Induced Drag Reduction with the WINGGRID Device

Summary

The WINGGRID is a nonplanar, multiple wake producing wingtip, which allows span loading control independent from wake interaction. Experimental verification and new design proposals of wing systems at subsonic speed are reported.

Recent theoretical and experimental work has cleared the way to understand more radical reductions of induced drag than possible with wing systems describable by the Munk stagger theorem, cf. [1]. These are wingtip configurations, that allow for span load control independent from wake interaction of the lifting wing system. Experiments and theoretical insights are treated in parallel to other configurations belonging to the same class of devices, i.e. the split-wing [2] and the SPIROID [8].