech
written by Seamus Dubh, May 26, 2009

This is nothing new.
I remember reading about projects in laminar flow wings throughout the history of aircraft.
The F-16XL from NASA in the 90's
I think the A-7's had this system.
The X-21 project in the early 60's using a modified B-66
Hell, this concept goes even farther back to experiments with P-51 Mustangs.
So, while this Lockerby thinks he's found something new. He really needs to read up on his history of flight.

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re: gravity
written by Tom M, May 26, 2009

1. No one is disputing whether gravity is a force that the plane has to overcome. However, work is the product of force times the distance over which the force is exerted. Thus, since the plane maintains altitude, no (or at least very little) work is done against gravity.

2. As mentioned, this is generally an old point (ironically, the 'winglet' in the picture is a good example), but new techniques are always worth investigating. I suspect there was a harmless miscommunication somewhere along the way.

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Re: Old tech
written by Kevin, May 27, 2009

Seamus: Of course Lockerby knows about previous work in the field - if you read the article at Cleantech then you can see that he cites some of it, and there is more on his web pages. The problem here is that he has simplified his work for public consumption, Cleantech have edited it, and now Ecogeek have simplified it further. You need to go back to the original sources in order to evaluate the work.

Here's his own lay summary:
http://www2.warwick.ac.uk/fac/sci/eng/staff/dal/turbulencecontrol/
The use of riblets is not new, however my understanding is that the use of Helmholz resonance to amplify their effect is.

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Flashback
written by Twist9, May 27, 2009

What ever happened to those wing designs based on whale flippers with big ridges on the back edge? They were supposed to reduce drag and increase lift substantially (by using "mico-vortecies" or something like that) but I have never heard of them being used in trials for aircraft, though I believe they might be in the works for wind turbines. Anybody know anything further?

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...
written by Fred, June 30, 2009

hopefully we can eventually develop a way to save more

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