y2kiah Posted November 23, 2010 Posted November 23, 2010 Wikipedia: "The center of mass or mass center is the mean location of all the mass in a system." Mean location refers to the mean distribution of mass. This is pure semantics you are arguing over. The centre of gravity directly represents how the mass is distributed in a body. The CG is only one part of the picture. You also have to consider moment of inertia, aka inertia tensor. Together the CG and inertia tensor represent the mass distribution of a rigid body. It's analogous to the standard deviation and mean of a set of numbers. The mean will tell you the location of the average, but absolutely nothing about the distribution. The standard deviation tells you whether the set is concentrated around the mean, evenly distributed, or concentrated away from the mean.
effte Posted November 23, 2010 Posted November 23, 2010 What plane has the vast majority of its mass concentrated at the front and back? Oh... I know it! No... damn... you got me... can't think of one. I mean, as you point out, it's an absurd suggestion. It would imply something truly crazy, like having a big-ass weapons system at one end and the engines at the other. Who'd design something like that?! I'm sorry for wasting your time, clearly such a contraption cannot exist and even less fly. I'll hide in shame now. ;) 1 ----- Introduction to UTM/MGRS - Trying to get your head around what trim is, how it works and how to use it? - DCS helos vs the real world.
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