Saw this one on Sci Channel last night. Reverese delta wing, with downward cast to the tip sponsons, then sharply upswept winglets. Powered by around 700 hp Corvette V8, driving two 4 blade props off of heavy rubber drive belts.
Is a seaplane, but only flies in ground effect a few feet off the water.
Very slick system and bird. Worth a look if it comes up again, on Mega Machines.
That’s pretty cool! I get a lot of pleasure watching the pelicans do that down at the beach. It sometimes seems like they even dip their wingtips in the water.
Have you ever seen the Ecranoplan! What a monster!
They had a few video shots of it along with some other early attempts at the type.
He is trying to sell it to the Malayisan gov’t as a quick response craft for oil spills in the straight… did a demo with popcorn in a containment boom. Flew over it in a simulated dispersant drop, maybe 4 feet off the water, at around 75-90 mph, never moved a kerrnal. Had 1000 lb load on board between sand bags and passengers for the sim load, was there in 15 minutes, and a chopper would have taken 2 hours. They had 60 spills in the straight in 2016 according to the program.
When in a tight turn, the sponsons clip the surface and the upswept tips have ailerons/rudder control as well. Actually tightens the turn by touching the surface, and the sponsons keep the wing from digging in and cartwheeling the thing.
Would be a beautiful model if it comes out it a kit…Kind of looks like a bat from a head on view
Oh My Goodness .
I would love a model of that . Maybe I can scratch it out of something !
The “wing in ground effect” vehicle was the inspiration of the great German aerodynamicist Alexander Lippisch, who was also instrumental to the development of the delta wing. The delta wing has become a popular planform for high performance aircraft, but the WIG still seems to be a solution waiting for a problem.