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Kayak and Canoe Design Bulletin Board
Re: Ever faster, by a decimal
Posted By: Ian Johnston In Response To: Ever faster, by a decimal (Pete W. P.)
Date: Saturday, 27 November 1999, at 11:53 a.m.
Pete,
I'm no expert but apparently this has to do with surface turbulance. There was a big thing in the media a few years back where someone discovered that a designed pattern on a surface resulted in less drag. The application they talked about was on jumbo jets and how this knurling would save X amount of fuel, reduce operating costs and result in lower ticket prices.
The problem was that each surface shape required a different pattern and this combined with increased manufacturing costs far outweighed the fuel savings.
I have thought of this application to a kayak as it should in theory provide many of the benifits we would want in a human powered vehicle operating in a fluid.
The problems are still the same though. How do you know where and what pattern to put on a kayak? How much increase in efficiency will you gain for the extra building effort?
Another big question is how much of a benifit is this going to be on a slow moving vehicle like a kayak? Would it even be perceptable to a paddler unless they were in a long distance race? It doesn't exist if you can't perceive it!
It is an interesting concept though! Would be nice if there was a computer program that could put you in the ballpark before you started building. It would be easy to put a pattern on the kayak and change it as required.
Ian
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