The ring wing or annular airfoil is an aircraft design which has been experimented with throughout the history of aviation with some interesting variations. It has served as the inspiration for several paper airplane designs, model airplanes of course, and a variety of children's toys. The capabilities imagined by the French coléoptère engineers of the 1950's and 1960's and the U.S. "flying tank" designers are available today at least in the form of unmanned vehicles (large PDF brochure, 6 minute video download, 1½ minute YT news clip). The technology has also been adapted to become the surfboard tunnel fin and there are underwater UAVs as well.
posted by XMLicious on Aug 28, 2009 - 14 comments

Building and flying free flight model airplanes is a pastime so obscure it doesn't even register on the geek heirarchy. But in the period between Lindberg's flight across the Atlantic until the start of the Second World War, thousands of boys (and some girls) around the world succumbed to the allure of rubber, lube, and dope. [more inside]
posted by gamera on Aug 6, 2009 - 13 comments

Airline Branding Weblog. Can you say "Awesome"?
posted by riffola on Oct 19, 2007 - 24 comments

Fantasy Planes. Sometimes I think the most interesting airplanes are the ones that never got built
posted by growabrain on Feb 10, 2005 - 7 comments

51 Migs Found Buried in Iraq
posted by Espoo2 on Aug 9, 2003 - 50 comments

A pole in the ground + an old Plane on top of it = home sweet home. A company in Tennesee is selling old airplanes as homes on ebay. I wonder if the new homeowners ever get tired of eating those little packets of peanuts every night.
posted by mathowie on Jul 19, 2003 - 14 comments

The F-22 Raptor is the next generation fighter for the United States. At nearly 97 million each, it will be deployed in 2004.This site gives a remarkably detailed report regarding its design and function. Including such gems as "first-look, first-shot, first-kill capability" and " Humans are good differentiators, but they are poor integrators."
posted by JohnR on Dec 19, 2002 - 53 comments

All coach seats are not created equal Every inch counts. Airplane coach seats with extra inches of stretching room. Print out and keep handy for when you fly.
posted by Voyageman on Apr 29, 2002 - 29 comments

The sky is falling, the sky is falling! -- never mind, it's just cremated human remains.
posted by nathan_teske on Jan 15, 2002 - 6 comments

New type of RC plane going for around $100 They're electric as opposed to gas powered, lighter than their gas powered cousins, and a fraction of the cost. I've always wanted to get into RC planes, but the cost was prohibitive until now.
posted by skallas on Dec 21, 2001 - 11 comments

Flight Data Recorder found for United Airlines flight 93 in Pennsylvania. They've also found the signal for at least one of the data recorders on the Pentagon flight, as well. Assuming it's still readable, the flight recorder for UA 93 could give new insight into why the plane went down, and why they're now finding debris 6 miles from the crash site. (The information for flight 93 came from CNN broadcast, but hasn't made it online yet.)
posted by elfgirl on Sep 13, 2001 - 13 comments

Canada: Spillover Nation Essentially every airport in Canada able to land a jumbo jet has done so. Halifax is packed to the walls with 44 planes; 24 at Pearson; 14 at Mirabel; two in Whitehorse, one of them, a KAL cargo plane, undergoing an escorted quasi-emergency landing because the pilot could not communicate in English with the control tower (!) to explain that the plane was low on fuel. Serious echoes of Swissair 111, where suddenly the small Atlantic airports showed themselves as invaluable and irreplaceable.
posted by joeclark on Sep 11, 2001 - 4 comments

Those darn airmen in their flying contraptions... Interested in hearing other's opinions on this. If I have an airplane should I be able to fly wherever I want to, or should property owners be able to erect an invisible fence 40,000 feet high around their property to keep airplane owners away? Also, if I can keep people with noisy airplanes from flying close to my house, can I also outlaw people with noisy motorcyles from riding on country roads near my home?
posted by fluxcreative on Jul 9, 2001 - 28 comments

Russian Concordski (Concord) for sale on the Internet
posted by stbalbach on Jul 5, 2001 - 7 comments