Talk:Variable-sweep wing/Archive 1

Archive 1

F-14 not designed to be maneuverable

I am not able to correct this article because someone inists, without documentation, that maneuverablity was not a design goal of the F-14. I will not pursue this, but it does need to be fixed because this assertion is not only flat out incorrrect but nullifies the single most important design feature and goal of the aircraft. See F-14 talk for series of positive evidence for design to agility, and lack of citations that say, in so many words, the F-14 was not designed to be agile. A web search on F14 and maneuverability brings up this page, and it's simply massively incorrect.--Wiarthurhu 22:15, 26 June 2006 (UTC)

Rename?

My source (okay, so it's a TV show) calls them "'Switch-Wing' Aircraft", and so do many games and mods thereof. This not only sounds better but I think it's what the airforce calls it. Nobodymk2 01:50, 30 July 2006 (UTC)

Toy

Is there an article about the swingwing toy?

F-111B

It seems to me that describing the F-111B project as "disastrous" is just pure opinion. It was abandoned merely because the aircraft ended up being heavier than the US Navy would have liked,and it could be argued that it was a successful design otherwise. As to "abortive", it was abandoned late enough in the project that USAF and RAAF production versions still have provisions for all of the carrier-based gear, for example rear arrestor hooks and provisions for launching bar mounts on the front landing gear. I propose these both just be changed to the more neutral "cancelled", if there's no major argument —Preceding unsigned comment added by Quadbox (talk • contribs)

Seems reasonable...do it! Akradecki 15:56, 4 March 2007 (UTC)

Rename part 2

I'm renaming this article to "Variable geometry wing" which is the formal name. Swing-wing is a colloquial. - Emt147 ^Burninate! 19:38, 15 April 2007 (UTC)

• Support. It's certainly not a "switch-wing" either! (see above) However, it should have been moved properly, rather than by cut-and-paste. I have asked an admin to fix this so we can retain the history; should be done in a few days. - BillCJ 20:34, 15 April 2007 (UTC)

• • Mea culpa, I didn't feel like digging through 50 pages of fluff to figure out which admin board to post the request on and it wouldn't let me do a rename due to existence of the redirect. Thanks for doing that! - Emt147 ^Burninate! 00:58, 16 April 2007 (UTC)

Rename part 3

I'd like to suggest changing the article name back to swing wing or something else like "Variable sweep wing". Swing wing may be colloquial, but there are many other variable wing features than just swing. This article only talks about swing. In fact, the article's "See Also" section points to some examples that I would rightly consider variable geometry wings. In this context, this is a swing wing article not a variable geometry wing article. Furthermore, being an aerospace engineer and having worked in a variable geometry wing program recently, I intend on adding a new article called morphing aircraft very soon to tie all of this stuff together. I realize this article was just renamed or moved, but the name of this article does not correctly reflect what's in it given the broader context of variable geometry wings. Jbowman90 12:31, 19 August 2007 (UTC)

I think Variable-sweep wing is a good choice, and the name is currently vacant. I don't know if there is an existing article covering all the types of variable geometry wings, but this current name would be a good place for it. "Morphing aircraft" might not be the best choice to go to for now, as it may be too much of a temptation for the "Transformers" fans to ignore! :) Good job btw in proposing the change first, given the recent multiple names for the page. Doing it here on the talk page is normally the best way to go. You could also post a short paragraph with a link here on the Aircraft Project talk page to draw in more discussion, since this is probably a low-traffic page. - BillCJ 16:06, 19 August 2007 (UTC)

I've gone ahead and moved toh page to Variable-sweep wing. I'd suggest Variable-geometry wing as a good page for the topics ov variable-sweep, -incidence, and -camber wings, and the Oblique wing. - BillCJ 02:41, 3 September 2007 (UTC)

No widespread adoption?

I would say that the line stating that swing-wings were never widely adopted is misleading, as a better description would be that they have 'fallen out of fashion'. All of the major aircraft buidling nations (except France) chose variable geometry for thier tactical bomber/strike aircraft during the 60s/70s - F111, Tornado and Su-24 - and many for fighters/interceptors and heavy bombers too.Jellyfish dave (talk) 14:39, 7 August 2008 (UTC)

Not so much fallen out of fashion as overtaken. The exponential rise in flight control technology has allowed aircraft aerodynamics to be tailored much more easily, and the advent of composite materials technology has freed aircraft designers from the strictures of building aircraft from metals01:56, 9 March 2010 (UTC)Petebutt (talk)

Variable- geometry

OK, swing wing is variable geometry, but variable geometry is far more than just swing-wing so lets have a proper variable geometry article and stop pratting about re-directing it to an inappropriate place shall we? Any discussion?Petebutt (talk) 01:50, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

More fuel and payload ??

from article: ..."allowing the aircraft to carry more fuel and/or payload..."

This is grossly inaccurate. If anything, the mechanisms necessary to sweep the wings takes away from the aircraft's carrying weight. But the aerodynamic benefits derived from wing sweep offset this drawback, producing a NET savings in weight. The main benefit producing this savings is the greatly reduced fuel consumption during subsonic cruise.

The swing wing itself does not enable greater carrying capacity. If anything, the delta wing is more deserving of being described as conferring greater carrying capacity, with its structurally deep wing root and yet aerodynamic thinness, due to the long chord lines near the fuselage.

I understand there is one sense that this statement could be considered somewhat correct. That is, the greater takeoff performance of a swing wing a/c permits it to leave the ground and clear obstacles with a greater payload than a swept wing a/c of similar weight. I'm not completely sure how best to describe this. If someone can come up with substantiation, we could include a modified version including this conditionality.

A better description of the benefits of the variable sweep wing would be: "allowing the aircraft to make better use of its fuel supply, due to more efficient subsonic cruise." (this is because of the greater aspect ratio. Wikkileaker (talk) 15:04, 16 July 2019 (UTC)

I would generally agree; I once read that Soviet swing-wing planes had a fairly large weight penalty... AnonMoos (talk) 15:52, 17 July 2019 (UTC)

@Wikkileaker: Thanks for alerting us to that problem. I have erased the offending sentence and replaced it with four sentences. Dolphin (t) 22:42, 17 July 2019 (UTC)

(unless complex high-lift wing devices are built in)?

This line seems to be a bit confusing as it seems to state that a swing wing is not a complex high lift device 107.77.205.209 (talk) 15:10, 7 May 2023 (UTC)