Quote:
Originally Posted by Tis
I can't believe im posting on a 5 year old POS GD thread.... what is my life coming to.
Imagine a rope tied from the front of the plane to the post at the front of the treadmill. If you pull that rope, everyone should be able to see that the plane will move forward. The essentially frictionless wheels are irrelevant, they just spin faster.
The effect of the engine is the same. It pulls the plane forward through the air.
Your problem is that your premise would not work. The only way the plane will remain stationary with the engine on is if there is so much friction between the wheels and the surface that it creates the same force going the opposite direction... but in that case it would have been forced off the back of the treadmill while idle.
I am going to go cry now.
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I'm fairly sure that I made a post on this thread a couple of years ago of something along similar lines, that the question makes no sense based on the sum total of the information provided.
The only way to discuss the premise of the question is to put it into logical contexts. Most of the discussion that has taken place has been postulation, and the idea that a question asked, merits a logical approach to formulating an answer. In this case, given that the provided 'conditions' of such an experiment couldn't exist without extreme hypothetical solutions, a logical answer can not be reached under such illogical circumstances.
The only 'arguing' seen in this thread wasn't ever about whether the plane could take off or not, people were merely arguing over how to approach the question.
I'm sure I didn't word it quite like that though.
Still, it was one of my favourite threads I've seen on a forum.