Submitted by Richard Smith on August 3, 2009 - 14:06
On my recent visit to the London Science Museum, amongst computing, rockets and VTOL exhibits, I also came across some historic British airplanes in the Flight Gallery. In this post I'll focus on the World War II era airplanes that played a pivotal role in defending the skies above Britain.
Submitted by Richard Smith on July 27, 2009 - 08:42
FINA, the governing body of swimming, has banned the full-coverage, low-drag swimsuits that are credited with aiding swimmers in breaking nearly all the world swimming records in the last year or so. I discussed drag reduction and its application to swimming in the lead up to the Beijing 2008 Olympics, where the Speedo LZR Racer swimsuit was the garment of choice for all would-be champions. In Beijing all but a couple of the existing Olympic records survived the LZR clad swimmer onslaught. Records were not only broken - they were smashed by huge margins instead of following a relatively steady historical progression.
Submitted by Richard Smith on July 20, 2009 - 08:21
In the days prior to Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD), wind tunnel testing was the primary method for assessing the performance of airplanes prior to actually building them. On my visit to the London Science Museum I noticed a number of wind tunnel models of historic significance that I'll share with you here.
Submitted by Richard Smith on July 12, 2009 - 16:07
After watching a recent stage of the Tour de France I started wondering; is there any reason from an aerodynamic and heat-transfer perspective, why cyclists shave their legs?
Lance Armstrong in the 2009 Tour de France: Smooth legs
Submitted by Richard Smith on July 9, 2009 - 09:09
The London Science Museum houses some historic exhibits as I found out on my recent visit. I've already posted articles on computing and rockets. Next up I'll cover a series of exhibits that related to the world's first Vertical Takeoff and Landing (VTOL) fixed-wing jet fighter - the Harrier 'jump jet.'
Submitted by Richard Smith on June 10, 2009 - 16:58
While on a recent visit to London I spent an enjoyable afternoon at the Science Museum. What I found was more sustenance for my computing-fluids obsession. In fact I came across enough fascinating exhibits to fill several blog posts. I'll kick off with a computing-themed post, first covering computing prehistory starting with the Babbage Difference Engines and the Phillips Hydraulic Computer, and moving on to the dawn of supercomputing with the Cray-1.
The ongoing Formula 1 (F1) diffuser controversy has raised the awareness in the general public (especially in F1-mad countries, such as the UK) of a key aerodynamic device used in many forms of motor racing. And if one diffuser is good then two must be better, right? So goes the latest thinking in F1.
Submitted by Richard Smith on April 1, 2009 - 12:37
I couldn't come up with an aerodynamic themed April Fools' joke this year, but even if I had, I'm certain it wouldn't have fared well against the Hotelicopter.
Submitted by Richard Smith on March 9, 2009 - 14:41
Aerodynamic considerations in golf ball design are nothing new, but the other golfing implement, the club, has resisted aerodynamic optimization until now. A new generation of golf drivers is now sporting streamlined, aerodynamic profiles in order to improve driving distances due to reduced club-head drag.
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