Aircraft 

Winglets
Many of us who fly regularly have most probably seen a so-called winglet or wingtip
device at the end of the wing of an airliner at least once. It is showing up more and
more often on more and more types of aircraft, thus we felt it’s time to give an overview
to our readers about these sometimes funny, sometimes cool and stylish looking aircraft
parts.

History, Reason and Benefits

The initial theoretical concept goes back to times before even the Wright Brothers first
took to the skies in 1905, but it was picked up and developed by Richard T. Whitcomb of
NASA after the 1973 oil crisis – in order to reduce fuel consumption. The first tests were
carried out in 1979/80 in cooperation with the U.S. Air Force. At almost the same time,
but independent of any U.S. military organization, a private jet producer, LearJet
exhibited a prototype in 1977: the LearJet 28 that featured the first winglets on a jet and a
production aircraft. Flight tests made with and without winglets showed that the winglets
increased range by about 6.5 percent and also improved directional stability for the
LearJet- these two factors are the major reasons behind using this facility at any fixed
wing aircraft ever since.
A winglet is a (near) vertical extension of the wing tips. The upward angle of the winglet,
its inward angle as well as its size and shape are critical for correct performance – this is
why they can look quite different. Air rotating around the wing strikes the surface of the
winglet that directs it in another direction – thus creating an extra force, basically
converting otherwise wasted energy to thrust. This is a small contribution but can save a
lot for an operator in an aircraft’s lifetime. Another potential benefit of winglets is that
they reduce the strength of wingtip vortices, which trail behind the plane. When
other aircraft pass through these vortices, the turbulent air can cause loss of control,
possibly resulting in an accident.

Winglet Types

In general any wingtips that not end the wing simply horizontally are considered as some
kind of a winglet. Even though in strictly technical terms Wingtip Fences are not real
extensions of the wing, and Raked Wingtips do not have a vertical part, they are still
widely considered as winglet variants.

WINGTIP FENCES are a special variant of winglets, that extend both upward and
downward from the tip of the wing. Preferred by European plane-maker Airbus, it is
featured on their full product range (except the A330/340 family and the future A350).
The Airbus A300 was actually the first jet airliner to feature this kind of solution by
default, but it was a very small version of the tool. Provided that most of the Airbus
planes (including all A320 family jets) feature such wingtip fences, this may be the most
seen and most produced winglet type. Even the new Airbus A380 double-decker features
wingtip fences.

Airbus Winglets as seen from the outside

Airbus Winglets as seen from onboard

BLENDED WINGLETS (the real “Winglets”) are the most popular winglet type,
leveraged by Airbus, Boeing, Embraer, Bombardier but also by Russian Tupolev and
Iljushin. Blended winglets were first introduced on the McDonnel Douglas MD-11
aircraft in 1990 with launch customer Finnair (it also features a smaller winglet at the
bottom side of the wing). In contrast to Airbus who applies the wingtip fences by default
on most of their aircraft (and the winglets on the A330/340 family),

blended winglets are considered by Boeing for example as an optional extra feature on
their products, except for the Boeing 747-400. For some of the older Boeing jets (737 and
757) such blended winglets have been offered as an aftermarket retrofit, these are the
newer, tall designs and do not connect to the tip of the wing with a sharp angle, but with a
curve instead. These winglets are popular among airlines that fly these aircraft on
medium/long haul routes as most of the real fuel savings materialize while cruising.
Longer flights mean longer cruising, thus larger fuel savings. And they also server as
marketing surface for airline logos or web addresses usually.
Just recently the Boeing 767-300ER has received 3.4 m high (!) winglets produced by
Aviation Partners Inc. with American Airlines as the launch-customer with Air New
Zealand and Hawaiian Airlines following with orders of 5 and 8 aircrafts respectively.
141 shipsets have been pre-sold already as the forecasted fuel savings range around 4%-
6% for medium/long-range flights. Airbus earlier tested similar blended winglets
designed by Winglet Technology for the A320 series, but determined that their benefits
did not warrant further development and they stayed with the wingtip fences
instead. Aviation Partners Boeing claims that winglets on 737s and 757s have saved a
collective 1.2 billion gal. of fuel since they were introduced and 11.5 million tonnes
of CO2 while reducing those types’ noise footprint by 6.5%. It has sold winglets to
140 airlines and 95% of all 737NGs are fitted with them. It is working on four winglet
concepts for the 777 and hopes to finalize a design for that aircraft type by December,
2008.

Blended Winglets on Several Aircraft Types

RAKED WINGTIPS are the most recent winglet variants (they are probably better
classified as special wings, though), where the tip of the wing has a higher degree of
sweep than the rest of the wing. They are widely referred to as winglets, but they are
better described as integrated wingtip extensions as they are (horizontal) additions to
the existing wing, rather than the previously described (near) vertical solutions. The
stated purpose of this additional feature is to improve fuel economy, climb performance
and to shorten takeoff field length. It does this in much the same way as “traditional”
winglets do. In testing by Boeing and NASA, raked wingtips have been shown to reduce
drag by as much as 5.5%, as opposed to improvements of 3.5% to 4.5% from
conventional winglets. Airliners to use raked wingtips: Boeing 747-8, Boeing 767-
400ER, Boeing 777(-200LR; -300ER; and freighter versions) plus the new Boeing 787
Dreamliner and the Airbus A350. The 747-8, the 787 and the A350 will have special,
new kind of wings, which do not have a separate winglet, but have raked, and
blended wingtips integrated - without a sharp angle between the wing and the
winglet.
 Raked Wingtips on the new Boeing 787 and Airbus A350
As you can see, wingtips/winglets have developed and changed very much over the last
30 years, but are becoming the standard, which is not proven better by anything else than
the wing designs of future aircraft by the largest airplane-makers that feature a built-in
winglet at the tip of their new, revolutionary wings.

Raked wingtip

Boeing 787 Dreamliner rollout showing raked wingtip

Raked wingtips are a feature on some Boeing airliners, where the tip of the
wing has a higher degree of sweep than the rest of the wing. The stated
purpose of this additional feature is to improve fuel efficiency and climb
performance, and to shorten takeoff field length. It does this in much the
same way that winglets do, by increasing the effective aspect ratio of the
wing and interrupting harmful wingtip vortices. This decreases the amount
of lift-induced drag experienced by the aircraft. In testing by Boeing and
NASA, raked wingtips have been shown to reduce drag by as much as
5.5%, as opposed to improvements of 3.5% to 4.5% from conventional
winglets.[16]
While an equivalent increase in wingspan would be more effective than a
winglet of the same length, the bending force becomes a greater factor. A
three-foot winglet has the same bending force as a one-foot increase in
span, yet gives the same performance gain as a two-foot wing span
increase.[27]
For this reason, the short-range Boeing 787-3 design called for winglets
instead of the raked wingtips featured on all other 787 variants.

Raked wingtips are installed on, or are planned to be installed on:

Boeing P-8 Poseidon
Boeing 747-8 Freighter
Boeing 747-8 Intercontinental
Boeing 767-400ER
Boeing 777-200LR
Boeing 777-300ER
Boeing 777 Freighter
Boeing 787-8
Boeing 787-9

Anyway - The performance of a commercial transport airplane is

typically measured in terms of mission capability and operating
costs. Mission capability can be improved by reducing airplane
drag during takeoff climb and cruise, and by utilizing designs that
minimize structural weight. Operating costs can be reduced by
reducing airplane cruise drag (hence, resulting in less fuel burn
and less fuel costs) and by utilizing designs that are inexpensive
to manufacture and maintain. Further, for commercial operators,
higher profits can be achieved by being able to transport more
customers and/or goods for a given flight. Because the additional
payload increases takeoff weight, it is even more desirable to
reduce takeoff drag for takeoff-climb-limited missions. - nothing
new here right ?
The objectives of reducing drag, reducing weight, and reducing
complexity (hence manufacturing and maintenance costs) are
often in conflict. Adding a wingtip extension member can reduce
the drag of a given airplane, but this will usually require
increasing structural weight - IE winglets bend the hell out of
wing roots because of the increased moment arm - therefore you
need to beef up the wing judiciously - on shitty wing designs -
the weight increase can "washout" the efficiency increase by
additing a winglet in the first place.. Sooooooo - Weight increases
are due to the weight of the wingtip extension member and also
due to strengthening required of the existing wing structure in
order to support the increased bending moments exerted by the
wingtip extension member. Additional weight penalties can also
occur if the extension exacerbates flutter. - IE if you fiddle with
ANY WING design after flight test - you change its natural
resonance - IE it becomes a new tuning fork - heaven forbid it
will like to resonate at cruise mach - IE flutter.. 747 has a speed
advantage over the A340 because of flutter - the old crusty 747
hauls ass - the A340 could haul ass if it didnt like to shake itself
apart at VMO.. ( my personal opinion based on 2nd hand info .. )
This conflict between the benefits of reduced drag and the
disadvantages of increased weight has motivated designers to
find an optimal balance between the two when designing a
wingtip extension member. One such attempt is described in U.S.
Pat. No. 5,039,032, incorporated herein by reference. The '032
patent describes a number of wingspan extensions termed "High
Taper Wing Tip Extensions". These are also known as "raked
wingtips". Raked wingtips are generally characterized by leading-
edge sweep angles that are greater than the main wing sweep
angles and are significantly tapered (i.e., the chord length
decreases in the spanwise direction.)
Raked wingtips offer several advantages, some of which are
outlined in the '032 patent. These advantages include the
aerodynamic benefit of drag reduction due to increased
wingspan, and a number of weight-reduction advantages
(relative to simply extending the wingspan of an existing
conventional main wing.) Two weight advantages are attributed
to the wingtip taper. At high-load-factor structural design
conditions, the smaller chords are subjected to less load and they
result in less induced loading on the outboard main wing. These
are both factors that reduce the bending moment that the
inboard wing must support. Two more weight advantages are
attributed to leading-edge sweep. The leading-edge sweep of a
raked wingtip results in the center of pressure being located
further aft than for a simple extension of an existing conventional
main wing. At the high load-factor structural design conditions,
this relative aft-movement of the center of pressure causes the
sections of the main wing adjacent to the raked wingtip to be
twisted more leading-edge-down, thus reducing the loading on
these sections and the bending moment that the inboard wing
must support. The relative aft-movement of the center of
pressure also acts to attenuate flutter. The raked wingtips
described in patent '032 range from moderate span extensions
(e.g., 6% increase in span) to large span extensions (e.g., 12%
increase in span). It is the large span extensions that offer the
greatest benefits.
Regardless of these benefits, there are challenges in
implementing raked wingtips on some aircraft. For example, on
aircraft designed to operate at high subsonic Mach numbers (i.e.,
at or greater than about 0.70) there is a tendency for the
boundary layer on the upper surface of each raked wingtip to
separate under high-lift conditions (such as during takeoff climb
or landing). This boundary-layer separation has the potential to
increase drag and to generate premature buffet. The primary
motivation for adding a wingspan extension is to increase the lift-
to-drag ratio (primarily by decreasing drag), both during cruise
and takeoff climb. If there is a significant drag increase due to
large-scale boundary-layer separation under takeoff climb
conditions, part or all of the takeoff-climb improvement is lost.
When the raked wingtip boundary layer separates, there is also a
possibility of unsteady aerodynamic forces strong enough to
vibrate the airplane structure and to be perceived by the airplane
pilot as buffet indicating the onset of aerodynamic wing stall. If
this form of buffet occurs prematurely (that is, within what would
normally be the operating envelope), stall speed must be
declared at a speed significantly higher than the aerodynamic
wing stall, thus degrading airplane performance.
The '032 patent acknowledges the tendency of the boundary
layers on raked wingtips to separate under high-lift conditions. In
the '032 patent, raked wingtips are categorized into two groups,
one group with leading-edge sweep angles between 40 and 50
degrees and another with leading-edge sweep angles between 50
and 60 degrees. For the first group, the '032 patent indicates
that some form of a mechanical leading-edge high-lift device
(such as a slat) is required in order to avoid premature low-
speed buffet. The addition of a mechanical leading-edge high-lift
device avoids premature boundary-layer separation, alleviating
the buffet problem, but it adds profile drag, weight, complexity,
and cost. Under some circumstances, these disadvantages may
outweigh the benefits of the raked wingtip. For the second group,
the '032 patent indicates that the wingtip leading-edge sweep is
great enough to trigger the formation of a stable leading-edge
vortex, and that therefore premature buffet will not occur and no
high-lift mechanisms are required.
The inventors herein have discovered that under some
circumstances, leading-edge sweep angles of 50 to 60 degrees
may not be adequate to ensure the formation of a stable leading-
edge vortex when conventional transonic airfoils are used for the
raked wingtip geometry. As used herein, "transonic airfoils" are
those designed to operate at high subsonic freestream Mach
numbers, with significant regions of locally supersonic flow.
Additionally, even if the presence of a stable leading-edge vortex
prevents premature buffet, such a vortex may result in higher
drag than if the majority of the raked wingtip boundary layer
could be kept attached over the range of typical operating
conditions. Further, the technical viability of any raked wingtip
would be improved greatly if there was no requirement for a
leading-edge high-lift mechanism.
Thus, the evolution of the improved raked wingtip, particularly
for use with aircraft that operate at high subsonic Mach numbers.
The ideal raked wingtip would provide the aerodynamic benefits
of an increase in wing span, while avoiding premature boundary-
layer separation under high-lift conditions. Further, the optimal
arrangement would not add significantly to wing weight or wing
complexity. Both the raked wingtip & the blunt raked wingtip are
Boeing inventions. Airbus A330/A340 uses the 747-400 winglet.
The A320 family of airplanes uses the AIRBUS ( opps BAE - UK
developed ) delta winglet that has an opposite plan-form camber
on the upper & lower half of the winglet - to gracefully control
the direction of the vortices comming off the top & bottom of the
wings to kinda mesh them together non distructively - a clever
design - by a company with a fine British aircraft heritage .. god
save the queen .. All that being said - winglets on business jets
regardless of eficiency increases are for sex- appeal ..