PREFACE

THE third volume in this series contains four articles dealing with various topics mainly in the field of aerodynamics. It is certain that the last word has yet to be written on any one of these topics and certainly some of the information offered here, though not ephemeral, will merit amplification in a few years' time. As is only to be expected in a series of this kind, the individual articles are not interconnected but report on fields where advances happen to have been made. As such, they give perhaps some indication of the vigorous activity and continuing growth of the aeronautical sciences. Certainly there would appear to be no dearth of material for an annual volume in this series. In fact, this third volume appears only a few months after the second volume: what was originally intended to form one volume was split into two for the greater convenience of the reader. The first paper is a review of the aerodynamics of swept-winged aircraft and as such is a contribution to the solution of the problem of present-day aerodynamic design which, as noted in Volume I, has emerged as a consequence of developments which have gone beyond the classical concepts of aircraft design. This paper is a first review of part of the research work, which was a co-operative effort on a large scale b y British aircraft firms and research establishments, aimed at the development of supersonic airliners. Not all the individual reference papers concerned in the study h a v e yet been published and it is hoped to report on other aspects of this research work in later volumes in this series. The second paper of this volume is concerned with ducted propellers which in recent years have attracted considerable interest owing to their potential application to a variety of aircraft types, notably the important category of those able to take off vertically or requiring a short take-off run. The paper gives an exhaustive survey of the widely dispersed literature in a way which does not ignore practical applications. The third paper, on hypersonic facilities, provides the reader with a balanced review of the, to some, bewildering multiplicity of means for experimenting with hypersonic flows. Even though development still proceeds at a rapid pace, the overall outlines and the usefulness of particular facilities for particular purposes begin to become more 'firmly established and a survey is, therefore, both opportune and welcome.
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PREFACE

The last paper gives an account of gust research--that fascinating field of work where meteorology, fluid dynamics and aircraft dynamics meet. The subject will be seen to be of great interest and prolific in its many aspects, one of which is, of course, the comfort and safety of ourselves as airline passengers.