Page:Aerial Flight - Volume 1 - Aerodynamics - Frederick Lanchester - 1906.djvu/50

§ 23 of the stratum of fluid infected by skin friction increases with the distance from the "cut-water"; that is to say, the factor on which the curvature of the surface probably depends is relatively more important on the buttock than on the shoulder. Hence we may expect that the lines of entrance can with impunity be made less fine than the lines of the run.

Again, all forces due to the inertia of the fluid vary as the



square of the velocity; those due to viscosity vary in the direct ratio of the velocity (§ 31). Therefore for different velocities the influence of viscosity predominates for low velocities, and that of inertia when the velocity is high. Consequently the form suited to high velocity will be that appropriate to low viscosity, and vice versa; that is to say, the higher the velocity the finer will be the lines required.