Heavier-than-air

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The opposite of lighter-than-air.

To fly, an aircraft which is heavier than air must have some force which moves it upwards. In general, this force is produced by some sort of reaction with the air, whether by means of a propeller or by a shape designed to catch the wind. The criteria for the success of a heaveier-than-air vessel are less clear-cut than for a balloon, because the question is not simply whether they leave the ground, but how they move through the air, and for how long. (A projectile is heavier than air but it's not an aircraft and doesn't "fly" in the same sense.) The French avion and the plus lourd que l'air, along with its grammatical variants, are the same designation as the heavier-than-air. The study and development of this sort of aircraft are what constitutes aviation per se.

In France an early wave of heavier-than-air enthusiasts formed the Société d'encouragement pour la locomotion aérienne au moyen d'appareils plus lourds que l'air in the 1860s. Gabriel de La Landelle, Nadar, and Gustave-Louis-Marie de Ponton d'Amécourt were prominent members of this group; they published a manifesto, Manifeste de l'autolocomotion aérienne, in 1863.

The phrase “heavier-than-air”, being theoretically based as it is in theoretical juxtaposition to the early-dominant “lighter-than-air”, likely comes up less within patent titles as we track data further into the establishment of the airplane and so forth. Relatively late exceptions will include will include airplane-helicopter hybrids, for instance, in which the “heavier-than-air” assertion is absolute, but in which the invention fits no precisely formalized or established contemporaneous type of aircraft.[1]

This wiki has 147 patents in category "Heavier-than-air". Other techtypes related to Heavier-than-air: Aéronautique, Aviation, CA 244/3, CA 244/4, CA 244/5, CA 244/6, GB 4 without buoyant, USPC 244/5

Patents in category Heavier-than-air

Publications referring to Heavier-than-air

Publications referring to heavier-than-air

References

Enclosing categories Simple tech terms
Subcategories Airplane, Helicopter, Kite, Glider, Ornithopter, Projectile, Coleopter, Orthopter
Keywords Lift, Aerodynamics, Propeller, Aéronautique, Aviation
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