Why Some Planes Have Backwards Wings

When you picture an airplane, a pretty familiar shape comes to mind. A long narrow body with two main wings sticking out from the middle, a pair of smaller wings on the back end, and a tail fin in the rear sticking straight up. The wings may be straight or swept to the back, but you wouldn't picture them sweeping forward, would you?
Sure, some fighter jets have wings that change position, and older planes might have an extra pair in the front, but you wouldn't have a backward wing. Well, tell that to the X-29. This experimental aircraft was developed by NASA and the US Air Force back in 1984!
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TIMESTAMPS:
It could be a real nightmare for pilots 1:00
What the designers were trying to achieve 1:47
Jets that can change the angle of their wings 5:04
Terrific X-29 7:04
#planes #aviation #brightside
Preview photo credit:
X-29 Banks over Desert Terrain: By NASA,
Animation is created by Bright Side.
Credit: NASA Image and Video Library
A model of the Ju 287 V1: By JuergenKlueser - Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0 ,
Junkers Ju 287. Top view (Model): By JuergenKlueser - Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0 ,
Polikarpov Po-2, of which over 20,000 were built by the Soviet Union: By Aleksandr Markin - Flight Po-2 RA-1945g, CC BY-SA 2.0 ,
First World War Sopwith Camel biplane: By Airwolfhound from Hertfordshire, UK - Sopwith Camel - Season Premiere Airshow 2018, CC BY-SA 2.0 ,
The Vulcan to the Sky Trust's Avro Vulcan XH558: By James Humphreys (SalopianJames) - Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0 ,
SR-10: By Anna Zvereva from Tallinn, Estonia - Russian Air Force, EX-88004, SAT SR-10, CC BY-SA 2.0 ,
Animation is created by Bright Side.
SUMMARY:
- The concept of forward-swept wings dates all the way back to the JU-287, developed in the 1940s, and many countries have experimented with this format over the years.
- Look at any plane developed before the advent of jet engines, and you’ll notice that almost all of them position their wings at a right angle to the body of the aircraft.
- This works great for any aircraft flying less than 460 mph, but causes trouble for anything moving faster than that.
- Unlike straight wings, where one hundred percent of the airflow moves parallel to the body of the plane, swept wings create a stream of air running lengthwise down the wing.
- The air moving across the top of the wing is called the chordwise flow, named after the chord, an imaginary line that goes from the front to the rear edge of the wings.
- Some military jets, such as the American F-14 Tomcat, and Russian MiG-23, can change the angle of their wings to take advantage of this effect.
- The issue that has yet to be resolved is that the further back the wings of a plane are swept, the more susceptible it is to a stall.
- While forward-swept wings reduce drag quite significantly, their unusual aerodynamic properties subject them to a twisting motion as they move through the air.
- This brings us back to the X-29, the shining pinnacle of early eighties aircraft technology.
- Shortly before a test flight, one of the prototypes malfunctioned, causing all three computers to fail simultaneously.
- Ultimately, the X-29 program came to an end in 1991.
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