Flight power scaling of airplanes, airships, and helicopters: Application to planetary exploration

Empirical relations for the required flight power of propeller-driven light er-than-air and fixed-wing heavier-than-air vehicles are developed purely a s a function of vehicle mass and flight speed. A relation for rotary-wing v ehicles includes rotor diameter as an additional parameter. For airships, a irplanes, and helicopters these relations each span some 6-7 orders of magn itude in power, covering model aircraft and unmanned air vehicles, as well as conventional crewed vehicles. From first principles, these relations are extended to other environments (different gravity and atmospheric density) and allow the rapid and convenient preliminary evaluation of aircraft conc epts on this world and others. Results compare favorably with terrestrial b irds and submarines.