2H4 From United States of America, joined Oct 2004, 8950 posts, RR: 62 Posted (6 years 1 month 3 weeks 5 days 21 hours ago) and read 2065 times:
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A couple of days ago, cnn.com reported that a new planet has been discovered that is very similar to Earth. Much remains unknown, of course, but early findings indicate a habitable environment with temperatures and atmosphere like our own.
One of the differences is the gravity. It's reported to be 1.6 times that of our own planet. In other words, a 100-pound weight would weigh 160 pounds on the new planet.
My question: Assuming all other factors are equal to Earth, how would aircraft design/usage change in light of the stronger gravitational pull?
More specifically:
Would we simply fly airliners around half-full with yards of legroom?
Would ranges drop as fuel is left behind in favor of payload? Perhaps turboprops and UDFs would quickly replace jets, as less fuel weight would need to be carried for a given range requirement.
Would new designs incorporate a large wing and sacrifice cruising speed?
Would maximum (structural) load factors be cut in half? How would this affect certification/operations?
Would helicopters even be usable?
Would people still fly gliders?
How long would runways/taxiways last?
Could we still utilize aircraft carriers?
Would landing distances decrease as a result of even more weight being placed on the gear when the spoilers are raised?
60% more gravity. It would be interesting to see the industry rise to the challenge.
Helicopters will always defy gravity, whether its Earth at 1.00Gs or "Planet X" at 1.60Gs. They do this because no matter what planet they are on, they will always fly by repelling the ground due to the ineluctable ugliness of their design
KELPkid From United States of America, joined Nov 2005, 5962 posts, RR: 4 Reply 2, posted (6 years 1 month 3 weeks 5 days 20 hours ago) and read 2025 times:
Actually, I remember hearing a while back that NASA had designed a solar cell/electric motor powered UAV specifically for flying on Mars...must be an interesting machine I wonder how you'd deploy such a machine...probably the reason it hasn't been sent to Mars yet.
Celebrating the birth of KELPkidJR on August 5, 2009 :-)
Futurecaptain From , joined Dec 1969, posts, RR: Reply 3, posted (6 years 1 month 3 weeks 5 days 18 hours ago) and read 2001 times:
Interesting to think about. My thought is firstly we all can agree that lift must overcome gravity. This leads me to believe that we would need more lift to move the same amount of mass through the atmoshphere on the other planet. AFAIK the two ways to do this are fly faster or increase wing span. If we took our current airliners and bumped the speed up a bit then more air moving over the wings would create more lift which is what we agreed we needed to overcome gravity. Or on the other hand we can increase wingspan and give more area for the air to pass over, at a slower speed, to increase lift.
Yes, as far as we know helicopters are so ugly even alien worlds repel them so they will fly. The A380 uses the same principle to achieve flight.
I assume landing distances would increase if the planes flew faster. even though more weight is put on the wheels the airplane is moving much faster. It would take awhile to stop all the weight. If we go with the increase wingspan theory then landing distances would still increase if we consider cruise speeds comparable to Earth. A 777 flying at the approach speed on a planet with 1.6 times the gravity of Earth will be that much heavier and harder to stop. Not only that but with the increased wingspan more area to the sides of runways and taxiways would need clearing.
Just my $.02
Interesting to consider. Perhaps Slamclick can chime in here.
KELPkid From United States of America, joined Nov 2005, 5962 posts, RR: 4 Reply 4, posted (6 years 1 month 3 weeks 5 days 18 hours ago) and read 1989 times:
F=ma, so the mass would be the same on our extraterrestrial world with 1.6x the gravity...and assuming the air density is relatively close to what we have down here on Terra, drag wouldn't change all that drastically...it seems as 2H4 pointed out, that a somewhat scaled-up wing would be in the works (to convert a terrestrial aircraft design), probably with increased thrust to overcome the excess induced drag from a larger wing
Quoting Futurecaptain (Reply 3): I assume landing distances would increase if the planes flew faster. even though more weight is put on the wheels the airplane is moving much faster. I
Once again, F=ma. Mass doesn't change...however, on account of the larger wing and bigger engines, I guess mass would go up...
I wonder if on E*1.6 (Earth world 1.6 times the size of Earth) you would encounter the coffin corner sooner than you would on Terra Firma.. Your wings are going to be called upon for 60% more lift than they would have to be here on our home world.
Celebrating the birth of KELPkidJR on August 5, 2009 :-)
Airfoilsguy From , joined Dec 1969, posts, RR: Reply 5, posted (6 years 1 month 3 weeks 5 days 18 hours ago) and read 1988 times:
I would think the air density would be grater on a planet with a higher gravity. Because the gravity would pull down more gas making the air density greater.
KELPkid From United States of America, joined Nov 2005, 5962 posts, RR: 4 Reply 7, posted (6 years 1 month 3 weeks 5 days 18 hours ago) and read 1980 times:
Quoting GAIsweetGAI (Reply 6): The A/C's weight would increase, true, but the air's weight would increase as well. The air would be denser than here on Earth.
Which would lead to a lower speed of sound on our Earth Mark II...which could present some problems.
Celebrating the birth of KELPkidJR on August 5, 2009 :-)
Yellowstone From United States of America, joined Aug 2006, 3071 posts, RR: 7 Reply 10, posted (6 years 1 month 3 weeks 5 days 16 hours ago) and read 1945 times:
Quoting Futurecaptain (Reply 3): A 777 flying at the approach speed on a planet with 1.6 times the gravity of Earth will be that much heavier and harder to stop.
Not quite. Stopping distances, which relate to momentum, depend on mass, not weight. (Although adding the necessary extra wingspan would add mass.) Friction, on the other hand, does depend on weight, so that could affect landing distances.
For those who don't know the difference: Mass is the amount of matter in an object; it is invariant under changes in gravitational field, and is measured in kilograms or slugs. Weight is the strength of the force exerted on an object by gravity, and hence it varies directly with the mass of the planet, the mass of the object, and inversely with the square of the distance between them. Like all forces, it is measured in newtons or pounds.
Hydrogen is an odorless, colorless gas which, given enough time, turns into people.
DavidT From Switzerland, joined Oct 2005, 475 posts, RR: 0 Reply 11, posted (6 years 1 month 3 weeks 5 days 15 hours ago) and read 1938 times:
The amount of energy needed to accelerate the plane to however fast it travels will be the same as on earth, as kinetic energy is just (1/2)mv^2.
However more energy (read: fuel) will be needed to raise the aircraft to cruising altitude, as the work done against gravity will increase 1.6-fold.
At cruise, to keep the aircraft level, the downwards gravitational force pulling the aircraft towards the ground will be 1.6 times larger than on earth, meaning that the wings must provide 1.6 times the lift they normally do on earth meaning bigger wings.
2H4 From United States of America, joined Oct 2004, 8950 posts, RR: 62 Reply 12, posted (6 years 1 month 3 weeks 5 days 15 hours ago) and read 1936 times:
AIRLINERS.NET CREW HEAD DATABASE EDITOR
Quoting DavidT (Reply 11): At cruise, to keep the aircraft level, the downwards gravitational force pulling the aircraft towards the ground will be 1.6 times larger than on earth, meaning that the wings must provide 1.6 times the lift they normally do on earth meaning bigger wings.
And with more lift comes more drag.....which increase the thrust required.....which increases fuel burn.....which either reduces range or payload. It seems that the net effect on operations would be extreme.
Mir From United States of America, joined Jan 2004, 19813 posts, RR: 56 Reply 13, posted (6 years 1 month 3 weeks 5 days 7 hours ago) and read 1885 times:
Quoting KELPkid (Reply 2): Actually, I remember hearing a while back that NASA had designed a solar cell/electric motor powered UAV specifically for flying on Mars...must be an interesting machine
Despite Mars' lower gravity, the thin atmosphere would make flying difficult. You'd have to have a plane like the U-2 designed to operate in those conditions, but because of the air density, the true airspeed would be much higher, which would lead to inertia problems.
-Mir
7 billion, one nation, imagination...it's a beautiful day
Rwessel From United States of America, joined Jan 2007, 2005 posts, RR: 2 Reply 14, posted (6 years 1 month 3 weeks 5 days 5 hours ago) and read 1876 times:
Assuming this planet were just like earth, except that someone cranked the gravity knob to "1.6", and things like air density and composition did not change, then an aircraft will fly exactly as it would on earth with a 60% extra load hung on.
IOW, you could take a 160klbs MTOW 737-700, and load it to an earth equivalent of 100klbs (that's only 16klbs above the OEW - so only pilots and a minimal amount of fuel), and it would fly on this new planet exactly like a grossed out '700 would here. One pesky detail is that it would be above the MLW in all cases, though.
In short, you'd need more wing, more structure, more power and more fuel to move the same amount of payload, which may impact other operational parameters (you might need longer runways if you accept higher takeoff speeds, for example), and which certainly have structural implications (leading directly to more weight), but there are no mysteries here.
And sailplanes? Sure, you'd nearly halve the effective L/Ds, and without some reinforcement, they'd be a bit overloaded, but they'd fly fine. It's just that unless the thermals get a lot stronger, your spiffy 50:1 ASG29 on planet X would perform a bit worse than a clunky old 30:1 SGS 1-36 would here. Although it would still not have that lovely oil-canning sound in turbulence...
Legs From Australia, joined Jun 2006, 207 posts, RR: 0 Reply 15, posted (6 years 1 month 3 weeks 5 days 5 hours ago) and read 1870 times:
Think about it from the perspective of the little green aerospace engineers that live on Planet X. They would be looking at our planes specs and marveling how on earth we get so much weight into the air on such ludicrously undersized wings and airframes. Imagine combining the materials engineering that Planet X's inhabitants would have probably developed with our (relatively) sparse gravity, the possibilities are mouth watering!
Jetlagged From United Kingdom, joined Jan 2005, 2462 posts, RR: 17 Reply 16, posted (6 years 1 month 3 weeks 5 days 1 hour ago) and read 1833 times:
Since the theme seems to be generally high weight and more drag, Antonov would appear to be ideally qualified to design an Earth II aircraft. NASA should put them under contract straight away. Or perhaps this might be a few centuries premature?
The glass isn't half empty, or half full, it's twice as big as it needs to be.
HangarRat From United States of America, joined Jul 2005, 627 posts, RR: 0 Reply 17, posted (6 years 1 month 3 weeks 4 days 16 hours ago) and read 1784 times:
Quoting Airfoilsguy (Reply 5): I would think the air density would be grater on a planet with a higher gravity.
Quoting DavidT (Reply 11): the downwards gravitational force pulling the aircraft towards the ground will be 1.6 times larger than on earth, meaning that the wings must provide 1.6 times the lift they normally do on earth meaning bigger wings.
It seems like everyone is skirting the very simple answer to the question. Aircraft would be optimized for the conditions on that planet. An aircraft designed to fly in E1.6's atmosphere would be horribly inefficient on Earth 1.0.
SP90 From United States of America, joined May 2006, 386 posts, RR: 0 Reply 18, posted (6 years 1 month 2 weeks 1 day 21 hours ago) and read 1657 times:
This might be a bit off topic but with the gravity being 1.6x that of Earth, can humans even live there for extended periods of time? You would have to be in good physical shape just to walk around empty handed. Imagine your a 150 lb person on Earth and someone just strapped on an extra 90 lbs to you and made you walk around with it 24/7.
Starlionblue From Hong Kong, joined Feb 2004, 15904 posts, RR: 66 Reply 19, posted (6 years 1 month 2 weeks 1 day 19 hours ago) and read 1630 times:
Quoting SP90 (Reply 18): This might be a bit off topic but with the gravity being 1.6x that of Earth, can humans even live there for extended periods of time? You would have to be in good physical shape just to walk around empty handed. Imagine your a 150 lb person on Earth and someone just strapped on an extra 90 lbs to you and made you walk around with it 24/7.
Good question. Most people would probably have heart problems, back problems, muscle problems and other fun stuff very fast.
"There are no stupid questions, but there are a lot of inquisitive idiots." - from Citadel by John Ringo
Rwessel From United States of America, joined Jan 2007, 2005 posts, RR: 2 Reply 20, posted (6 years 1 month 2 weeks 1 day 6 hours ago) and read 1575 times:
Quoting SP90 (Reply 18): This might be a bit off topic but with the gravity being 1.6x that of Earth, can humans even live there for extended periods of time? You would have to be in good physical shape just to walk around empty handed. Imagine your a 150 lb person on Earth and someone just strapped on an extra 90 lbs to you and made you walk around with it 24/7.
The total kit being carried by our infantry running around Afghanistan and Iraq weighs more than that. The old standard for various exploratory expeditions was that you carried your own weight in supplies.
1.6G would undoubtedly be hard on knees, backs and a few other body parts, and significantly increases the odds of injury from falls and whatnot, but a decade or two should be endurable by most semi-fit humans in the 15-55 age range. And if you were only semi-fit at the beginning of that, you'll probably be quite fit at the end.
Mind you there's a dearth of experimental evidence involving humans on this point. Mouse studies have been done where mice have lived multiple life cycles (birth, growth, reproduction, repeat), under 2G, with minimum ill effects, although bigger bones and musculature develops, as one would expect.
Starlionblue From Hong Kong, joined Feb 2004, 15904 posts, RR: 66 Reply 21, posted (6 years 1 month 2 weeks 18 hours ago) and read 1513 times:
Quoting Rwessel (Reply 20):
The total kit being carried by our infantry running around Afghanistan and Iraq weighs more than that. The old standard for various exploratory expeditions was that you carried your own weight in supplies.
Agreed, but in a high G environment it's not all on hips, shoulders and knees. Even breathing would be harder due to he extra weight of the ribcage.
Quoting Rwessel (Reply 20):
1.6G would undoubtedly be hard on knees, backs and a few other body parts, and significantly increases the odds of injury from falls and whatnot, but a decade or two should be endurable by most semi-fit humans in the 15-55 age range. And if you were only semi-fit at the beginning of that, you'll probably be quite fit at the end.
Mind you there's a dearth of experimental evidence involving humans on this point. Mouse studies have been done where mice have lived multiple life cycles (birth, growth, reproduction, repeat), under 2G, with minimum ill effects, although bigger bones and musculature develops, as one would expect.
All good points. The interesting thing would be looking at pregnancy and developing children. Larry Niven had Jinxians becoming very stocky and short. Hmm...
"There are no stupid questions, but there are a lot of inquisitive idiots." - from Citadel by John Ringo
WSOY From , joined Dec 1969, posts, RR: Reply 22, posted (6 years 1 month 6 days 15 hours ago) and read 1358 times:
Quoting Starlionblue (Reply 21): Even breathing would be harder due to he extra weight of the ribcage.
Since the "air" would also be heavier, less breathing of air would supply the needed oxygen. The effort required for getting air to the alveoli in the lungs would be more, but the alveoli could count less. It's complicated.
Rwessel From United States of America, joined Jan 2007, 2005 posts, RR: 2 Reply 23, posted (6 years 1 month 6 days 7 hours ago) and read 1332 times:
Quoting WSOY (Reply 22): Since the "air" would also be heavier, less breathing of air would supply the needed oxygen.
Just because the gravity on a new planet might be higher (or lower), does not mean the atmosphere will be denser (or less dense) at ground level. The planet in question could simply have less (or more) total atmosphere, and of a different composition.
Consider Venus, for example: it has about 90% the surface gravity of Earth, and about 90 times the atmospheric pressure.
WSOY From , joined Dec 1969, posts, RR: Reply 24, posted (6 years 1 month 6 days 4 hours ago) and read 1325 times:
Quoting Rwessel (Reply 23): Quoting WSOY (Reply 22):
Since the "air" would also be heavier, less breathing of air would supply the needed oxygen.
Just because the gravity on a new planet might be higher (or lower), does not mean the atmosphere will be denser (or less dense) at ground level. The planet in question could simply have less (or more) total atmosphere, and of a different composition.
Yes quite, but I thought the idea here was just that everything else but the gravity will be the same as on the planet Earth. Pardon me.
Starlionblue From Hong Kong, joined Feb 2004, 15904 posts, RR: 66 Reply 25, posted (6 years 1 month 5 days 12 hours ago) and read 1297 times:
Quoting WSOY (Reply 22): Since the "air" would also be heavier, less breathing of air would supply the needed oxygen. The effort required for getting air to the alveoli in the lungs would be more, but the alveoli could count less. It's complicated.
So it is. Like breathing in scuba gear. At depth the air is so dense it starts to feel "heavy".
"There are no stupid questions, but there are a lot of inquisitive idiots." - from Citadel by John Ringo
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I wonder how you'd deploy such a machine...probably the reason it hasn't been sent to Mars yet.
Your wings are going to be called upon for 60% more lift than they would have to be here on our home world.
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