Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[Tack]

I mean, if the wheels were spinning faster than usual, the treadmill would spin faster than usual, and because the wheels are free-rotating they wouldn't exactly care. Either you have to ditch physics or prepare for some kind of calamity.
But yeah, my knee-jerk reaction seems to have been the wrong one. This goes a little deeper.

[wierd]

The moving runway is just enforced added drag. It assures that as long as the wheels are touching the runway, the aircraft cannot move forward relative to the runway.

However, the craft does not care about the runway. 99% of the vehicle's operation is performed with the landing gear up, at several thousand feet above the ground.

The mechanism that permits the vehicle to move forward and stay aloft is the pressure differential between the air above and below the wing, caused by the curvature of the wing, in relation to the effective difference between the vehicle's forward velocity, or the inverse velocity of the air.

An aircraft that is magically prevented from accelerating due to a magic conveyor is still primarily exerting thrust against THE AIR, not the runway. The air is not restricted by the runway, and will get forced behind the craft. This creates a pattern of airflow that is congruent with lifting the aircraft.  Once the aircraft is lifted, it stops being in contact with the runway, and then it begins to accelerate.

[Tack]

I think the idea is that the plane is being pulled back by a conveyor moving at such a pace that it stops the plane via the friction coefficient of the bearings in the wheels...
Or something. I’m Really not a mathematician.

[milo christiansen]

Read the article. The treadmill does not matter at all, the plane will take off wheels or no wheels, after all float planes and ski planes can take off just fine, and they don't have wheels.

Basically, what will happen is the thrust will push the plan forward, turning the wheels. The wheels will spin, which will in turn cause the treadmill to turn. This has a very slight effect on the plane (greater friction, but not much since the wheels are unpowered and turn freely), but not enough to significantly slow takeoff.

(Somewhat ironically, a float or ski plane will have a lot more trouble in this scenario due to massively more friction, but assuming the engines are powerful enough the plane can probably still take off.)

[IcyTea31]

Yeah, I think we've confirmed what Munroe posits is the real problem of the question: everyone has a different idea of how the treadmill works and reacts to the plane. Before that is defined, there can really be no agreement on what will happen.

[Egan_BW]

Let us all agree that the treadmill spins infinitely quickly and hurls the plane backward through a tower.

[milo christiansen]

Yeah, I think we've confirmed what Munroe posits is the real problem of the question

True enough, even I (who should know better) had a moment of weakness...

[bloop_bleep]

Let us all agree that the treadmill spins infinitely quickly and hurls the plane backward through a tower.

The treadmill did 9/11, spread the truth

[Egan_BW]

My instinct was to write "the wtc" there, but I felt that was a little on the nose so settled on "a tower". :V

[wierd]

No, it couldnt have been because jetfuel cant melt steel girders. ;P

[Egan_BW]

Kinetic energy can shatter em good, tho

[Hanslanda]

Spoiler: Unrelated (click to show/hide)

I once, when I was very young, had my palm read by this girl I liked. Her name was Aerika. It was not cold reading or any of the 'psychic' tricks. She had a palm reading book from the school library. We were too young and I was too quiet for any of that.

She said I wasn't artistic nor would I ever be. She said I was chaotic and ever changing. I was dark a lot but not malicious. She said I was always falling in love with someone new or something new and I got bored fast. I craved stability yet I actively avoid it.

Looking back, I think that is the only time someone has ever seen me clearly. I prevaricate and distract and dissemble. I hide in an illusory construct made for the benefit of others. And a ten year old girl with a book full of bullshit is the only one who ever saw through it.

[SOLDIER First]

That is a way to spell that name I have never once seen in my life.

[TD1]

Me neither. Still, fits her future career role as crazy-palm-reader-who-owns-a-lot-of-black-cats.

Aerica's Arcane Solutions: Astrology, Psychic Readings and Palmistry.

[wierd]

Me neither. Still, fits her future career role as crazy-palm-reader-who-owns-a-lot-of-black-cats.

Aerica's Arcane Solutions: Astrology, Psychic Readings and Palmistry.

(Subtext)
Please wash hands before entering.