# HaS A Delta-Winged Airliner Ever Been Built? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [March 20, 2004, 8:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-a-delta-winged-airliner-ever-been-built/235455 "2004-03-20T20:59:14Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 6\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![astro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9dc877/32.png) [@astro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astro)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2004, 6:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-a-delta-winged-airliner-ever-been-built/235455/21 "2004-03-21T06:13:32Z")
Good (and fairly understandable by the layman) discussion of the engineering issues with flying wing designs. [Flying Wings - What happens without a tail?](http://www.nurflugel.com/Nurflugel/n_o_d/weird_02.htm) ---
**Author:** ![mcbiggins](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/7c8e57/32.png) [@mcbiggins](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mcbiggins)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2004, 8:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-a-delta-winged-airliner-ever-been-built/235455/22 "2004-03-21T08:11:17Z")
Hey Padeye, Where did you take those pics? And is it open to the public? ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2004, 8:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-a-delta-winged-airliner-ever-been-built/235455/23 "2004-03-21T08:24:40Z")
> [@MonkeyMensch](#): > > I have to go with **Padeye** on this one, **QED**. I used to fly balsa wood flying wing gliders that were inherently _stable_. They flew quite well in defiance of your cited reference. > > Just 'cause you can find it on the web don’t make it true, in spite of the bona fides of the quoting source. Well, I’m sure your miniature balsa-wood passengers were happy with the flight, but scaling the design up to something that can carry 350+ humans introduces a few minor problems. ---
**Author:** ![Padeye](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/a9a28c/32.png) [@Padeye](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Padeye)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2004, 2:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-a-delta-winged-airliner-ever-been-built/235455/24 "2004-03-21T14:36:21Z")
> [@mcbiggins](#): > > Hey Padeye, > Where did you take those pics? And is it open to the public? The [USAF museum at Wright-Patterson AFB](http://www.wpafb.af.mil/museum/) in Dayton Ohio. Open to the public and free. The XB-70 is housed with other experimental aircraft and presidential planes apart from the main collection. For now it’s a short bus ride away but I expect those aircraft may be moved when an additional hangar is completed. It’s well worth a visit for aviation buffs and takes a full day to get a good look at everything. Thanks for the link **astro** , that’s very informative. I was suprised to find no mention of spoilers for roll control which have less tendancy to induce adverse yaw compared to ailerons. Both the A-6/EA-6 and F-14 (when in low speed configuration with wings at 20º sweep) use them for roll control as those planes have full span flaps and no ailerons. **Bryan Ekers** , no one was saying that full size aircraft don’t have issues that aren’t apparent in small models but that the blanket statement that “flying wings are inherently unstable” is probably false or at best very misleading. ---
**Author:** ![Q.E.D](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/51bf81/32.png) [@Q.E.D](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Q.E.D)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2004, 7:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-a-delta-winged-airliner-ever-been-built/235455/25 "2004-03-21T19:20:47Z")
> [@Padeye](#): > > **Bryan Ekers** , no one was saying that full size aircraft don’t have issues that aren’t apparent in small models but that the blanket statement that “flying wings are inherently unstable” is probably false or at best very misleading. Alright, I’ll buy that. Still, I’ll assert that a stable flying wing configuration is much more technically difficult to design than more conventional wing configurations. Better? ---
**Author:** ![fortytwo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/f9ae1b/32.png) [@fortytwo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fortytwo)\ **Post date:** [March 21, 2004, 7:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-a-delta-winged-airliner-ever-been-built/235455/26 "2004-03-21T19:34:09Z")
> [@Ale](#): > > … > In any case a backwards facing seat would feel really weird at take-off, the Vulcan climbed quite steeply, and passengers would have ended up hanging from their seats facing down the fuselage. 😃 In my RAF days I flew on a RAF VC-10 which had no passengers and a very light fuel load. We were returning to base after an air show and the skipper decided to show off its take off and climbing ability. It’s exactly as you described, and not something a fare paying passenger would be too happy about. We enjoyed it though. V [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/has-a-delta-winged-airliner-ever-been-built/235455.md?page=1)