Introduction to Aircraft Performance and Static Stability by Earll Murman 2026-11-05
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Author's MIT 16.885J/ESD.35J lecture, hosted in the Fall 2004 course. First slide explicitly credits Prof. Earll Murman and 18 September 2003; the course-host year is distinct. PDF page 9, Basic Sweep Concept, defines the edge-normal Mach component and distinguishes subsonic and supersonic leading edges; the accompanying Mach-angle geometry uses a differently drawn angle from the leading-edge sweep convention in this wiki. Article examples explicitly use leading-edge sweep measured from the spanwise direction.
Additional locators: PDF pp. 14–15, Horizontal Turn and Pull Up/Pull Over/Vertical, give the lift-to-weight load factor and distinct force balances for horizontal and vertical curved flight. The vertical pull-up example in Aerodynamic load factor is an original calculation, not lecture performance data.
Additional exact locators: PDF pp. 21–24, Specific Energy and Excess Power, Excess Power and Summary of Power Characteristics. They define energy height as potential-plus-kinetic energy divided by gravitational weight and relate its time derivative to specific excess power; the article uses an original SI-unit numerical example.
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