Thursday, March 20, 2014

Rogallo wing

Francis Rogallo began developing an idea for a flexible wing with his wife Gertrude after WWII, she helped with sewing and by contributing their curtains. The two used household electric fans and boxes for wind tunnels and they got patents in both their names, the due diligence required for later space-related projects led to further patents.

The Rogallos developed two types of self-inflating kite wings that would go on to become the parasail and the hang glider.

Wikipedia has several articles, self-contradicting if you read them all, this first result for [rogallo wing] begins:
The Rogallo wing is a flexible type of airfoil. In 1948, Gertrude Rogallo, and her husband Francis Rogallo, a NASA engineer, invented a...
Giving the impression Gertrude played the more serious role. It is the husband with the degrees in engineering, the interest, the government jobs in aeronautics and NASA.

Another contradiction here is the confusing statement:
The wing itself is not a kite; neither is it a glider nor a powered aircraft, until the wing is tethered or arranged in a configuration that glides or is powered. In other words, how it is attached and manipulated determines what type of aircraft it becomes. 
It is a kite when tethered. All kites are tethered, or else they're a glider.

Another Wikipedika entry for Francis Rogallo draws a clear picture of his career.

Another Wikipedia entry for Parasev, the Rogallo wing developed for NASA reentry that never got ... off the ground. It had deployment issues. And over 4,000 parts. And was slower in development. Due to haste and urgency of making a moon landing happen by Kennedy's arbitrary goal, the project was put on low priority, like seven out of ten, and then eventually dropped. Losing Rogallo wing from Gemini. 

The wing went on to sweep the world of recreational flight but NASA has no interest in any of that.

The frame is flexible. There is give to the construction. The tail end of the wing are flexible not rigid. They are not flapping around but they give, and because they give that means the glider does not need a tail section, "empenage" in aviation. It is more like the feathers of a bird, not the rigid wings of an airplane but sometimes stiffened with battens inserted into tight sleeves sewn into the sail.


Francis Rogallo died recently, 2009, at age 97.

This nytimes article notes Francis Rogallo chose to live near Kitty Hawk to be near his inspiration. It says that he met Orville Wright in 1939 and that he took up hang gliding himself at age 62 there at Kitty Hawk dunes, taking his last flight there at age 80.

Goodness.

There was a very old man on our training hill in our beginning class. He astonished all of us just by being there. We were all in our 20's.  He looked exactly like Popeye the sailor man. We asked him, "What are you doing here? Why are you trying this? What is your impulse? What makes you think you can do this? What do your friends think? Does your mother know you're out here? Aren't you worried about breaking your fragile bones? What has got in to you?"

"I want to."

He shut us all down. That was our reason too. He was automatically hero to all us. Inspiration because he gave us all hope for the future. The distant future. Hope that adventure and wonder is not lost, does not fade, does not die in us. We were all determined to be like Popeye the sailor hang gliding man.

The Times article cites 50,000 people hang glide annually. Some paying $4,000 for gliders.

That is a lot. A lot of people and a lot of money.

My Harrier II (pdf) was $1,000.00 This guy says he wouldn't pay more than $250.00 now. Ha!

Sounds about right. It's a dinosaur. Pterodactyl.

But boy, was it hot then. I just reminded myself of something touching. That whole thing was free. I was talking to a group of people about my desire, about my intention to follow through, about what I learned up to that point, what I needed to continue, what glider I had my eye on at the time, how long I thought that will take.

The next day I was presented a check for $1,000 and a note saying, "Go on then."

I forgot completely about that until this moment. Somebody I know, a fairly good friend, wanted me to get started with my own glider right away now that I passed the initial beginning instructions, or else wanted me dead.

I accepted the cash, bought the glider, advanced to intermediate level, crashed continuously throughout, had very many very satisfying flights that can be shared with nobody, crashed very badly, sold the glider on the spot. Another hang glider pilot out on the hill had already expressed curiosity about my glider, it was beautiful, asked about buying it. So when I crashed everyone comes running to see if you're dead or what.
I hate to take advantage of a catastrophic situation but are you still interested in selling your glider?
The thing was a heap. The aluminum tubes crimped. Wires shorn. But the sail was not torn.

Tubes and wires are cheap. Sort of. I told him I'll have it repaired and if still interested then maybe so. I'm losing interest in crashing. I got this whole flying like a bird thing work out of my system. "Where is my car?" 

I didn't know this then, but my hang glider was gay as hell. The gayest hang glider in the world. It veritably screams GAY GAY GAY on account of it being a rainbow. A beautiful rainbow. 

But that was then before rainbows were gay.

I sold the glider for $1,200.00 and presented the cash to the person who originally gave it to me. The original thousand was a gift, but that entire effort turned out a profit. I did fly like a bird. Crashed as birds do too. They're dying out there by the thousands like nobody's business, I needn't be one of them. I'm too much a klutz for flying like birds. 

All of that brings me around to ask, because I do wonder, what took so long? 

Why did humanity have to wait for Francis Rogallo and his wife Gertrude to invent this arrangement of parachute wings? 

Why didn't Chinese invent this 1,000 years ago? 2,000 years ago? Honestly, what was the holdup? 

I'm losing respect for creativity on a global level because there is no good reason I see why this wasn't invented centuries earlier, given intense interest throughout history. It's not just me thinking this, it's everybody. So what took so long? 

They had an interest in kites, they have the perfect building material, bamboo and silk, nobody else had those two wondrous materials yet they failed to use them for human flight. Come on.

9 comments:

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

I have a friend who says Einstein stole from his first wife.

I forget what exactly, might have been relativity.

We are sort of used to him making these wild eye allegations.

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

Last night, I started watching Flight (2012) with Denzel Washington.

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

I believe you and Bags have something in common.

XRay said...

Great story, Chip. Thanks.

ricpic said...

Youth is impossible. By what rights did all those young nothings pepper the old guy with questions as though he had to legitimize himself to those green snots? Presumptuous pukes.

bagoh20 said...

I have always wonder that too: what took so long? The method is so simple and the design is something you would expect someone to try very early on, even by accident at some point, but it took a modern man basically ignoring all his modern technology to find the such a simple solution. Rogallo is a hero to the free flight community. Of all the things ever invented, I wish I invented the hang glider. It's magic.

bagoh20 said...

Our club's oldest member was still flying at 83 - we were basically throwing him off the mountain. He just recently quit after claiming to have passed out in flight a couple times, although coming to in time to land safely.

We also had a German couple who flew into their eighties. He was a WWII veteran of the Luftwaffe, or so he claimed. He always wore a U.S. Air Force uniform when he flew hang gliders.

deborah said...

Chip:
"They had an interest in kites, they have the perfect building material, bamboo and silk, nobody else had those two wondrous materials yet they failed to use them for human flight. Come on."

Fascinating. I wonder if they had any origami designs that glided.

The Dude said...

Origami is Japanese, not Chinese.