Talk:Nose cone design

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Why not merge this article with the Nose cone article?

I split the article from the nose cone article because it really focuses on the math involved during nose cone design. Lots of articles use seperate sections for this kind of thing. Ruleke 09:29, 2 January 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Copyright question

This page appears to be largely a direct copy of the following article, copyrighted in 1996: http://projetosulfos.if.sc.usp.br/artigos/NoseCone_EQN2.PDF - which is even listed in the references. Is there permission to use this? If not, I will consider marking as a copyright violation. --Knotnic 19:57, 12 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Please see http://myweb.cableone.net/cjcrowell/VCPMAIN.htm

This is Mr Crowell's site where he publishes the article stating everything on the site is freeware.

If you want

  , I can get an email from him, not sure where to post it or what the procedure is. --Ruleke 09:26, 13 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

I have verified by email with Mr Crowell that the work is in the public domain. --Ruleke 11:31, 14 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Great - thanks for clarifying.--Knotnic 15:58, 14 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Create a comparative table?

The article is interesting but its not easy to discern which designs work best in what situations. Perhaps it needs a table at the bottom comparing the various designs and their characteristics.--Hooperbloob 20:41, 18 June 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for the suggestion. I have started a section for this. It's not an easy comparison though the table I put in place now is a good first guideline. More to come later. Ruleke 15:38, 2 November 2006 (UTC)[reply]

Why is a cone mischosen?

"A very common nose cone shape is a simple cone. This shape is often chosen for its ease of manufacture, and is also often (mis)chosen for its drag characteristics." Why is a cone mischosen? Does it have more drag than one would normally assume? Banaticus 08:27, 24 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

The conical shape has a drag coefficient of about 0.5, which is very low. However, the turbulence created with this nose cone when fitted to a rocket causes the total drag coefficient to be the worst of the shapes listed here. Ruleke 08:51, 25 July 2006 (UTC)[reply]

So on subsonic propellor driven aircraft, a sharp conical nose is a better choice or would it still be better to go with a more rounded nose cone? 22:18, 27 July 2006 (UTC)

I realize this is about 'nose cones,' but with regard to kinetic weapons like bullets, and penetrating weapons like certain bombs, the shape of the nose may be chosen for penetation and shaping of the impact, the impact's explosion, etc. as well as aeordynamics. Not sure if that is pertinent, which I why I like writing in the 'discussion' first. Paulc206 08:38, 19 March 2007 (UTC)[reply]

The Von Karman shape is not explained

Just referred to in the table of preferred shapes. -- Egil (talk) 21:47, 2 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]

My fault, it was mentioned, but not obvious for me at a brief glance. I've added a small subchapter to make it more obvious, especially when coming here via the Von Karman ogive link. -- Egil (talk) 05:33, 3 September 2009 (UTC)[reply]

link

reference link not working.

Secant ogive

The last formula states that the ogive radius is greater than 2L, but the associated graphic show that L is greater than the ogive radius. In fact, L can approach 2 time the ogive radius, so the formula may have it reversed, in that L must be less than the 2 times the ogive raidus. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.169.100.186 (talk) 18:22, 24 February 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Citation needed: "The Haack series nose cones are not perfectly tangent to the body at their base"

It can be proven mathematically by differentiating y and substituting in x=l. Does this really need a citation? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 95.150.205.134 (talk) 22:58, 23 October 2014 (UTC)[reply]

According to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sears%E2%80%93Haack_body, the derivative is 0 at x = 1/2, for C = 1/3, contradicting this article. 72.226.68.197 (talk)

The Sears Haack body is a different shape altogether. The statement in the article is mathematically verifiable. Maxwelljets (talk) 18:45, 3 November 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Link misleading

The first reference mentioned doesn't go to a pdf file as it claims - it opens a website. Could you kindly update this? Yetanotherwriter (talk) 21:57, 17 December 2015 (UTC)[reply]

Parabolic vs parabolic shape

"The power series includes the shape commonly referred to as a "parabolic" nose cone, but the shape correctly known as a parabolic nose cone is a member of the parabolic series (described above)." This statement is very awkward. Can it be reworded? Also, the "power series" shape isn't particularly blunt, either. The tangent vector at the vertex doesn't look perpendicular to the axis of rotation. Rather, it seems to come to a point like an ogive. SharkD  Talk  03:47, 9 April 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Influence of the general shape

the performance chart is poorly referenced and doesn't even say what bluntness, vertex angles, and fineness ratios performed poorly, or what the test conditions were, except for mach number. so calling either cones or ogive's inferior is not proved. as a quick calculation, take the vertex half-angle, theta, at the tangency point: then 1/(tan theta) becomes the mach number at which air striking the area forward of the tangency point is forced to compress, but if striking the area aft it is allowed to blast outward at the speed of sound. all noses with the same bluntness and vertex half-angle at this point should perform similarly at this mach number. Waveguy (talk) 04:10, 3 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]

this chart appears in the source document by Gary A. Crowell, as well, and he has extensive references but attributions for the chart are not clear, and i don't know which of these might be online in some form. the reason i believe this needs to be justified is, the tangent ogive nose cone was chosen by SpaceX for their Starship rocket. the chart here lists it as inferior, yet i believe they did their homework to be confident that it would work, including all necessary computational fluid dynamics simulations; if this shape were truly inferior they would either choose something else or be risking a lot to have a retro future look. -- Waveguy (talk) 03:53, 30 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]

ok, found the chart in Chinn fig.3-12, p.27. will dig in and see what extra info can be teased out. meanwhile i updated the attribution for it in the article. -- Waveguy (talk) 05:19, 31 October 2020 (UTC)[reply]

Missing non-designs for comparison

While the article currently ranks the straight cone as the worst performing design, I think it needs to be compared to the absense of any cone at all - i.e. a round flat plate. Could even include the polar opposite, a concave one. --Hooperbloob (talk) 18:45, 28 January 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Copyvio cleanup

@FinchSpace: @Sennecaster: @Wham2001:

There's a claim of a large copyvio in this version, in relation to this source. The response has been to delete most of the article, including a range of independent sources for this same material. I am unconvinced by this copyvio claim. Even if it was copied, was it a violation of any copyright? Was it a violation of that article's copyright? That article gives a list of references, but it doesn't cite them inline or indicate the material that they're sourcing. Certainly I see very little of that article as original (some of the commentary, maybe) – it's much more of a literature review of the maths behind a whole range of 'well-known' (i.e. published in the literature corpus and with their definitions easily accessible) shapes and the maths behind them.

There is no copyright to be protected here on the maths behind these nosecone designs. Certainly not copyright attached to a secondary source from 1996, some decades after their invention and first study. This level of section blanking is thus inappropriate. Andy Dingley (talk) 10:03, 15 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I would agree that the maths itsel almost certainly would not be under copyright. However most (if not all) of the text surrounding the mathematics, at least in the section on nose cone geometries, appeared to be directly copied from the source. Considering that this also includes their commentary, I think its relatively likely that copyright (at least in regards to the commentary in the source) was violated although I wouldn't be entirely sure.

If someone with more detailed understanding of copyright law/regulations wants to take a close look and determine exactly what text could be salvaged that would be understandable, but I personally do not feel able to do this. FinchSpace (talk) 14:16, 15 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]

@Andy Dingley; you can restore the math and the other sources if you want, but the text flies above the threshold of originality and is clearly copyrighted (© 1996 Gary A. Crowell Sr). Everything, even secondary review, carries copyright if it is eligible. Math isn't eligible, but the secondary source commentary certainly is and that is why I removed nearly everything. I find math with zero context in an article to be useless to our readers and that is why I removed it as well. Editing around the math was nearly impossible so I may have nabbed a few sources while doing so. I'll try to take more care in the future, but I firmly believe that the text is copyrighted and a copyright violation and stand by my action. Sennecaster (Chat) 15:50, 15 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I have removed the restored text as copyvio again. Sennecaster (Chat) 16:06, 15 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Discussion? I guess you've heard of it. But you just went on and repeated the blankings anyway. This is very poor editing and seriously damaging to this article. Andy Dingley (talk) 17:47, 15 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I've stated my reasoning. But if you insist, I will bring it to WT:CP for additional review. Sennecaster (Chat) 20:20, 15 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]

By misreprenting what I wrote, then going to an already-partisan audience looking for articles to delete, and without any subject knowledge of either rocketry or maths. Typical WP logic. You should run as an admin, they'd love you. Andy Dingley (talk) 20:44, 15 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I added the Parabolic, Von Karman, and Power series equations a few days ago with citation to a NACA report, I'm unsure as to why the most recent edit decided to repeat this. They've also decided to cite an MS thesis as the source for many of the images, which seems to be somewhat silly as the images are very clearly taken from Gary Crowell's paper. I think the renders are fine, but moving forward a NACA, NASA, AIAA , or similar aeronautics source should probably be targeted as readers wanting to know more will be better served by citations to that content. Furthermore, information from these agencies will not have any threat of copyright. Hypersoniceditor (talk) 20:54, 15 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]

My, that's an awfully interesting assumption - those of us watching that board lack "any subject knowledge of either rocketry or maths." GreenLipstickLesbian💌🦋 20:57, 15 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]

As requested:

Well, there's limited ways to rewrite anything excessively mathematical. Phrases such as "Cones are sometimes defined by their half angle", for example, are clearly basic definitions that you can find in any undergrad textbook. There is nothing creative about that statement; I can think of no way to rewrite it without distorting its meaning and disagree with its removal.

Sections such as

A very common nose-cone shape is a simple cone. This shape is often chosen for its ease of manufacture. More optimal, streamlined shapes (described below) are often much more difficult to create. The sides of a conic profile are straight lines, so the diameter equation is simply

are more complicated, when what the source exactly says is:

A very common nose cone shape is a simple cone. This shape is often chosen for its ease of manufacture, and is also often (mis)chosen for its drag characteristics. The sides of a conical profile are straight lines, so the diameter equation is simply

Some parts of this are fine - saying that "the diameter equation is" or even "the diameter equation is simply" is common, and not unique enough to be eligible for copyright protection; I would remove the "simply" anyways because it's a bit too flowery for my liking.

However, the longer sentences do have actual, creative choices - "often chosen for its ease of manufacture" "the sides of a conic profile are straight lines, so" to pick a few examples. These are much too close - which we can see in sentences like "More optimal, streamlined shapes (described below) are often much more difficult to create", which says the roughly same thing as "often chosen for its ease of manufacture", but using completely different language. (Please tell me if I'm wrong, but I can't find that in the source!) We have evidence that these ideas can be rewritten completely, so WP:LIMITED can't apply.

Similarly, - "a simple cone". Well, what the text clearly means here is a "right circular cone", I believe? Go for that. Say "Right circular cones are common nose-cone shapes". You could even say "Geometric cones are common nose cone shapes" That's conveying the same facts, but with different creative language. And better, because "simple cone" is a annoying term without a strict definition. There's a reason we avoid it in our own articles. (Engineers might have decided to give it a particular definition, apologies if so, but that's really not my fault).

If Andy Dingley can prove that the author lifted that text directly from a public domain source, and therefore is not a copyright violation, then he is free to do so on his own time. But I know that if I turned in a paragraph like that on an assignment, my topology professor would have pulled me up in front of the dean for academic misconduct before the day was out. GreenLipstickLesbian💌🦋 20:47, 15 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]

So your contention, like that of Sennecaster, is that there can be no other non-infringing textual expression of the descriptions here, thus blanket deletion is the only option? Because otherwise, the useful fix to this is to copyedit the text, same as we do in every other article to make an encyclopdically useful and non-infringing article. But there seems to be no interest in writing anything any more, just finding excuses to do something Very Important and usually damaging, with minimal effort. Andy Dingley (talk) 21:00, 15 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]

No, not copyedit - that's superficial. The text needs rewritten. If you wish to do that, then, again, you are more than free - but we are all volunteers here. I The amount of time you've spent on this, for example, you could have rewritten the text yourself, rather than reverting in such freshman-level plagiarism. Are you not interested in doing that? GreenLipstickLesbian💌🦋 21:03, 15 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Mathematical equations are usually a standard representation of fact, so would not be copyrightable. But the rest of it is commentary that is creative text that is copyrighted and cannot be added to the article. It is a copyright violation. The paper is dated 1996 so is still under copyright. -- Whpq (talk) 20:46, 15 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Since I was pinged: I agree with Sennecaster and GLL that copyright text should be removed from articles, but there is nothing stopping any editor appropriately summarizing it, or indeed summarizing the sources that it lent on, themselves. This is pretty basic stuff and I'm surprised that an experienced editor is arguing about it in these terms. I've removed the unused LDRs again – Sennecaster, it would be ideal if, when removing large chunks of text from articles, you could double-check the References section for errors afterwards – but they remain in the article history, obviously. Best, Wham2001 (talk) 12:00, 16 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I couldn't figure out where the reference errors were being thrown this time around; usually I'm a little bit more careful :P. I usually use visual editor since it tends to break refs less but visual editor and endless <math> tags don't seem to play nicely. Sennecaster (Chat) 17:27, 16 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Fair enough I guess that the issue was that they were list-defined references – I don't use the visual editor much myself so I don't know how well it deals with them. Best, Wham2001 (talk) 18:37, 16 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]