High wing vs low wing efficiency

Matthew Rogers said:
Actually, most soaring birds do not flap their wings except for takeoff, so the point is valid. To add to it, our brethren, the world’s fastest flying creatures are true high wings (although they flap to get that fast). The Mexican free tailed bat achieves 100mph in level flight. That is as fast as my Cessna.

The Raptor’s wings flap up and down because the airplane is so unstable. Maybe that is actually a new design feature.
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It makes sense for a bird to have the wings up high, away from the prey they're seizing with their talons down low. I don't see any connection between that and airplanes, though (except maybe a helicopter -- rescues or slung loads would be pretty awkward with the main rotor on the bottom of the helicopter :) ).
 
Back to hangar efficiency, my high wing doesn’t quite clear our tractor with ROP, but does nicely clear motorcycles.

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David Megginson said:
It makes sense for a bird to have the wings up high, away from the prey they're seizing with their talons down low. I don't see any connection between that and airplanes, though (except maybe a helicopter -- rescues or slung loads would be pretty awkward with the main rotor on the bottom of the helicopter :) ).
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Not to mention getting out while the engine was running!
 
David Megginson said:
except maybe a helicopter -- rescues or slung loads would be pretty awkward with the main rotor on the bottom of the helicopter
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You mean like this...

FWIW: while I don't have a dog in this hunt flying-wise, the one place high-wing beats low-wing every time is from the mx side. Give me a hangar full of high-wings over low-wings to work on every time.
 
EdFred said:
Yall talk about high wings = birds.

How many ****ing planes have wings that flap like a bird?
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Thats called an ornithopter. They had them in the Dune books by Frank Herbert.

I've seen some videos of lightweight RC / toy planes that are ornithopters.
 
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Bell206 said:
FWIW: while I don't have a dog in this hunt flying-wise, the one place high-wing beats low-wing every time is from the mx side. Give me a hangar full of high-wings over low-wings to work on every time.
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Yup. One can spend much of his day putting on extra miles walking all the way around the low-wing airplane. Billable hours go up!
 
David Megginson said:
It makes sense for a bird to have the wings up high, away from the prey they're seizing with their talons down low. I don't see any connection between that and airplanes, though...
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That's not why bird's wings are high. It's because muscles can only pull, and since a bird's wings generate lift on the downstroke, the geometry of a high wing permits massive muscle mass in the breast where it does the most good for its weight.
 
JohnAJohnson said:
'Cept for the high wing BUFF, which held the record for many years :)
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Being dragged around the world by low-winged tankers is not exactly "efficient." ;)

Not to take anything away from what they intended, it was a significant accomplishment all the same.

Nauga,
plugged
 
The the final result seems to be that — except for in ground effect — high wing vs low wing makes no aerodynamic-efficiency difference worth mentioning.
 
I’ll add that when it comes to retracts, the look and appeal of flying a low wing is way above that of a high wing for me personally. But it is nice to be able to see the gear and know it’s there in case something goes wrong, no matter how goofy the retraction process looks when you’re in something like a C182RG. That is if you even remembered to lower it in the 1st place...
 
nrm2430 said:
I’ll add that when it comes to retracts, the look and appeal of flying a low wing is way above that of a high wing for me personally. But it is nice to be able to see the gear and know it’s there in case something goes wrong, no matter how goofy the retraction process looks when you’re in something like a C182RG. That is if you even remembered to lower it in the 1st place...
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I think not seeing the gear in a low-wing is how they pressure you to buy a low-wing twin so that you get the fancy engine cowl mirrors!
 
Google “can muscles push”. Universal agreement that they only work through contraction.

“Muscles move body parts by contracting and then relaxing. Muscles can pull bones, but they can't push them back to the original position. So they work in pairs of flexors and extensors. The flexor contracts to bend a limb at a joint.”
 
FastEddieB said:
Google “can muscles push”. Universal agreement that they only work through contraction.

“Muscles move body parts by contracting and then relaxing. Muscles can pull bones, but they can't push them back to the original position. So they work in pairs of flexors and extensors. The flexor contracts to bend a limb at a joint.”
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I remember that from weight training years ago -- you usually try to work on pairs of opposing muscles evenly (e.g. back vs chest, biceps vs triceps, quads vs hamstrings, etc).
 
Matthew Rogers said:
That is as fast as my Cessna
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..hardly a high benchmark



(sorry I couldn't resist)

There is empirical data out there.. we've built plenty of high and low wings, someone could load this into a spreadsheet and come up with a general trend.

For what it's worth, we haven't discussed mid wings.. there aren't many, but the ones that exist are either very fast, very efficient, or both. I'm looking at you Piaggio Avanti and the Aerostar

PS, while on the topic of birds.. they're more similar to flying wings than traditional tube and wing designs. And as mentioned up thread the "high wing" location has more to do with muscle design than operational efficiency

Anyway... here are two modern turboprops

Saab 2000 low wing https://www.saabaircraftleasing.com/prod/datasheets/2000_JAR.pdf
--365 knot cruise
--51,000 lbs
--60 pax
--30,000 ft ceiling
--3,100 lb block fuel for 500 nm trip

Dash 8 Q300 high wing https://www2.bombardier.com/Used_Aircraft/pdf/Q300_EN.pdf
--280 knot cruise
--43,000 lbs
--25,000 foot ceiling
--50 pax
--4,000 lb block fuel for 500 nm trip

**The figures above are rough estimates based on internet sleuthing and the resources above.. and it's not the full picture. But if you go and compare overall speed and fuel burn for various designs the low wings win.

Heck, Mooney holds the standard for "fast and efficient" and they went with a low wing design. Just about every fast GA plane is a low wing
 
Tantalum said:
Heck, Mooney holds the standard for "fast and efficient" and they went with a low wing design. Just about every fast GA plane is a low wing
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I think a lot of high-wings are optimised for applications where ground clearance, visibility, and access are more important than speed, e.g. off-airport landings, float and ski ops, skydiving, SAR, pipeline inspection, etc. etc. There are some speedy high-wings, like the Cessna 210, but they usually don't have wing struts (except for the earliest 210s). I think if you see a high wing with wing struts, speed probably wasn't the top design goal — but then again, when's the last time you saw a Mooney on floats?
 
Okay, here's the solution: an aircraft that has wings that move up for high wing flight or down for low wing controlled by a lever in the cockpit. This way a pilot can select the best configuration for the stage of flight. I mean, what could possibly go wrong? Nothing but win here!!!
 
David Megginson said:
I think a lot of high-wings are optimised for applications where ground clearance, visibility, and access are more important than speed, e.g. off-airport landings, float and ski ops, skydiving, SAR, pipeline inspection, etc. etc. There are some speedy high-wings, like the Cessna 210, but they usually don't have wing struts (except for the earliest 210s). I think if you see a high wing with wing struts, speed probably wasn't the top design goal — but then again, when's the last time you saw a Mooney on floats?
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So you made me Google this, there was a thread on MooneySpace back in 2010 of someone actually looking to put a Mooney on floats.. I guess there are some PA28 on floats? But I couldn't find a single float Mooney

Form follows function, for sure. But it seems that most designers who, from the outset, say "I want speed" either go low wing (Mooney, TBM, etc.) or mid wing (Aerostar, Piaggio Avanti), but few (if any?) go high wing
 
mcdewey said:
Okay, here's the solution: an aircraft that has wings that move up for high wing flight or down for low wing controlled by a lever in the cockpit. This way a pilot can select the best configuration for the stage of flight. I mean, what could possibly go wrong? Nothing but win here!!!
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The Navy has had that capability for years ;)

Blues_farvel.png

Nauga,
downside up
 
Tantalum said:
Form follows function, for sure. But it seems that most designers who, from the outset, say "I want speed" either go low wing (Mooney, TBM, etc.) or mid wing (Aerostar, Piaggio Avanti), but few (if any?) go high wing
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I did mention the Cessna 210, which is a decently-fast plane (the 210P even more so, though it also has a bit of a reputation as a hangar queen). But I think the engineering challenges of a strutless high-wing plane convince most of the designers looking for max speed to take the cheaper and easier low-wing route.
 
Tantalum said:
So you made me Google this, there was a thread on MooneySpace back in 2010 of someone actually looking to put a Mooney on floats.. I guess there are some PA28 on floats? But I couldn't find a single float Mooney
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Have you seen the photos of a DC-3 on floats?
800px-DC-3_on_Floats_N130Q.JPG
 
Tantalum said:
See.. now I need one. Add this to the list of toys for the dream hanger when I have Bezos money
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I'm too late in my career now to pretend I'll ever be rich, but in my fantasy world of me as a billionaire, a DC-3 would be one of the first planes in my hangar too.
 
Tantalum said:
So you made me Google this, there was a thread on MooneySpace back in 2010 of someone actually looking to put a Mooney on floats.. I guess there are some PA28 on floats? But I couldn't find a single float Mooney

Form follows function, for sure. But it seems that most designers who, from the outset, say "I want speed" either go low wing (Mooney, TBM, etc.) or mid wing (Aerostar, Piaggio Avanti), but few (if any?) go high wing
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Would you settle for an Aztec:
aztec-nomad.jpg
 
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