On Wednesday, 19 March 1997 21:00:00 UTC+13, Stephen Lund wrote:
I am wondering what might be the theoretical and/or practical MINIMUM
disk loading for an autogyro and what might be the characteristics or dificulties in flying such a lightly loaded disk?
Steve Lund
xpzc00b@prodigy.com
If you mean wing-loading in cruise - it is a trade-off with flight speed. The bigger the disc, the lower the disc loading, the higher the hover-efficiency (or whatever you want to call it in autorotation - I don't think the momentum argument changes) but
the lower the flight speed. Also, there are practical limits to rotor diameter to do with blade-droop and ground-handling. Most designs seem to be around 10 kg/m2. Above that the efficiency falls off.....
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