Take-Off and Landing Performances of a GETOL Airplane

Several problems on the take-off and landing performances of a GETOL (Ground Effect TakeOff and Landing) airplane are pointed out and studied in this report.This GETOL airplane has a configuration equipped with an air cushion landing gear in place of a conventional one, and the wind tunnel experiments are carried out for a model of this configuration.After some calculations, principal results are obtained as follows:1) Take-off and landing distances of a hypothetical GETOL airplane are estimated and compared with those of a conventional airplane, and it is shown that in some cases the GETOL airplane has STOL characteristics.2) The energy absorption capability of the air cushion landing gear at the touch-down condition in landing flight is evaluated from a simple analysis, and it is indicated that the hypothetical GETOL airplane has the sufficient capacity as well as the conventional landing gears.