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SOCIETY OF AUTOMOTIVE ENGINEERS, INC.

Two Pennsylvania Plaza, New York, N.Y. 10001

Some Aspects of
STOL Aircraft Aerodynamics
John L. Loth

West Virginia University

Business Aircraft Meeting

Wichita, Kans.

April 3-6, 1973

730328

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Copyright Society of Automotive Engineers, Inc. 1973

All rights reserved.

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730328

Some Aspects of
STOL Aircraft Aerodynamics
John L. Loth

West Virginia University

STOL (SHORT TAKEOFF AND LANDING) refers to a

fixed wing aircraft which has the ability to take off from a
shorter runway than a CTOL (conventional takeoff and
landing) aircraft. The actual takeoff distance required is
proportional to the wing loading, the square of the stall
speed, and inversely proportional to the available thrust.

Any one or all of these parameters can be changed to con

vert a CTOL to a STOL airplane. Most existing STOL light
aircraft decrease the wing loading by increasing the wing
area and use stall delay mechanisms to reduce the stall
speed.

STOL ability reduces the minimum landing speed and the

risk of a serious landing accident, which at 65 mph is four
times less than at 130 mph. However, unless a STOL air
plane can convert to an aerodynamically clean configura
tion, it might have a poorer cruise and climb rate per
formance. The extra weight, complexity, cost, and pilot
skills required do not justify making a STOL airplane out of
every production aircraft. The most impressive performance
is obtained with powered STOL when excess engine power

auxiliary vacuum pump for boundary layer control

through suction.
HIGH-LIFT WING DESIGNS

Most light aircraft cannot afford the additional expense,

weight, and complexity associated with powered STOL, and

they must rely on mechanical means of increasing the wing
area so as to reduce the wing loading and to increase the
wing camber, thereby increasing the obtainable lift coef

ficient with a corresponding reduction of the stall speed.

Note that the lift coefficient, CL, reported is always based

on the wing chord in cruise configuration.

is available so one can use either engine slipstream deflec

tion, jet engine compression bleed for blowing power, or an

ABSTRACT

STOL aircraft obtain their unique performance by incor

porating in their design any one or all of three design aspects:

increase of the powerplant size to minimize the weight-to

thrust ratio, increase of the wing area to reduce the wing
loading, and/or increase of the maximum obtainable lift
coefficient.

A special powered STOL light aircraft wing has been

developed at West Virginia University. This wing combines
several STOL features such as: circulation control through
blowing around a circular trailing edge, boundary layer

control through suction, leading edge modification and

slats, 20% increase in chord length in the STOL mode, blown

and drooped ailerons, and fences for maximum spanwise

lift distribution.

This wing was designed at West Virginia University and is

based on the results of theoretical analysis and wind tunnel

tests of several other configurations. The wing has been

built and is to be test flown in spring 1973 on a light aircraft

called the Technology Demonstrator. The wing design
features and anticipated performance are described.

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From Eq. 1, it can be seen that if one increases the wing area
in transition from cruise to STOL, then this increases the

commercial versions which utilize the propeller slipstream

are the DHC-6 Twin Otter, the BN-2A Islander, and the

achieved in flight by extending the flaps from the trailing

efficiently distributed over the entire wing, such as by using

first term in the equation, and thus CL. This may be

edge or slots from the leading edge, or by telescoping the

wing and folding out nonvertical fences.

In the second term of Eq. 1, the average net pressure coef

ficient -CpavIf should be maximized.

powered STOL is not available, then single engine light

wings
aircraft

are limited to Cpav =-2.5,the which can be ob tained through

application of flaps down, drooped ailerons, drooped leading edges

or slats (Fig. 1). The Robertson STOL

modification is a good example of obtainable performance increase
without the use of powered STOL. The

wing area is increased by extending the flaps. The spanwise

lift distribution is improved by simultaneously using flaps
down and drooped ailerons. The stall angle of
attack is increased by using a fixed thick dro ped leading edge
modification and the addition of stall fences. The result
is a 20% decrease in stall speed, and thus, requires
a 36% decrease in q along with a 56% increase in CL.

This increas in CL reduces the landing and takeoff distance by

approximately 50%, and the low forward velocity increases

the climb angle by about 60%. The high drag associated

with the unpowered STOL mode usually does not
improve the climb rate of the aircraft and may result in

a power-of glide that is uncomfortably ste p. Twin-engine light

aircraft with the engines built in the wings can

utilize the propeller slipstream to generate a powered eSfTOecLt

by locally increasing the average pres sure coefficient

so that the Cpav for the (see entire wing can in crease signif cantly

Short Skyvan Srs 3M. If the propeller slipstream could be

multiple propellers, then the increase in Cpav greater would be

and the STOL performance correspondingly higher. Several

experimental light aircraft have been built using powered

STOL uniformly distributed over the entire span. Very

impressive performance was obtained on the MK-4 built at

the University of Cambridge, England, where boundary layer

control through suction was used over the entire wing

area (Fig. 1). The required suction coefficient CQ =-V

suction average/V8 should be at least 0.004. Steady flight at

a 45 deg angle of attack and 33 knots was performed, which

indicated the stall delay ability of boundary layer control

through suction. The staff at Mis is ip i State University

has designed, constructed, and successful y flown

several light aircraft with boundary layer control (BLC)

through suction with vacuum pump requirements of

less than 20 hp. Extensive

design analysis on suction BLC aircraft was done by

W. Pfen iger (1)*. Although the low power requirement and

good performance appear very attractive, the BLC by suction

is structural y complex and the small suction holes are
clog
to
liable
by dirt, rain, or ice which might nduce unexpected stall. The nextmost
economical form
of powered STOL is to en ergize the boundary layer by
very moderate tangential blowing with total blowing coefficient Cu
< 0.02. (See Katzmayr (2) and Fig. 1.) The
blowing coefficient is usual y
defined per unit span as per unit span as as

Fig. 1). Typical examples are

the experimental Custer Channel Wing CCW-5 where

the propeller inflow is drawn over a semichannel wing surface.
Examples of very successful suc es ful successful successful

The blowing power unit span in the form of kinetic energy is

In level flight the engine

thrust power/unit span is D. V8/span = Cd q c V8 = PT. As

a result, the power ratio is

The most efficient blowing velocity is

*Numbers in parentheses designate References at end of
paper.

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The blowing momentum in the jet remaining after separa

tion from the airfoil will produce a thrust in the direction of

flight. If one ignores the wall friction losses by blowing over

the airfoil surface, then the drag coefficient of the airfoil will

be reduced by Cu relative to the unblown drag value, or

Cdblown= Cdunblown

CL = 6 by using a rounded blunt trailing edge. This is

called circulation control by blowing, which has gained con
siderable interest in recent years. Some of the original
theoretical work was done by Kind (3, 4) at the University
of Cambridge, and this concept has since been investigated
in the United States by Williams (5, 6), Walters (7), Bauer (8),
and Ness et al. (9).

With a sharp trailing edge unstalled airfoil, the rear stagna

tion point and its circulation is controlled by the location of
the flap trailing edge. As the angle of attack is increased or
the flaps are lowered, the rear stagnation point moves down
and the circulation and lift increases.

In a rounded blunt trailing edge airfoil, the rear stagnation

Eq. 5 shows clearly the magnitude of the blowing power

for powered STOL using high values of Cu.

Blowing on a conventional flapped airfoil with blowing
coefficient 0.5 < Cu < 2.0 is most efficient when applied at

the flap hinge to create the blown flap where flap deflec
tions up to 60 deg can be used without stall. The average

wing pressure coefficients generated in this manner can be as

high as CL = 5, but is limited by the Kutta condition lo
cated at the sharp trailing edge of the flap (Fig. 2).
With a much lower range of blowing coefficients, one
can generate an equal high average lift coefficient up to

point is only controlled by the separation of the Coanda

blowing jet over the rounded blunt trailing edge. The stagna
tion point can be moved down by increasing the blowing
rate, thereby increasing the circulation and lift. However,
increasing the angle of attack has little influence on the lo
cation of the separation point and thus the lift. To fly an
airfoil of this type will require almost entirely pneumatic
lift control at nearly constant level attitude, which is good
for pilot visibility.

Special pilot skills are needed as the flareout in landing

cannot be achieved by only increasing the airplane attitude

and thus wing angle of attack, but must involve an increase

in blowing rate. Circulation control is one of the most

efficient means of powered STOL because it can be applied

uniformly over the entire span and has a high lift augmenta
tion ratio and good blowing momentum thrust recovery.
However, in the high-speed cruise mode, it is essential that
one converts in flight from a blunt trailing edge to a sharp
trailing edge for low drag.
For future transport STOL aircraft with multiple turbo

fan engines located in wing nacelles, the simplest high lift

device is the externally blown jet flap. Here the fan and

engine exhaust pass over an extended and deflected flap

system which locally generates a high lift. In order to achieve
more spanwise uniformity in the generation of high lift,
some of the fan air is ducted through the wing and ejected

in the augmenter wing. An extensive experimental study of

its performance has been done by the Boeing Co. for NASA.

The static thrust augmentation was as high as 1.5 and lift

coefficients CL up to 8 were achieved for a blowing coef

ficient Cu = 2.0. The effective range of blowing coefficients

is 0.5 < Cu
<4.0.

The augmenter wing is more efficient than the conventional

blown flap which operates in the same range of blowing
coefficients, but at Cu = 2.0 the lift coefficient, CL, is only
= 5.0 (Fig. 2).
NASA is presently sponsoring the design of a quiet experi

mental augmenter wing-type STOL aircraft with a 110 psf

wing loading, similar to that on a Boeing 737, but landing at

about 75 mph instead of 130 knots required on the 737.
Note the CL of the 737 in landing is 1.57, whereas the new

NASA STOL aircraft will land with CL = 4.7.

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For higher blowing rates in the range 2 < Cu < , one can
avoid the complexity of the blown flap or the augmenter
wing and employ a simple jet flap, where the jet is ejected
at a downward angle from the trailing edge of airfoil. The
blowing thrust requirements are the highest and the lift
augmentation the lowest. However, thrust recovery is good
because there are no wall shear losses for the jet prior to
separation from the airfoil. This technique is probably the
most suitable when the propulsive wing has been developed

Research on circulation control, blunt trailing edge airfoils

was initiated at West Virginia University (WVU) in 1968 under
contract with the Office of Naval Research, Aeronautics Code
461 . Initially, cambered elliptical rotor airfoils with circula
tion control by blowing were investigated.
Several problems were experienced in two-dimensional wind

The linearized theory of jet flap effectiveness has been

developed by Spence (11). To get an insight into the blowing

these tests require large corrections for tunnel wall interfer

ence due to the large wake deflection. With the high lift co

WEST VIRGINIA UNIVERSITY POWERED

STOL AIRCRAFT

to the point where it is efficient.

tunnel tests of the circulation controlled airfoils. Some of

power required as a function of the blowing coefficient, one

efficient generated at midspan, it is difficult to get true two-

can consider that the blowing jet mass flow rate is proportional
to the jet velocity and the blowing coefficient Cu is propor
tional to the square of the jet velocity, while the blowing
power is proportional to the third power of the jet velocity or

to(CM)3/2

The various powered STOL techniques all require different

blowing coefficients for the same obtainable CL. Recall that

doubling Cu requires nearly three times as much blowing

power but will, however, reduce the total wing drag coefficient
by Cu. The corresponding thrust power savings are lower than
the blowing power required, but can only be computed for
given relative magnitudes of Cu,induced,

andCdfuselage.

Cdviscousw

dimensional loading. The nonuniform loading not only

invalidates the wind tunnel balance data, but also creates a
strong shed vortex along each wall which induces a downwash
velocity at the center of the span. In addition, if balance data
are used one has to account for the stiffness of the blowing air
supply hoses attached to the model. Due to the high circula

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5
tion, the stall characteristics are different from conventional

airfoils, and a leading edge separation bubble often occurs

prior to trailing edge separation even at low angles of attack.
From the wind tunnel data, the circulation control concept
appeared so efficient in terms of blowing power required rela
tive to the other high lift wing concepts, that it was decided
to investigate the feasibility of applying it to fixed wing air
craft.

In 1970 the design and construction of a WVU flight test

aircraft called the Technology Demonstrator was initiated. It
was found that the homebuilt BD-4 fuselage could readily be
modified to suit the requirements of the circulation controlled
aircraft and, therefore, served as a convenient starting point
for the construction of the flight test aircraft.

Several sources of blowing power were investigated, such as

stored compressed air, a piston engine driven centrifugal com

pressor, and finally a jet engine with compressor bleed. It was

found that only a jet engine Airesearch GTC 72 could provide

the required 200 hp compressed air to permit a wide range of
test conditions and still be of reasonable weight.
The first STOL wing designed and built at the Department
of Aerospace Engineering of WVU was tested full scale in the
8 X 10 ft NSRDC wind tunnel and is designated WVU Model
A. It was designed such that modification of the basic BD-4
wing could be easily accomplished. The wing uses a conven
tional flap which can be rotated through 166 deg and in this

way disappear into a built-in cavity of the wing (Fig. 3). The

circular trailing edge thus formed is blown from a compressed

air supply duct located above the wing cavity. The leading
edge of the wing also contains a compressed air chamber to
permit blowing to prevent leading edge separation.
The wing's performance was very encouraging, in particular
the pitching moment and lift changes in transition from sharp
to blunt trailing edge, and vice versa. The lift coefficients
based on the cruise configuration chord length did not look
too impressive, mainly because the wing area was decreased by
17% in the STOL configuration (Fig. 4).
Based on the experience gained with WVU Model A, the
next generation STOL airfoil was designed by J. L. Loth, J. B.
Fanucci, and Carmine Verna and was designated WVU Model
B (Fig. 5). This wing has many additional features including
an increase in the wing area by 20% when converting to the
STOL configuration. The wing also has variable camber by
flap action, boundary layer suction at the flap hinge, and
optimum Reynolds number jet blowing on the blunt trailing
edge Coanda surface. It also has an improved leading edge
modification with removable slats, but the leading edge blow
ing was eliminated. In the STOL mode the ailerons can be
drooped up to 20 deg and will be blown over the top surface.
The Model B wing performance in flight will be measured by
pressure taps in the wing and boundary layer rakes. The pres
sures will be measured by a transducer mounted on a scani
valve, and the modulated analog pressure signal will be
recorded on board of the test flight aircraft; the computed
pressure distribution for CL = 4 is shown in Fig. 6.
The first flight tests are scheduled in spring 1973 and will
include the establishment of safe operational procedures in

flight transition from cruise to STOL and during the landing

and takeoff. The first test will also include measurements of

minimum stall speeds, takeoff and landing distances, and

maximum climb and glide angles.
Later flights will test the effectiveness of differential blow
ing for roll rate control, and variable blowing rates for direct
lift control. It is expected that in the future a whole new
family of circulation-controlled high lift airfoils will be de
veloped for testing on the Technology Demonstrator. The
anticipated characteristics of the WVU Technology Demon
strator with WVU Model B wing are shown in Fig. 7 relative to
other powered STOL aircraft.
CONCLUSIONS

Future STOL aircraft will employ many different high lift

wing designs depending on the desired performance, allowable

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6
cost and complexity, and nature of the basic propulsion sys
tem.

For light propeller-driven aircraft, it is unlikely that powered

STOL will prove to be economically justifiable as it is cheaper
and less complex to reduce the wing loading to get the desired
STOL performance. For fast jet engine-driven aircraft, a
powered STOL wing will involve increased cost, complexity,
and weight, which is justifiable only if STOL performance is
essential.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

The research described in the paper is funded by the Depart

ment of Aeronautics, Code 461 , of the Office of Naval Re

search under Contract N00014-68-A-0512.

The wing leading edge of the WVU Model A was designed

by Dr. N. Inamaru, visiting professor of aeronautical engi
neering at West Virginia University, 1970, from N.A.L.,
Tokyo, Japan.
REFERENCES

1.W. Pfenniger, "Design Considerations of Propulsive Sys

tems for Low Drag BLC Airplanes Cruising at High Subsonic

Speeds." Northrup NOR-59-418, July
1959.
2.R. Katzmayr, "Berichte der Aeromechanischen Ver
sugsanstalt." Wien Vol. 1, No. 57 (1928). NACA Technical
Mem. 521, 1929.

This paper is subject to revision. Statements and opinions

advanced in papers or discussion are the author's and are
his responsibility, not the Society's; however, the paper has

3.RJ. Kind and DJ. Maull, "An Experimental Investi

gation of a Low-Speed Circulation Controlled Aerofoil."
Aeronautical Quarterly, Vol. XIX, May 10, 1968, pp. 170-182.
4.R. J. Kind, "A Calculation Method for Circulation Con

trol by Tangential Blowing Around a Bluff Trailing Edge,"

Aeronautical Quarterly, Vol. XIX, August 1968, pp. 205-233.
5.R. M. Williams, "Some Research on Rotor Circulation

Control." Proc. of the Third Cal/AVLABS Symp., Vol. 11,

June 1969.

6.R. M. Williams and H. J. Howe, "Two-Dimensional Sub

sonic Wind Tunnel Tests on a 20% Thick, 5% Cambered Circu
lation Control Airfoil." NSRDC TN AL-176, 1970, AD
877764.

7.R. E. Walters, D. P. Myer, and D. J. Holt, "Circulation

Control by Steady and Pulsed Blowing for a Cambered Ellipti

cal Airfoil." TR 32, Aerospace Engineering, West Virginia
University AD 751045, July 1972.
8.A. B. Bauer, "A New Family of Airfoils Based on the
Jet-Flap Principle." Douglas Rep. MDCJ 5713, September
1972.

9.N. Ness, and J. P. Ambrosiani, "Analysis of a Circula

tion-Controlled Elliptical Airfoil." TR 30, Aerospace Engi
neering, West Virginia University, AD 726434, April 1971.
10. J. V. O'Keefe and G. S. Kelly, "Design Integration and
Noise Studies for Jet STOL Aircraft." Vols. 1-4 D6-40552-1,
2,3,4; NASA CR-11428-3, 4, 5, 6, May 1972.
11. D. A. Spence, "The Lift of a Thin Jet Flapped Wing."

Proc. Roy. Soc, A 238 (1956), pp. 46-68.

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