STOL C-5 Galaxy, NASA Wind Tunnel Model

[Sentinel Chicken]

A friend of mine found this and was curious as to what the story was with this wind tunnel test model. It appears to be a C-5 with some sort of STOL modifications, perhaps? Is is a C-5 concept, derivative, or test program that used old C-5 tunnel models?

 

[elmayerle]

Looks like it's at least an experimental investigation of improving the C-5's stol performance. The overall flap set-up reminds me of what the c-17 has.

 

[Pioneer]

Know this would make for a more effective improvement to the Galaxy capability`s!

Regards
Pioneer

 

[elmayerle]

But on the downside, it would mean another re-winging of the C-5 (the C-5As having already had one due to durability concerns when it was determined that the original wing design was life limited).

 

[Wahubna]

What really gets my attention is the device on the leading edge of the horizontal...looks like an upside down slat in the extended position.

 

[Stargazer]

We've had the STOL C-5 model in another topic a couple of years ago I think. If I'm not mistaken, the consensus was that it was not a real Galaxy project. NASA was using that Galaxy model as a generic base design to evaluate different configurations.

 

[Sundog]

What really gets my attention is the device on the leading edge of the horizontal...looks like an upside down slat in the extended position.

That's exactly what it is. If the wing creates a lot of lift, it also creates a a lot of pitching moment, in this case pitching the nose down. Therefore, the horizontal tail has to create a lot more down force to counteract it. Also, since the aircraft is naturally stable the horizontal tail is just a small upside down wing (Basic static stability). So you will see the similar features to what you see on a wing when you need to increase it's effectiveness without greatly increasing the size of the entire horizontal tail itself.

 

[Steve Pace]

thus - shorter roll-out upon landing. BIG bird lands on short runway. -SP