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View submission: Ask Anything Wednesday - Engineering, Mathematics, Computer Science
Thank you for the opportunity for me to ask this.
I'm a helicopter instructor pilot and I was recently researching the math and physics behind aircraft performance, specifically related to maximum range and maximum endurance airspeeds.
I came across this online textbook which explains the concepts very well, but only for airplanes.
I have only a little experience in airplanes, so I am finding some of this a little confusing. Specifically, the author notes that the calculations are different for jet airplanes and propellor airplanes. For jet airplanes, the calculations involve *thrust*, and for propellor airplanes, the calculations involve *power*.
Now, for helicopters, I have always read that the math is similar to what this book says about jets. That is, max endurance is the bottom of the curve, where total drag is lowest. Max range is where the ratio of drag to speed is lowest, which is on the tangent line drawn from the origin of the chart.
However, I do not intuitively understand what is different between thrust and power, why the calculations are different, and why helicopter performance charts match the thrust version versus the power version.
I did find this stackexchange post[1] which seems to answer my question, but it's a bit over my head. I'm not the brightest math student, so any further insight would be much appreciated.
1: https://aviation.stackexchange.com/questions/81809/how-do-power-and-thrust-curves-compare
There's nothing here!