Monday, February 04, 2008

The Plane and the Conveyor

The infamous plane and the conveyor belt problem has sparked much controversy on the web, especially because it was recently featured on an episode of Myth Busters (warning: youtube link, and all that that implies).

Imagine an airplane on a huge conveyor belt, kept moving at the same forward rate of speed as the airplane. Would it be able to take off?

People get all bent out of shape over whether it would or not. Like on this blog. The problem is that folke (including yours truly) confuse a car (which is propelled forward by sending power to the wheels) with an airplane (which is not powered by its wheels). The wheels on an airplane do nothing but reduce friction.

So, can it take off? Why, yes, it can! Watch the video and see for yourself (believe or not, lots of people on the 'net still argue with the results, right in front of their eyeballs).
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3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Yes, indeed. An airplane flies because of the flow of air over the wings. Ground speed has nothing to do with it. I've been flying for years, and I have a little trouble understanding why there's any myth here. But I have seen some pretty amazing lack of insight in people. A good number of years ago, a rough and tumble janitor friend of mine tried to convince me that AIR HAS NO WEIGHT. It made no difference that hurricane force winds could blow down trees, houses, etc. Air has no weight. There was no such thing as lighter than air. He also explained one day that he knew all about marriage; he'd done been married three times! He was perfectly serious.

10:10 PM
Bob B said...

Haha - whee! Good stuff!

And speaking of air weight... everyone knows you can have fun with helium, which is lighter than air, but have y'all ever heard of sulphur hexafluoride, which is heavier than air?

It makes your voice sound lower (the opposite of helium): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gavSQ8ohwCY

And you can do nifty science experiments with it:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1PJTq2xQiQ0&feature=related

Now if I could just find my friendly sulphur hexafluoride dealer.

10:36 PM
Anonymous said...

I knew my dad would have something to say about this post.

9:12 PM

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