HumanPoweredDesigner
Well-Known Member
When a weight is hung in the middle of a cloths line, the tension is way higher than the weight, unless the deflection is high.
For the same reason, the lift acting on stretchy mylar between ribs would make the mylar bow a bit if it is 0.001" thick. If it is only attached to ribs, the deformation of the airfoil would probably still be aerodynamic. But if it is attached to half spars or spanwise members such as kevlar thread or spars, the deflection pattern would be very non-aerodynamic (just my guess).
Even if you have plywood in front, and then only mylar behind that, I would expect bowing at the transition area. So unless you change the rib shape so that the bowed pattern is the good shap, I don't know how half ribs could be used.
Fortunately, I bought the Daedalus team book. Hopefully they discuss this issue in detail. I may know some things that they overlooked, but if I win this prize, I can't take most of the credit, since I'll be getting a lot of thought food from previous designs.
For now, I don't know how I'll get around using extra ribs. My design is far from done.
For the same reason, the lift acting on stretchy mylar between ribs would make the mylar bow a bit if it is 0.001" thick. If it is only attached to ribs, the deformation of the airfoil would probably still be aerodynamic. But if it is attached to half spars or spanwise members such as kevlar thread or spars, the deflection pattern would be very non-aerodynamic (just my guess).
Even if you have plywood in front, and then only mylar behind that, I would expect bowing at the transition area. So unless you change the rib shape so that the bowed pattern is the good shap, I don't know how half ribs could be used.
Fortunately, I bought the Daedalus team book. Hopefully they discuss this issue in detail. I may know some things that they overlooked, but if I win this prize, I can't take most of the credit, since I'll be getting a lot of thought food from previous designs.
For now, I don't know how I'll get around using extra ribs. My design is far from done.
