Ring Wing - Lockheed Airliner Concept

[jqavins]

Very nice! I forgot the "Lt." part, but something like "you're looking at the only Starfleet cadet to beat the no-win scenario"?

Make it fly RG or BG, as Lockheed intended, pretty, pretty please with sugar on top?

"you're looking at the only Starfleet cadet ever to beat the no-win scenario."

Because RS does include ring tails, I started a quick and dirty file for this, with the ring tail attached to a pod and the single fin support. I'm having trouble making it come out by just eye-balling my dimensions from the screen images; would you send the OR file? So far, it looks like the CP RS gives is a small, not insignificant distance forward from what you've got in OR, but it's too soon to draw conclusions.

 

[BABAR]

? So far, it looks like the CP RS gives is a small, not insignificant distance forward from what you've got in OR, but it's too soon to draw conclusions.

I’ll take swing test any day over a sim program.

 

[Daddyisabar]

I’ll take swing test any day over a sim program.

I'll take a good ole tyme oddroc mindsim over all else. Mindsim, mindsim, uber alles.

 

[jqavins]

I’ll take swing test any day over a sim program.

Agreed, as the definitive test for stability. One might want to know where the CP is all the same.

 

[lakeroadster]

would you send the OR file?

Actual simulation stability caliber is about 1.9. The caliber shown is using the 4" ring fin, not the 1.88 o.d. body.

11.158" - 7.568" = 3.59"

3.59" / 1.88" = 1.91

 

[Charles_McG]

The ring is a simple thin wall? I’ve wanted to play around with airfoiled rings - but don’t have a light way to fabricate them. I think.

 

[lakeroadster]

The ring is a simple thin wall? I’ve wanted to play around with airfoiled rings - but don’t have a light way to fabricate them. I think.

It's a 4" nominal shipping tube. Not sure how it could be airfoiled, perhaps with foam?

 

[BABAR]

The ring is a simple thin wall? I’ve wanted to play around with airfoiled rings - but don’t have a light way to fabricate them. I think.

I know @Rktman and I think @neil_w has done rings with balsa. Which presumably could be airfoils, although just BENDING the balsa seems challenging enough, getting an even airfoil would be a beaut. i know enough physics to understand that a symmetrical airfoil would decrease drag. Trying to get on to achieve lift (like for a glider) with a positive airfoil would be a challenge. MAAAAAYBEEEE if you airfoiled the balsa before you bent it. the most likly SUCCESSFUL scenario would be simply rounding th forward and trail edges before creating the ring, which apparently (per Der MicroMeister and Tim VanMilligan still helps quite a bit with drag.)

I still don’t understand how the RingHawk figures out which way is up, and I don’t think it it airfoiled, but more than one person has made it work, including @Rktman

https://www.rocketryforum.com/threads/best-method-to-bend-balsa.139470/
my “Scoupe” backsliders have non-airfoiled body tube rings, and they glide pretty well, not “competition” glides, but as good or better than some commercial rocket gliders (agreed, Estes set the bar pretty low with the Cosmos Mariner), THERE’S a rocket that isn’t coming back Into production.
https://www.rocketreviews.com/estes-industries-cosmos-mariner--by-bruce-canino.html
not rings, but many of the Edmonds‘ gliders were thick flat balsa sheets. They were a lot of fun, very satisfying sport gliders. So airfoiling isn’t REQUIRED to get gliders to glide, although it can make them BETTER gliders.

 

[jqavins]

The ring is a simple thin wall? I’ve wanted to play around with airfoiled rings - but don’t have a light way to fabricate them. I think.

I've thought about that on and off for years. Try two tubes of nearly the same diameter, and 3D printed ends that hold them together while providing the end shapes.

(Of course, you would change the proportions to suit your needs and desires.) Each end is a ring; two pieces are visible because they're shown in cross section.

Bonus: doing this would allow for cutting a slot in the outer tube for TTW attachment.

i know enough physics to understand that a symmetrical airfoil would decrease drag.

As compared to a square ended tube of the same thickness, yes. But I suspect, actually I'm pretty well sure, that adding enough thickness to make an airfoil, then making it, will land you with more draft than sticking with the thin wall. If I should ever do what I've pictured above, it will purely be for the look of the thing.

 

[BABAR]

I'll take a good ole tyme oddroc mindsim over all else. Mindsim, mindsim, uber alles.

Yeah, a tapeworm probably doesn’t take kindly to a swing test!

 

[sr205347d]

Agreed, as the definitive test for stability. One might want to know where the CP is all the same.

@lakeroadster knows, a good swing test isn’t a guarantee.

Thread 'Passes Swing Test, but Unstable in Flight'
https://www.rocketryforum.com/threads/passes-swing-test-but-unstable-in-flight.180232/

 

[jqavins]

@lakeroadster knows, a good swing test isn’t a guarantee.

Thread 'Passes Swing Test, but Unstable in Flight'
https://www.rocketryforum.com/threads/passes-swing-test-but-unstable-in-flight.180232/

Well, yes, OK, it's not a perfect test of stability. Rung tails, even internally tangent ring tails, are well established as stabilizing features in general, unlike cylindrical legs, so I wouldn't worry about it here.

 

[Charles_McG]

I know @Rktman and I think @neil_w has done rings with balsa. Which presumably could be airfoils, although just BENDING the balsa seems challenging enough, getting an even airfoil would be a beaut. i know enough physics to understand that a symmetrical airfoil would decrease drag. Trying to get on to achieve lift (like for a glider) with a positive airfoil would be a challenge. MAAAAAYBEEEE if you airfoiled the balsa before you bent it. the most likly SUCCESSFUL scenario would be simply rounding th forward and trail edges before creating the ring, which apparently (per Der MicroMeister and Tim VanMilligan still helps quite a bit with drag.)

I still don’t understand how the RingHawk figures out which way is up, and I don’t think it it airfoiled, but more than one person has made it work, including @Rktman

https://www.rocketryforum.com/threads/best-method-to-bend-balsa.139470/
my “Scoupe” backsliders have non-airfoiled body tube rings, and they glide pretty well, not “competition” glides, but as good or better than some commercial rocket gliders (agreed, Estes set the bar pretty low with the Cosmos Mariner), THERE’S a rocket that isn’t coming back Into production.
https://www.rocketreviews.com/estes-industries-cosmos-mariner--by-bruce-canino.html
not rings, but many of the Edmonds‘ gliders were thick flat balsa sheets. They were a lot of fun, very satisfying sport gliders. So airfoiling isn’t REQUIRED to get gliders to glide, although it can make them BETTER gliders.

I've also built a slightly downscaled Ringhawk - and it's know, or care about 'down'. Mine never developed forward speed, and just kind of floated straight down.

I've also built the Estes DOM Flying Stovepipe. I couldn't get the booster to disengage - but the glider part had some very interesting hand-throw characteristics. I've thought that an inside surface airfoil - like a Dyson fan - would be interesting.

 

[GlenP]

A glider, straight wing or ring wing, is usually trimmed and balanced for flight in the upright sense, it doesn't know up from down, it is trimmed for upright flight. If inverted with sufficient forward speed, then it will tend to fly as if it were at the top most point of a loop, and if it gets to the bottom of the loop before hitting the ground it will right itself. The rudder tends to keep it going straight, it won't roll itself upright, it loops, or maybe loosely speaking it may barrel roll, itself upright. The Ringhawk has fins that support the ring which may act like a rudder to keep it somewhat straight.

PS - A cool throwing ring toy is the X-Zylo, it is an aerodynamic miracle how far you can throw one of those. It has a weighted thicker lip which also acts as a very rudimentary "airfoil" but the spinning spiral throw action gives it a gyroscopic precision no quarterback has ever achieved with a football. My kid had a couple of those some years ago and our backyard was not big enough.

​

 

[BABAR]

A glider, straight wing or ring wing, is usually trimmed and balanced for flight in the upright sense, it doesn't know up from down, it is trimmed for upright flight. If inverted with sufficient forward speed, then it will tend to fly as if it were at the top most point of a loop, and if it gets to the bottom of the loop before hitting the ground it will right itself. The rudder tends to keep it going straight, it won't roll itself upright, it loops, or maybe loosely speaking it may barrel roll, itself upright. The Ringhawk has fins that support the ring which may act like a rudder to keep it somewhat straight.

PS - A cool throwing ring toy is the X-Zylo, it is an aerodynamic miracle how far you can throw one of those. It has a weighted thicker lip which also acts as a very rudimentary "airfoil" but the spinning spiral throw action gives it a gyroscopic precision no quarterback has ever achieved with a football. My kid had a couple of those some years ago and our backyard was not big enough.

​

A rocket launched glider I am guessing has three forces acting at ejection/release.

Drag, gravity, and a limited amount of kinetic energy.

Unless the kinetic energy keeps it oriented initially nose forward, at which point if stable it will turn (either loop or otherwise orient to bellow down stable level flight). I assume it starts to fall and tends to orient along the path of lowest drag, which is nose down. Until it picks up forward speed, it generates no lift. Only after generating lift can the aerodynamic surfaces go into effect.

A 360 degree tube HAS no “belly” or dihedral. If it is forward weighted, it may fall nose first but I see no force of lift that is going to turn it horizontal.

I haven’t built the StovePipe yet. A problem I see is that its stability is only as durable as the duration of the imparted spin kinetic energy. Furthermore, it seems like once it assumes a direction, up, down, or horizontal, it will MAINTAIN that direction (or due to nose weight gradually turn nose down/ballistic.)

The POSSIBLE exception would be if it starts to TUMBLE post deployment, which is likely as a cylinder is inherently unstable. In this case, because of its SPIN, conservation of angular momentum WOULD kick in and as long as it spins, it WOULD indeed orient horizontal (perpendicular to fall vector.)
@Dotini , could this be the original Horizontal Spin Rocket?

 

[BABAR]

PS - A cool throwing ring toy is the X-Zylo, it is an aerodynamic miracle how far you can throw one of those. It has a weighted thicker lip which also acts as a very rudimentary "airfoil" but the spinning spiral throw action gives it a gyroscopic precision no quarterback has ever achieved with a football. My kid had a couple of those some years ago and our backyard was not big enough.

​

Not sure the X-Zylo is a glider. I'm curious, if you throw it STRAIGHT UP, what does it do? I am guessing it does NOT level out and fly horizontal. I am thinking it is intermediate mass and extremely low drag, but not sure.

So I stand by my premise (which the exception of the RingHawk, which I still don't get), a glider needs to have a definite UP and Down side. A perfectly symmetrical cylinder doesn't have that, and without "something" else to help it (spin or other aerodynamic surfaces) it SHOULDN'T glide.

 

[GlenP]

Not sure the X-Zylo is a glider. I'm curious, if you throw it STRAIGHT UP, what does it do? I am guessing it does NOT level out and fly horizontal. I am thinking it is intermediate mass and extremely low drag, but not sure.

So I stand by my premise (which the exception of the RingHawk, which I still don't get), a glider needs to have a definite UP and Down side. A perfectly symmetrical cylinder doesn't have that, and without "something" else to help it (spin or other aerodynamic surfaces) it SHOULDN'T glide.

Right, those are sound principles, I agree.

Those other contraptions are a bit different from the rocket in this thread. I think you are mixing up some ideas about that foam cylinder odd-rocket thread and this thread? This model is a rear eject and not designed for gliding flight, just resembles an airliner, hence some tangent discussions of gliders here.

The Z-xylo throwing ring toy requires a healthy spin for gyroscopic stability, not sure it relies on a lifting capability at all, more of a projectile but one with low drag that tends to fly straight, but in a typical parabolic arc from Physics 101 class. Somewhat similar in basic construction to the Double Ringer Estes model, but those parasite gliders are not spinners rather offset designs balanced for a gliding flight with a ring wing body and partial tail.

The RingHawk front and rear rings each have three fins that support the rings and act as stabilizers and rudder, you could have three possible orientations for "up" on that model when properly balanced for gliding flight. That is a unique animal.