Air on the Move

You will need:

Two sheets of paper

Two thick books

What to do:
Hold one of the sheets of paper close to your bottom lip and blow hard across the upper surface.
What happens?
Place the two books about 4 inches apart on a table. Lay a sheet of paper over the books. Blow
hard through the gap between the books. Notice how the paper moves.
Hold the two sheets of paper upright, a few inches apart in front of your face. Again, blow hard and
watch what happens.
Try to explain your observations by thinking about the air pressure on either side of the paper in
each of the experiments.
What did you do to the air
on each side when you
blew on it? What effect do
you think this had on the
pressure on that side?

More Speed,
Less Pressure
In 1738, the Swiss
mathematician Daniel
Bernoulli made a
surprising discovery. It
has become known as
BERNOULLI'S
PRINCIPLE.
This drawing shows how Bernoulli's principle results in an upwardBernoulli found that as
pressing force
the speed of a gas or
liquid increases, its
pressure drops. This means that air rushing over a surface, for example, pushes
against the surface less than if the air were still.

Page 1 of 35

If air moves everywhere around an object at the same speed, then the pressure on all
sides will drop by the same amount. In this case, the pushing force from every direction
remains balanced. But what happens if the air only moves over the top of an object and
is still underneath? From Bernouilli's principle it follows that the pressure on top will be
less than that underneath. Because of this, there will be an upward-pressing force.

Mapping Air Flows

You will need:

A glass jar

20 or 30 pins

Paper, scissors, and glue

A large wood or cork board

A large sheet of paper

A pencil

A blow dryer

What to do:
Cover the board with the sheet of paper. Draw a line down the middle of the paper at right angles
to the edge nearest you.
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Cut a 1/2-inch wide, 2-inch long strip of paper and fold it around one end of the pins. Glue the
ends of the paper together so that the result is a small flag, with the pin as the flagpole. The paper
should be able to spin easily around the pin when you blow on it. Make similar flags using the
other pins.
Place the glass jar at the near edge of the board on the middle of the line. Stick the pins in at
various points behind and to the side of the jar. Some should be close behind the jar, others farther
away. Turn all the flags so that they are pointing inward at right angles to the center line.
Point the blow dryer at the near side of the jar, about 6 inches away, and directly along the center
line. Switch it on to the lowest setting for several seconds. Then turn it off. Look at the new position
of the flags.
Under each flag draw a short line to show the direction in which it now points. Then remove the
flag. Observe the pattern of lines. What does this tell you about the way the air flowed around the
jar?

Taking it further:
Repeat the experiment with the pins in new positions. For example, you could stick the pins at the
ends (or beginnings) of the short lines. By doing this a number of times, you could map out
complete lines of flow. Make sure that you hold the blow dryer in exactly the same place in each
time.
Do the whole experiment again with different shaped obstacles some with straight sides, others
with smoothly curved sides. What happens if you make the surface of he jar less smooth by
wrapping it with cloth? What happens if you
increase the speed of the air flow?

Sticky Streams
Sometimes when you try to pour water
from a jug the water runs down the side of
the jug. In fact, all liquids and gases
behave this way. That is, when flowing
past a smooth surface, they tend to stay
close to the surface. The effect was first
described by a Romanian engineer, Henri
Coanda, in 1926, and is named after him.

The Coanda effect

Because of the COANDA EFFECT,

moving air will try to follow the lines of an object, even if it has to change direction to do
so.
Page 3 of 35

A Wind Tunnel
You will need:

16 large milk cartons

A powerful fan, preferably with several speed settings

A large wooden board

Glue or tape

A sheet of paper (about 8" by 11")

A knitting needle

Cotton thread

What to do:
Cut out the front and back of the milk cartons. Glue or tape the cartons together to make a 4-by-4
square, as shown. Fix this arrangement to the wooden board. Place the fan behind cartons so that
it is exactly in line with them. Position the center of the fan opposite the center of the square. The
basic wind tunnel is now complete.
Fold the sheet of paper in half. Tape the top half to the bottom half about 1 inch from the edge. The
paper now looks like a stubby wing. Slide the knitting needle into the fold.
Turn the fan to its lowest speed. Hold the knitting needle level in the center of the air stream with
the curved side of the wing uppermost. What happens? Turn the wing upside down and try again.
Page 4 of 35

What effect does this have?

Taking it further:
Tape several pieces of thread along the front edge of the wing so that they trail back over the
upper wing surface. Replace the wing in the wind tunnel. What happens to the thread when the air
stream is turned back on? What happens if you switch the fan to a higher speed?
Make wings of various different shapes and test them. Records your results and try to explain
them.

Experiment in depth:
Many improvements to the basic wind tunnel are possible. It would be very useful, for example, to
install a fan with a continuously variable speed. This should only be attempted by an adult with a
good knowledge of electrical equipment. Similarly a device for measuring wind speed (an
anemometer) would be a valuable addition for more advanced experiments. The milk cartons
could be replaced by a more permanent array made from thin panels of wood.
Some sort of arrangement will also be needed if model planes are to be tested properly in the wind
tunnel. A framework could be built from which the model could be suspended by threads. The
threads would need to be slack enough that the plane could rise or fall, or bank to the left or right,
but not so loose as to let it go out of control. In practice, this is not easy. An alternative method is
to hold the plane steady and tape cotton thread to the areas of interest on the model. The way in
which the thread is blown indicates the behavior of the air flow.

Wings and Lift

Think what happens as a wing passes through air. At the leading edge of the wing, the
airflow divides. Some
air goes over the top of
the wings; the rest goes
underneath. Because of
the Coanda effect, the
airflow tends to "hug"
the outline of the
surface over which it is
moving.
The air passing under
the wing continues on
more or less a straight
line. This is because
the lower surface of the
wing is almost flat.
Page 5 of 35
How the shape of a wing, or airfoil, creates lift

However, the air flowing over the wing has farther to go, because the upper surface is
curved. To keep up with the air underneath, the air on top has to move faster. But by
Bernoulli's principle, higher speed means lower pressure. As a result, the air on top of
the wing must press less strongly against the wing than does the air underneath.
Since the downward pressure on the top of the moving wing is less than the upward
pressure on the bottom of the wing, there is an overall upward force. This upward force
is called LIFT.
A wing shape, or AIRFOIL, happens to be the best shape for producing lift. That is why
nature uses airfoils in birds, flying insects, and bats, and why human engineers use
them in various types of aircraft.

Losing Lift
You will need:

The wind tunnel

A paper wing

A knitting needle

A stiff piece of cardboard

What to do:
Set up the wing in the wind tunnel as before. Observe its position in the moving airstream. Now
block off the air from the top of the wing with the piece of cardboard. To do this place the edge of
the cardboard along the center of the leading edge of the wing so that the cardboard shields the
upper surface of the wing. What happens?
Repeat the test with the cardboard blocking off the wind from the lower surface of the wing. What
do you observe?
Try to explain your results in terms of what you have already learned about lift.

The Flight of the Frisbee

Scientific discoveries and inventions are often made completely by accident. Take
Frisbees, for instance. In 1871, William Russell Frisbie opened a pie factory close to
the college that, sixteen years later became Yale University. Hungry students of the
college, who were regular customers, soon found that the empty pie tins flew extremely
well when thrown upside down! It was not until the 1940s, however, that someone took
Page 6 of 35

full advantage of the idea. Then Frederick Morrison, a keen pie-tin thrower, made a
similar disk out of a new type of plastic. Later, he sold his invention to the Wham-O
Corporation of California, which coined the
named "Frisbee" for the toy.
A Frisbee produces lift in the same way as
a wing. That is, the top of the disk is
curved while the bottom is flat. During
flight, this results in a lower air pressure on
top than on the bottom. But the similarity
between the Frisbee and a wing ends
there. Because of its spin, the Frisbee
behaves in a much more complicated way.

Looking at Feathers
You will need:

A feather (Find one of the long narrow

feathers lost from the end of a bird's
wing)

Close-up diagram of a bird's feather

A magnifying glass

What to do:
Look at the feather from the side. What shape does it have? Examine the feather under the
magnifying glass or microscope. What do you see?
Identify the central shaft and the barbs projecting from each side. Focus on one of the barbs.
Attached to each barb are tiny branches called barbules. These lock together but how? Examine
them carefully to find out.
Hold the feather straight out by the end of its shaft. Tilt it so
that the front edge is slightly higher than the back. Now move
it quickly through the air. What do you notice?

Feather Power
A bird's wings, and each of its feathers, are shaped
much like an aircraft's wing curved on top and flatter
underneath. This allows them to generate lift in the
same way.
Page 7 of 35

The main problem facing a bird especially a heavy bird is taking off. To do this, the
bird has to beat its wings very hard to force air quickly over the wings' upper surfaces
and so produce a lot of lift. Once it has climbed high enough, the rate of beating can be
reduced to that needed for level flight.
Several factors help to give birds mastery of the air. They have bones that contain
many hollow spaces, making them lightweight yet strong. A bird's chest muscles, which
operate the wings, are extremely large and powerful. And, finally, the wings themselves
are covered in tightly fitting feathers that trap the air.
http://www.meridian-int-res.com/Aeronautics/Coanda.htm

Since all interactions of a solid body with a fluid, be it bird, fish, aeroplane or ship, involve the flow
of fluid over a solid boundary, it can be said that Fluid Dynamics IS the Science of the Coanda
Effect.
The Coanda Effect has come to mean attachment of a flow to a surface beyond where we "expect" it
to remain attached - but this is a scientifically meaningless view.
The classic example is that of fluid pouring out of a bottle or teapot. If the fluid does not pour
straight out but flows around the lip, reversing direction before finally succumbing to gravity and
detaching, this effect of "sticking to the surface" has come to be called the "Coanda Effect".
A more interesting example that anyone can perform for themselves is to allow a fine continuous
stream of water to issue from the kitchen tap. Bring the rounded pad of your first finger towards
the stream until it just touches. With the finger barely touching the flow, the stream of water will
be diverted around the finger and spray out horizontally with some force. The horizontal distance
the water is projected is remarkable.
The best introductory article available on the subject is still "Applications of the Coanda Effect" by Imants Reba,
which appeared in the June 1966 edition of Scientific American.
This diagram shows a Coanda Thruster tested by Reba. Air is ejected from a plenum at the front of the body. A
small step is inset into the surface of the body which causes the ejected air jet to attach to the surface and flow
around it towards the upper surface. A sheet of attached air called a Coanda Jet flows towards the back of the
thruster.
In so doing, it entrains by suction up to 20 times as much
air from the surrounding atmosphere as is in the jet itself.
A shroud placed around the body increases the suction on
the surrounding air even more.
Air pressure on the front of the thruster is therefore

Page 8 of 35

reduced by the entrainment suction so the body moves forward. In addition, the afterbody made of flat angled
segments causes the attached Coanda jet or sheet to exert a positive pressure on the rear of the thruster and so
further increase thrust.
We therefore have exactly the opposite situation to a normal airfoil moving through air: instead of positive air
pressure on the front and negative pressure on the rear, creating drag, we have Negative Drag - i.e. Thrust.
This shows a model levitating device (hovercraft) tested by Reba. The body of the device is made of short flat
surfaces, creating a so called Coanda Surface; high pressure air ejected from an annular slot on the top of the
device flows around and down to wards the bottom, entraining the surrounding air as it does so and creating a
partial vacuum on the upper surface - a lower pressure region. Lift is therefore produced. As with the thruster
above, ambient air pressure is increased below the
device to increase lift.
Hydrofoil and Submarine Propulsion
Reba tested a model hydrofoil using a shrouded
Coanda thruster. The entrainment of the
surrounding water to produce thrust results in very
little wake or noise. Reba felt that a hydrofoil so
equipped could reach speeds of 80 knots. At about
the same time in 1962, Stine at the Huyck
Corporation worked with Henri Coanda to build a
similar device using ejected steam for submarine
propulsion.
This concept has recently been re-invented by Australian Alan Burns and developed by Pursuit Dynamics in the
UK. A 20 cm long "underwater jet engine" that injects steam from an annular slot into an internal Coanda nozzle is
said to produce 30 HP output. (See New Scientist, 1/3/03, P19).
Allied Signal patented an internal Coanda nozzle using similar principles in the late 90s. One application is to
eliminate the back pressure from the exhaust of an internal combustion engine, but to instead suck the combustion
products out and so improve efficiency.
Circulation Control Wing
Circulation Control Wing technology is one of the most important potential applications of the Coanda Effect.
The objective is to replace the lift devices on the leading and trailing edges of a wing by use of Coanda Surfaces
and slot blowing instead.
The diagram above is from AIAA 93-0644.
The first known use of this "blown flaps" concept was on the
prototype Boeing 707. Boundary Layer blowing was
successfully used on the Hawker Siddeley Buccaneer to
improve STOL performance for aircraft carrier operations. The supersonic TSR2 also incorporated blown flaps,

Page 9 of 35

allowing the 90,000lb delta winged aircraft with a wingspan of only 37 feet to achieve an approach speed of 130
knots: the Concorde type droop nose was also eliminated since a much flatter non alpha lift approach could be
made.
In the late 1970s, Robert Englar tested a modified Grumman A6 Intruder fitted with a prototype CCW system. The
aircraft was able to fly at less than 60 knots and take off or land in less than 600 feet without catapult or arrestor
assistance.
Studies showed that a Boeing 737-100 weighing 105,000 lbs fitted with CCW and no headwind would take 3000
feet to clear a 50ft obstacle on take off (Sea Level, ISA); the normal distance is 5000 feet. Landing roll with no
headwind would be 750 feet, compared to 2000 feet for the conventional configuration. A lightly loaded 737
(65,000 lbs) with a 20 knot headwind would land in 300 feet with CCW lift devices.
CCW allows lift to be produced at Zero Degrees Angle of Attack. Coefficient of Lift (CL) of 8 at alpha = 0 was
achieved in tests.
CCW has been criticised for requiring extra APU or engine capacity to supply the bleed air to drive
the slot blowing,
According to Englar, a pressure differential of 13.8 psi at Sea Level ISA is sufficient to produce a
Coanda Jet velocity equal to the speed of sound. Normal airfoils achieve a CP of between -1.0 and
-2.0; the most efficient airfoil possible, the cylinder, has a CP of -3.0. CCW equipped wings have
achieved CP of between -50 and -60, i.e. the suction on the upper wing surface is 50 times the
freestream dynamic pressure.
Cross feed can be used between the plena in each wing to maintain flap blowing in case of an
engine failure.
Engine and APU manufacturers are studying a next generation of APUs that would supply all the
bleed air for pneumatic systems, leaving the engines dedicated for thrust alone. APU reliability will
have to improve greatly before this is achievable.
The X Wing Helicopter
The conventional helicopter is limited to a maximum forward speed of about 200 knots; above that speed the
decreasing relative velocity of the leading edge of the retreating blade with respect to the freestream air flow leads
to unsustainable loss of lift and lift asymmetry between the forward going and retreating blades; if the helicopter
tried to fly even faster, the oncoming airstream would impinge the trailing edge of the retreating blade causing even
more loss of lift.
Numerous designs have been put forward since the 1950s for Compound Helicopters to help solve this. The
compound helicopter adds a wing and thrust engines to transition to fixed wing mode and unload the rotor at high
speed.
Despite the great advantages in efficiency, payload and range that this would bring, no compound helicopter has
been commercially developed. Piasecki Aircraft have been trying to commercialise this technology since 1955 and
flew their first Vectored Thrust Ducted Propellor (VTDP) designs in the 1960s: in 2002 they were awarded a
contract to convert an SH-60 to VTDP mode but this apparently was cancelled due to disagreements over flight

Page 10 of 35

test rules.
Another solution is to use CCW technology. In this application, the helicopter rotor blades are constructed as
Coanda surfaces. A plenum and spanwise blowing slot run the length of the trailing and leading edges, with a
symmetrical cross section to the rotor blade. Air is blown onto the trailing edge of the forward going blades. As the
blades retreat, slot blowing is swapped onto the leading edge of the blade, which is now a trailing edge with
respect to the forward motion of the helicopter. This maintains lift on the retreating blades and theoretically will
allow forward flight speeds of 400 knots in pure helicopter mode. Above that speed, fixed wing mode is more
efficient so the rotor is locked into place to create an "X Wing". Differential slot blowing is used in the transition
phase to eliminate differential lift as the rotor slows down.

http://www.laesieworks.com/ifo/how/Coanda_effect-P1.html

Coanda efficiency

A fan that blows air, produces thrust in the

opposite direction.

An airfoil that directs the airstream

downwards under the airfoil, will be pushed
up and away from the fan.
I don't have real numbers from a coanda test
bench, so my guess is that the total amount of
thrust is upwards and about equal to the
original thrust directly from the fan.

Page 11 of 35

An airfoil that directs the airstream

downwards over the airfoil, using the
"Coanda effect", will also be pushed up and
away from the fan.
My guess is that very the total force will again
be about equal to the direct thrust.
The airfoil adds a lot of weight, so direct
thrust would probably be more efficient.

ADDING AMBIENT AIR

Adding a lot of ambient air and thus extra weight into the airstream, can improve the thrusting
power and energy efficiency significantly. So, the goal is to entrain as much as possible
ambient air into the airstream. The area where the airstream and the ambient air are in contact
needs to be a very large surface. Working near the edge of the disc is therefore most effective.
AIR AMPLIFIER
An air amplifier, air knife / air curtain, are products that can amplify flows up to about 30
times the input air consumption rate. The input air is of very high pressure though (1.5 - 7
Bar).

Antonov 71

Antonov 71

LESS DISTANCE, LESS DRAG

A radial airstream, flowing from the center to the edge, loses volume and energy really fast. If
the airstream would, for example, start at 30 cm from the center at 4 cm thick, it would be
((30*2)*3.1416)*4 = 753.98 square centimeters.
If the edge of the disc would be at 200 cm, and for now no air resistance, the airstream would
at the edge only be 753.98 / ((200*2)*3.1416) = 0.6 centimeters thick.
But in reality there is resistance, which makes the airstream turbulent and discontent from the
airfoil pretty soon, losing thrust. I guess this must have plagued the first Astro Kinetics design.
The last Astro Kinetics design starts its airstream almost at the edge.
As an airstream flows next to a surface, they interact, which will cause the airstream to become
turbulent. One solution is boundary layer control, but a more simple solution is to keep the
distance short, so that the air near the surface has enough velocity, all the way.

Page 12 of 35

http://www.discoverhover.org/infoinstructors/guide8.htm
Page 13 of 35

DiscoverHover CURRICULUM GUIDE #8

BERNOULLIS PRINCIPLE AND THE COANDA EFFECT
2004 World Hovercraft Organization

DATE

NAME

A closer look at how propellers cause forward thrust will reveal that the hovercraft moves forward by
pushing air behind it. Exactly how does the propeller push air behind it? To understand this we turn to a
principle that was discovered about 300 years ago, Bernoullis Principle.
Daniel Bernoulli
1700-1782

Bernoulli's Principle: An increase in the velocity of any fluid is always accompanied by a decrease in
pressure.
Since air behaves exactly like a fluid, Bernoullis principle applies. Any time the wind is blowing or a fan
blows air, the pressure of the moving air becomes less than it would be if the air wasn't moving. As an aside,
this characteristic plays a huge role in how weather systems work! If you can cause air to move faster on one
side of a surface than the other, the pressure on that side of the surface will be less than the pressure on its
other side.
One of the most widely used applications of Bernoulli's principle is in the airplane wing. Wings are shaped
so that the top side of the wing is curved while the bottom side is relatively flat. In motion, the front edge of
the wing hits the air, and some of the air moves downward below the wing, while some moves upward over
the top. Since the top of the wing is curved, the air above the wing must move up and down to follow the
curve around the wing, while the air below the wing moves very little. The air moving on the top of the
curved wing must travel farther before it reaches the back of the wing; consequently it must travel faster
than the air moving under the wing, to reach the back edge at the same time. The air pressure on the top of
the wing is therefore less than that on the bottom of the wing, according to Bernoullis principle. The higher
pressure air on the bottom of the wing pushes up on the wing with more force than the lower pressure air
above the wing pushes down. This results in a net force acting upwards called lift. Lift pushes the wings
upwards and keeps the airplane in the air.

Page 14 of 35

Though Bernoulli's principle is a major source of lift in an aircraft wing, a French engineer by the name of
Henri Coanda discovered another effect that plays an even larger role in producing lift.
Henri Coanda
1886 - 1972

Although generally unrecognized, Coanda was actually the first person to build and fly a jet powered
aircraft. It is commonly believed that the first jet engines were developed during World War II. Dr. Hans Von
Ohain designed the first German jet aircraft, which made its first flight on August 27, 1939. Unaware of Dr.
Von Ohain's work, A British engineer named Sir Frank Whittle also independently designed a jet aircraft,
which first flew on May 15, 1941.
Although these two men are generally thought of as the fathers of jet aircraft, Henri Coanda built and "flew"
the first recorded jet aircraft about 30 years earlier. The somewhat amusing first flight is best described in
Coanda's own words:
"It was on 16 December 1910. I had no intention of flying on that day. My plan was to check the operation
of the engine on the ground but the heat of the jet blast coming back at me was greater than I expected and I
was worried in case I set the aeroplane on fire. For this reason I concentrated on adjusting the jet and did
not realize that the aircraft was rapidly gaining speed. Then I looked up and saw the walls of Paris
approaching rapidly. There was no time to stop or turn round and I decided to try and fly instead.
Unfortunately I had no experience of flying and was not used to the controls of the aeroplane. The
aeroplane seemed to make a sudden steep climb and then landed with a bump. First the left wing hit the
ground and then the aircraft crumpled up. I was not strapped in and so was fortunately thrown clear of the
burning machine."
Page 15 of 35

The Coanda- 1910, the world's first jet aircraft

Unfortunately Coanda couldnt obtain funding to continue his research after the wreck, and so his
contribution to jet propulsion never became widespread. If he had been able to continue his work, France
could have had a jet-powered air force before WW II began. Even though he didn't build another jet aircraft,
he did make a very important contribution to how the aircraft wings produce lift when he discovered what is
now called the Coanda Effect.
Coanda Effect: A moving stream of fluid in contact with a curved surface will tend to follow the curvature of
the surface rather than continue traveling in a straight line.
To perform a simple demonstration of this effect, grab a spoon and find a sink. Get a small stream of water
coming down from the sink, then place the bottom of the spoon next to the stream. Notice how the water
curves along the surface of the spoon. If you hold the spoon so that it is free to swing, you should be able to
notice that the spoon is actually being pulled towards the stream of water.

The same effect occurs with an airplane wing. If the wing is curved, the airflow will follow the curvature of
the wing. In order to use this to produce lift, we need to understand something called angle of attack. This
gives the angle between the wing and the direction of the air flow, as shown in the following diagram.

Page 16 of 35

The angle of attack indicates how tilted the wing is with respect to the oncoming air. In order to produce lift,
or an upward force acting on the wing, Newton's third law says that there must be an equal force acting in
the opposite direction. If we can exert a force on the air so that it is directed down, the air will exert an
upward force back on the wing. Look at how the Coanda effect directs the airflow for different angles of
attack in the diagrams below.

This diagram shows that increasing the angle of attack increases how much the air is deflected downwards.
If the angle of attack is too great, the air flow will no longer follow the curve of the wing. As shown in the
bottom of the diagram, this creates a small vacuum just behind the wing. As the air rushes in to fill this
space, called cavitation, it causes heavy vibrations on the wing and greatly decreases the efficiency of the
wing. For this reason, aircraft wings are generally angled like the middle wing in the diagram. This wing
efficiently directs the airflow downward, which in turn pushes up on the wing, producing lift.
This method of determining lift is called momentum change. Other methods to calculate the same lift utilize
the difference in pressure fields above and below the wing. Either method is accurate on its own, but never
add the two methods together.
In addition to producing lift on an aircraft, Bernoulli's principle and the Coanda effect play an important role
in the operation of a propeller. Examine a propeller closely and you will find that the blades of the propeller
look like an airfoil, or wing. Essentially, a propeller blade is a wing turned on its side. Just as wings traveling
forward are lifted upward, a rotating propeller blade is sucked or pushed forward. A propeller blade also has
something that wings don't: they are twisted. Watch a propeller turn very slowly, and you will see how the
twist of the blade causes it to move the air evenly and push it backwards. Additionally, the propeller blades
are set at an angle. This is called propeller pitch. The greater the pitch of the propeller, the more air it can
push. Blades of common household fans are also slightly angled to help move air for cooling. Ideally an
equal quantity of air will pass the blade at its root (the hub of the propeller) and its tip, but the tip travels
much faster than the root. To maintain an even flow rate as much as possible, the hub pitch (pitch at the root
Page 17 of 35

of the propeller) has to be very steep while the propeller tips have to be almost flat! This will help insure an
even flow of air through the duct.
http://www.sailtheory.com/sail.html

How a sail (and wing) works

A wing deflects air down. As the air is pushed down, the wing is pushed up.
The force that pushes the air down is the same force that pushes the wing up.
Compare to: When you are standing on the floor there is a force supporting you, and a force
pushing the floor down.
This is the same force.
Now the question remains, why the air is deflected.
At the lower side of the wing (=windward side of a sail) the air is deflected in a very simple
way: Going straight is not possible because the wing is blocking this option.
The leeward of the sail (=upper part of a wing) is also changing the direction of the air
passing it.
This is due too the Coanda effect: Air tends to follow a curved surface as long as the curvature
is not too much.
Something as sketched down here is happening.

A wing is deflecting air with the bottom as well as the top of the wing.
Page 18 of 35

The air being deflected at the lower side of the wing is for most people easy to understand.
The air being also deflected by the upper side of the wing, by the Coanda effect, is harder to
understand.
Later I continue about the Coanda effect, first something about what this theory results in.
One could imagine from the theory above that a flat plate works as well as a curved profile.
Unfortunately this is not completely true.
That is because the air going up the wing (leeward of the sail) has to make a very tight turn
around the sharp leading edge when under an angle.
If this turn is too sharp the air can not follow the upper surface of the wing (the leeward side
of the sail), and will be deflected less.
In aviation flow separation of a wing is called "stall".
Curvature makes this turn less sharp.

Beside the sharpness of the turn also the amount of not moving air at leeward matters.
If the wing (or sail) has a rough surface it tends to slow down the air by friction, resulting in
not moving air staying at leeward.
This explains why sail are never rough like a carpet.

Again, a sail works by deflecting the air.

This deflection results in a force -The sailforce- working perpendicular to the sail.

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That this force is perpendicular to the sail is important to understand and apply couple and
forces
Now in more detail the Coanda effect:

In the right picture one can see the start situation.

From the dotted area the air is being "washed" away by the friction of tf the fastmoving air.
This is viscosity.
De dotted air is disappearing. This would imply that there would be no air at all and that there
would be a very low pressure.
The air from the fast-moving air is thus being sucked to this area, and thereby deflects the air.
So why does the flow separate from the curved surface sometimes?
That is due to the friction between air and the surface.
This friction slows down the air, and "refills" the dotted area with not moving air.
This area then sucks less and if the fast-moving air is then deflected too much it can not be
sucked completely to the surface.
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The air close the surface that has been slowed down is called boundary layer.
This boundary layer grows when moving to the trailing edge.
This implies that there can be more curvature in the front(=luff) of the wing as there can be at
the aft part of the wing(=leech).
A flow follows a curve because friction between air (=viscosity) and separates if there is too
much friction between the air and the surface.
Some simple experiments to show this can be found here
Using this theory.
When one wants as much force as possible directed forward one has to deflect as much as
possible air aft.
If one can achieve something as down here one is doing it right.

Often confused with this too much deflecting to the windward side:

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Also one has to watch out for stall.

In above stalling sail the air has to make a tight turn at the leading edge.
This can be too much. If one can give a little bit more curve in the forward part, the air moves
around smoother, and will not easy separate.

Off course one also has to take care to sheet in the sail enough, else the forward part will not
do anything.

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When having less curvature one needs to pull in the sheet less to have the luff doing
anything.
A flat sail can be used to improve pointing, but is gives less force.

above: when one would go more to the wind the luff would start flapping. If then one sheets in
the sail more it would be deflecting air to the windward side.
Until now we only discussed curvature in length direction, but a sail often also has curvature
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in height direction: Twist.

The upper part of the sail is more pointing outward then close to the bottom.

A little twist is good, since the higher one gets the harder the wind gets, and thus the
apparent wind changes more to abeam.
Een beetje twist is gunstig, aangezien hoe hoger je komt hoe harder de wind, en dus hoe
ruimer de wind inkomt.
Interesting is that with some heeling and twist one can make the sail more flat, from the
winds point of view.
The blue line represents the path the air is going along the sail.

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In the right picture the air is only deflected a little.

without twist the path of air is not much changed:

Because one can sail more upwind with a flat sail one can see that with some twist and
heeling one can sail more up wind.
Unfortunately this will reduce the sailforce.
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Nice theory, but how can you see how and if the flow is following your sail?
I recommend telltales and gentry tales, more about them in tuning
but before you start there I recommend to first read couples and Forces
The theory of deflecting as much wind as possible aft has an error.
When one is sailing close to the wind and the trailing edge of the sail is directed aft one is
doing it right.
However, this does not mean when one is sailing before the wind one should have the sail
sheeted in almost completely.
In that case the sail is not working as a wing but as a parachute, slowing as much air as
possible.
The air moves faster on the leeward side.
This is only for the real theory cracks, Probably you can better continue with reading couples
and forces
As explained above deflecting the wind results in the sailforce.
This force is given to the sail by pressures, A lower pressure at the leeward side and a higher
pressure at the windward side.
Air has the tendency to be sucked to the lower pressure area from the higher pressure area.
The air in front of the sail is also sucked to the lower pressure area on the leeward side.
This means that there will be more air flowing on the leeward side as on the windward side.
This results in that deflection on the leeward side is more important as on the windward side,
because there is more air to deflect.

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The ropes in the sail show that the speed is much

higher on the leeward side.
Some people say that the air is speeding up because of the Bernoulli effect. They say the
lower pressure is created by the higher speed.
They are right, but it does not help understanding the flow around a sail to my opinion.
Also the Law of Bernoulli is applied wrong because it is not a very simple law.
My advice is not to use Bernoulli law to explain sailing.
For people who want to know more about Bernoullis law please click here.

Tipvortexes.
(Also only for the real theory cracks)
Beside the air "leaking" from the higher windward pressure around the mast to the leeward
part as explained above air is also leaking around the lower side of the sail.
This leaking is a deflection to the wrong side and is not helping.

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The force that results from this deflection is in the wrong direction. It results in less driving
force and more sideway force.
See the picture below (I should have drawn only the red force, or only the orange force, and
not all together)

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(For airplanes the increase in sideway force is called "induced drag", and the loss in driving
force "loss of lift")
To reduce this leaking one needs to have a sail with only a small area where this leaking
occurs, so a real high sail with a short length. In general such a sail is called a "high Aspect
sail"
This leaking of air can be easily detected by holding a windex just below your sail. It will point
to the higher pressure level -the windward side- much more as the windex on top of your
mast.
This leaking also explains the needed twist:
If one would hold a very small sail just below the sail it should be sheeted in much less as the
mainsail, because it is in the "leaking" air.
same goes for the upper end of your sail, what is actually being
much smaller because the sail is tapered.
Sometimes this is called "taper induced twist"
The leaking air in front of the sail explains why the jib is sheeted in
less as the main.
The jib is in the leaking air of the mainsail.
Of course the main is also in the pre-deflected air of the jib,
making it also necessary to sheet in the main more as the jib.

http://f1-dictionary.110mb.com/coanda_effect.html

To perform a simple demonstration of this effect, grab a spoon

and find a sink. You can easily demonstrate the Coanda effect
for yourself. Conveniently, these are often found together in the
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kitchen, no need for highly technical lab. Get a small stream of water coming down from
the sink, and then place the bottom of the spoon next to the stream. Dangle the spoon
next to the stream coming from the tap. I say dangle because you want to hold it loosely
enough so it can swing back and forth a bit. It helps to attach a piece of tape at the
handle end to act as a hinge. Move the spoon up to the edge of the stream so it barely
touches. When you do the water will flow around the bowl of the spoon and off the
bottom deflected to the side and the spoon will move into the stream. Spoon is actually
being pulled towards the stream of water. Gases behave pretty much like liquids, so when
you see the water behaving strangely with the spoon, that's what the air does with the
curved paper. Just as water flowing around the spoon's curved surface draws it into the
stream, air blown over the curved paper is what causes the lift in that common paper lift
demonstration.
What is unusual about the Coanda effect is the fact that the fluid or gas flow is pulled so
strongly by a curved surface. With a tap, the water will be projected out at a remarkable
distance. The degree to which the water and the curved surface remain attached goes
beyond the expected. A concave curve will naturally push the flow, but the fact that a
convex one would react so strongly to fluid or gas is unusual.

Same situation apply to the wing. Since air behaves exactly like any fluid, Bernoullis
principle applies. Any time the wind is blowing or a fan blows air, the pressure of the
moving air becomes less than it would be if the air wasn't moving. As an aside, this
characteristic plays a huge role in how weather systems work! If you can cause air to
move faster on one side of a surface than the other, the pressure on that side of the
surface will be less than the pressure on its other side.

One of the most widely used applications of Bernoulli's principle is in the airplane wing.
Wings are shaped so that the top side of the wing is curved while the bottom side is
relatively flat. In motion, the front edge of the wing hits the air, and some of the air
moves downward below the wing, while some moves upward over the top. Since the top
of the wing is curved, the air above the wing must move up and down to follow the curve
around the wing and stay attached to it (Coanda effect), while the air below the wing
moves very little. The air moving on the top of the curved wing must travel farther before
it reaches the back of the wing; consequently it must travel faster than the air moving
under the wing, to reach the back edge at the same time. The air pressure on the top of
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the wing is therefore less than that on the bottom of the wing, according to Bernoullis
principle. The higher pressure air on the bottom of the wing pushes up on the wing with
more force than the lower pressure air above the wing pushes down. This result in a net
force acting upwards called lift. Lift pushes the wings upwards and keeps the airplane in
the air.
Though Bernoulli's principle is a major source of lift in an aircraft wing, Coanda effect
plays an even larger role in producing lift.
If the wing is curved, the airflow will follow the curvature of the wing. In order to use this
to produce lift, we need to understand something called angle of attack. This gives the
angle between the wing and the direction of the air flow, as shown in the following
picture.
The angle of attack indicates how tilted the wing is with respect to the oncoming air. In
order to produce lift, or downforce acting on the wing, Newton's third law says that there
must be equal force acting in the opposite direction. If we can exert a force on the air so
that it is directed down, the air will exert an upward force back on the wing. Look at how
the Coanda effect directs the airflow for different angles of attack in the diagrams below.
This diagram shows that increasing the angle of attack increases how much the air is
deflected downwards. If the angle of attack is too high, the air flow will no longer follow
the curve of the wing (Coanda effect is loosing the power). As shown in the bottom of the
diagram, this creates a small vacuum just behind the wing. We can say that wing is
stalled. As the air rushes in to fill this space, called cavitations, it causes heavy vibrations
on the wing and greatly decreases the efficiency of the wing. For this reason, aircraft
wings are generally angled like the middle wing in the diagram. This wing efficiently
directs the airflow downward, which in turn pushes up on the wing, producing lift. If you
turn this wings on upper picture up side down, you get formula 1 or any wing in use in
auto sport. This configuration of
the wing, with longer lower part of
the wing will produce opposite
force, called downforce. But we can
apply same rules.
To get around air stream separation
problem in airplane wing
construction and in Formula 1, and
increase the Coanda effect on
wings, dual or more element or
slot-gap wings are used, these
allow for some of the high pressure
flow from (in Formula 1 case) the
upper surface of the wing to bleed
to the lower surface of the next flap
energizing the flow. This increases
the speed of the flow under the
wing, increasing downforce and
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reducing the boundary flow separation. If you look at a F1 rear wing few years ago on
picture above, you can see this concept taken to the extreme, with multi-element wings
creating huge amounts of downforce and little air stream separation even on the flaps
with extremely high angle of attack.
The Coanda effect has important applications in various high-lift or high downforce
devices on aircraft, or in our area of interest, on the racing car wing, where air moving
over the wing can be "bent" using flaps over the curved surface of the top of the wing.
The bending of the flow results in its acceleration and as a result of Bernoulli's principle
pressure is decreased; aerodynamic lift or
downforce is increased.

Notice how unlikely is to have a wing in

flight with air flow only on one side. The
Coanda effect only works in specific
conditions where an isolated jet of fluid
(or air) flows across a surface, a situation
which is usually man-made. You don't find
it much in nature. Just so you know,
there is no Coanda lift on an airfoil.
Coanda effect helps airstream to stay
attached to the wing surface, but Bernoulli principle and difference in pressures are the
reason why we have a lift or downforce.
Coanda effect is a balancing act between many factors, among them speed of fluids
stream, pressure, molecular attraction, and a centrifugal effect if the surface is curved.
Main trouble of the Coanda effect is the airstream becoming turbulent and detaching from
the surface, that's how a wing stalls. Pull of surrounding air causes turbulence, drag from
the surface and from the ambient air. It's a goal to pull as much as possible ambient air
into the airstream, but the drag caused by the difference in velocity between the
airstream and the surface is just a loss of energy. If the airstream gets turbulent and
stops following the curved surface, there's no more low air pressure, no more thrust.
Since all applications of a Coanda effect involve a fluid object flowing over a solid one, the
science behind this effect is known as fluid dynamics. Fluid dynamics represents and
study the motion of liquids or gases. Studying this science can lead to many
consequential discoveries like the Coanda effect.
Below a CFD simulation of a true Coanda effect saucer:

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Regards,
Jean-Louis
The first Coanda saucer effect used as drone has been built and tested in flight in 1940 by Viktor
Schauberger (1938-1957). The name of this device was "the Repulsin", see an original photo below:

The Repulsin device is an Electro-Aero-Dynamic device (E.A.D.) and uses two effects :
- The Coanda Effect, a pure Aerodynamic effect based on the Bernouilly's principle,
- The ElectroDynamic effect : The high speed vortex in the vortex chamber produces an electric
charges separation effect, called "the diamagnetic effect " by Schauberger.
These two effects combined create the so-called "implosion effect".
When the main electric engine is started, the Coanda effect begins to create a differential
aerodynamic pressure between the outer and the inner surface of the primary hull. At a higher
speed, the vortex chamber becomes a kind of high electrostatic generator due to the air particles in
high speed motion acting as an electrical charges transporter. The "Repulsin" will begin to glow due
to the strong ionization effect of the air. Now, we have all the ingredients for a continuous and
strong Aether Flow along the main axis from the top to the bottom of the craft.....
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