Northrop Grumman Bat UAV

Northrop Grumman video of a flight test of its Bat small unmanned aircraft - a flying-wing design acquired from Swift Engineering, which called the UAV the KillerBee.

Category:

Science & Technology

Tags:

• aviation
• aircraft
• unmanned
• UAV
• Northrop

[iewgnem]

When did Northrop rename the Killerbee?

[iewgnem]

@tsb247 Upward winglets does that too, downward winglet makes it statically unstable, which might be intentional or it might just be designed to look unique.

[ttwilkable]

love the video man

[smuggecko]

love the video really good

[jessyjessy4]

very interesting thanks

[4E047RHH]

AWSOME!!! Target practice!

[shaider1982]

@alexicon89 ...actually has less drag than a smooth one at high Reynold's number (i.e. higher speeds, same size and fluid). For more info, read a college fluid mechanics textbook as English Wikipedia is blacked out today in protest to PIPA and SOPA.

[shaider1982]

@alexicon89 If you only consider skin friction, then you are right because, for a given volume, a sphere has the least surface area.

Unfortunately, when you consider viscous pressure drag, you need to control the wake. The smaller the wake, the better. Hence, the "rain drop" shape a commenter to your post stated.

Viscous pressure drag creates somewhat counter-intuitive approaches to reducing drag,. One example is that a rough surfaced sphere...

[krap101]

@alexicon89 Close... sort of. A raindrop (airfoil) is the most aerodynamic shape. A sphere is actually one of the worst.

[alexicon89]

@krap101 Are you sure? a spherical droplet is the best aerodynamic shape when it comes down to air resistance.