THEORETICAL ANALYSIS OF A LOOP TYPE FLEXIBLE SKIRT AIR CUSHION

A theory is proposed for the loop or bag type flexible skirted air cushion or air bearing. It is shown that the nozzle formed by the skirt in the region where the air escapes from the cushion plays an essential role in the skirt action. Consequently earlier attempts to model the skirt by ignoring this region, on the ground that it is usually small, are incomplete. Some numerical results are obtained for the case where the skirt behaves as a membrane and the flow in the nozzle can be considered inviscid and one-dimensional. The stiffness curves are compared with the corresponding curves for a simple rigid walled plenum chamber fed from the same source. These show that the skirt can be relatively stiff in heave, but also that if very low mass flow rates are practical it will be much less stiff than the simple plenum chamber. It is suggested that viscous flow effects are very important, and that an alternative simplification, namely that the flow can be treated as inertialess, may not be valid.

• Corporate Authors:

  University of Toronto

  Institute for Aerospace Studies, 4925 Dufferin Road
  Toronto, Ontario  Canada  M5S 1A1
• Authors:
  • Sullivan, P A
  • Parravano, G J
• Publication Date: 1977-6

Media Info

• Features: References;
• Pagination: p. 1-12
• Serial:
  • Issue Number: 204

Subject/Index Terms

• TRT Terms: Air cushion vehicles; Mathematical models; Viscous flow
• Old TRIS Terms: Skirt configurations
• Subject Areas: Marine Transportation; Vehicles and Equipment;

Filing Info

• Accession Number: 00177254
• Record Type: Publication
• Source Agency: Engineering Index
• Files: TRIS
• Created Date: Jul 19 1978 12:00AM