MYTH BUSTERS IS GOING TO SEE IF A PLANE TAKES OF FROM A TREADMILL

First off, I think the plane would take off.

That being said (and I'm trying to think logically and I know I'm obviously missing something) if the plane is sitting on a big giant treadmill and then the treadmill is turned on, wouldn't the plane be pushed backwards due to items at rest tend to stay at rest (inertia laws)? In order to counteract the action of the conveyer belt, thanks to friction on the plane's wheels, the plane's wheels would have to somehow move counter to the conveyor belt. Since there is no engine driving the wheels, the plane would have to rely on thrust to counteract the force of friction on the wheels in order to stop moving backwards. It is possible to create just enough thrust to provide enough counterforce to keep the plane "stationary" in relationship to where it was at rest when the conveyor belt started. At what point does the thrust exceed the ability of the magical conveyor belt. If thrust is all that is necessary, then how come the brakes on the plane are all that is necessary to keep the plane stationary while producing enough blowback to flip cars over?

Just some questions I am having trouble with...

geeeeeeze wrote:

4 X 58,000lb of thrust, I say it can push its own weight off the ground. Thats a total of 232,000lb of thrust. The weight of a Boeing 737 is 90,710lb, that gives and additional thrust of 141,290lb! The plane easily takes off.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cJ5ZGV3Vxo8&NR=1

Personally I believe this to be the correct awnser. The thrust shown in the video is just sick. If the force of the engines can rip up the tarmack after just 30 seconds, then I'm sure the plane could get off the ground.

someone needs to kill this stupid thread, and I think Mr Norris is our only hope....

And, yes, the plane will take off (unless Chuck tears it apart with his teeth)

Poke Salad Annie wrote:

The treadmill you tube video proves nothing, and I bet the mythbusters get it wrond as well. The you tube example and the mythbusters will not have the "magical" conveyor belt that can dynamically (and instantly) adjust to the changing wheel speed of the plane.

It does not matter how fast your 'magical' conveyor belt spins, the 'magical' wheels would continue to speed up. but yes, if you had a 'magical' belt and could not get some 'magic' wheels. The speed and friction would blow the tires. But if you want to go ahead and throw in some magic then the plane will still fly. Think of it this way, while the wheels are attached to the plane, they are only holding it off the ground, the planes movement has nothing to do with it.

^o^

Blaze

geeeeze wrote:

breaks on.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QHau5ySUT4M

So if the wheels have nothing to do with the plane taking off, how was the plane able to stay in one place when it blew the cars over?

How can your car be running and you don't move forward. Just because the engines on and the plane isn't moving doesn't mean anything. And what I said above only goes for when the plane is set to move, that way, the wheels are in neutral. otherwise they wouldn't be able to land now would they. I didn't think I needed to explain that part......

^o^

Blaze

The brakes were applied. Tire rubber can provide an enormous amount of friction, as needed in braking and turning on the road or runway. In the case of takeoff, you just take the brakes off and the wheels are free to spin. Think about turning a sharp corner in a car. The wheels are simultaneously allowing the car to roll forward and still applying lateral friction to keep it in a curved path, all (hopefully) without ever slipping on the road surface. Apply the brakes and the plane isn't going anywhere.

Assuming the wheels are free to roll, the inertia of the plane would tend to make the plane stay right where it is if you were to turn the treadmill on underneath the idle plane. In other words, if you had perfectly frictionless and massless wheels, and you turned the treadmill on, the plane would go nowhere. In reality, the rolling friction of the wheels would cause the plane to start to drift backwards. The engines would have to provide very little thrust to counter this backwards drift (think of pushing a car on a flat road, it doesn't take a huge amount of force to get the wheels rolling). Throttle them way up and the plane will still roll forward.

BUMPZILLA!

so here's the real question, will this make the week of letsrun?

I say it should, whichever way it turns out

The plane took off bitch.

They used an actual sized airplane and a giant conveyor belt. It was awesome.

Total BS. The belt did NOT match the speed of the airplane. The fact that it was a prop plane is also I huge factor as the prop produced wind to the wings where as if the plane had been a turbine jet with engines underneath the wings it wouldn't have done anything.

Quit being such a damn pessimist

Quit being such a damn pessimist

dont you see, the prop, jet, rocket, whatever pushes on the air around the plane. because the plane has wheels, the conveyor belt will not push the plane backwards, just make the wheels spin.

I'm still calling BS. The "conveyor belt" wasn't even a conveyor, it was a tarp. I won't believe it until a 787 dreamliner gets put on a treadmill.

Yeah, this was actually pretty sad. It was apparent that the plane was actually moving forward- you could see it pass by the cones- which means that the forward speed was in excess of the backward speed. And it was not a real converyo rbelt, so it was alos getting some friction from the ground under the tarp. Myth was neither busted nor confirmed.

The answer is in "Bernoulli's Principle"...no, the plane will not take off. If it did, why would all of the airports waste runway space.