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*The REALL News*

"It's a very dangerous thing to believe in nonsense." -- James Randi


Volume 3 Issue 6 June 1995

In This Issue

Features Departments

 

The Sociocultural Genesis of the Flying Saucer
(Swedenborg Hybrid Ornithopter of 1714)

by Wesley R. Smith, Ph.D.

Among the most badly handled, most interesting, most distorted, and most eclectic of aerospace history subjects is the origin of the use of the circular, elliptical and annular wing planforms (shapes) in aircraft design.

A quick review of the writer's memory and library reveal that more than 50 aircraft have been designed, and/or built, using an ellipse or circle as a wing configuration. However, this listing is by no means a complete survey, only a brief overview of what can be located at hand. In fact, there is an entire U.S. Patent subclass (Class 244, Aeronautics; Subclass 21.2 Airplane, circular) dealing with aircraft using a circular wing planform. Likewise, a number of lighter-than-air or hybrid designs have appeared in the course of aeronautical history which also use the disc shape as a basis for the gas envelope. MoreMore

 

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