durabol
Well-Known Member
I'm been considering a moderately high lift airfoil for a non-flapped slow flying airplane that cruises around 120mph and lands at 50mph. Although some airfoil have very high CLs (Coefficient of Lift) topping out at around 2.5 on X-foil they also have a lot of drag as well as being unsteady at low CLs for cruise. I am wondering about using a less aggressive high lift airfoils say with a CL of around 2 which is still quite a bit higher than the standard CLs of 1.5-1.6 (X-foil) for the often used airfoil such as the Clark-Y, 4412, 2412, 23012, ect. The standard airfoils have low drag and also work well with flaps so are good all around airfoils. I guess what I am wondering: is their a window where a slow flying, non-flapped plane could have a substantially smaller wing and not be significantly effected by the increased drag by using a moderately high lift airfoil? If this is reasonable is their any favourite airfoils that fit this requirement?
