A fundamentally new approach to the aircraft minimum induced drag problem is presented. The method, a “viscous lifting line,” is based on the minimum entropy production principle and does not require the planar wake assumption. An approximate, closed form solution is obtained for several wing configurations including a comparison of wing extension, winglets, and in-plane wing sweep, with and without a constraint on wing-root bending moment.Like the classical lifting-line theory, this theory predicts that induced drag is proportional to the square of the lift coefficient and inversely proportional to the wing aspect ratio. Unlike the classical theory, it predicts that induced drag is Reynolds number dependent and that the optimum spanwise circulation distribution is non-elliptic.


    Access

    Check access

    Check availability in my library

    Order at Subito €


    Export, share and cite



    Title :

    An Entropy Method for Induced Drag Minimization


    Additional title:

    Sae Technical Papers


    Contributors:

    Conference:

    Aerospace Technology Conference and Exposition ; 1989



    Publication date :

    1989-09-01




    Type of media :

    Conference paper


    Type of material :

    Print


    Language :

    English




    Minimization of Induced Drag of Elastic Airplane

    Kuzmina, Svetlana / Ishmuratov, Fanil / Kuzmin, Victor | AIAA | 2004


    Aircraft Induced Drag Minimization Using the Constrained Optimization Method

    Martins, A. L. / Ribeiro, R. S. / American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics et al. | British Library Conference Proceedings | 1996


    Aircraft Induced Drag Minimization Using the Constrained Optimization Method

    Martins, A. L. / Ribeiro, R. S. | British Library Online Contents | 1996


    Transonic Induced Drag Minimization Including Trimmed Aeroelastic Effects

    Kolonay, Raymond / Thompson, Ernest / Camberos, Jose et al. | AIAA | 2008


    Drag minimization using exact methods

    POWERS, S. A. | AIAA | 1964