Ground Effect Vehicle (GEV) Design and Wing in Ground Effect (WIG) Craft Design

A ground-effect vehicle or GEV, also known as a wing-in-ground-effect or WIG craft, or ekranoplan, is a vehicle that can move over the surface by gaining support from the reactions of air against the surface of the ground. These vehicles typically cruise over a level surface, usually over the sea, by making use of ground effect. GEVs can provide solutions to niche markets such as island hopping, coastal transport and reconnaissance, operation in remote areas without runways, and so on. In this video, we will look at some of the design considerations while designing ground effect aircraft. Although this video does not cover the details of the design, it can be a good starting point while designing a GEV.

0:00 Introduction
0:51 Why design GEVs
1:43 Aerodynamic Benefit 1: More lift
2:03 Aerodynamic Benefit 2: Less Drag
2:51 Design Considerations
6:06 GEV limitations
7:00 Design Resources

[1] https://maritime-executive.com/editor...
[2] Constructing a model ground-effect vehicle, Doug Stith, DOI: https://doi.org/10.1119/1.5145540
[3] Wing-in-ground effect vehicles, Progress in Aerospace Sciences, Kirill V. Rozhdestvensky, DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.paerosci.20...
[4] Review of experimental investigations of wings in ground effect at low Reynolds numbers, T. Lee, G. Lin, DOI: https://doi.org/10.3389/fpace.2022.97...

GEV Design Resources:
Wing in Ground Effect Craft Review, Holloran, Michael O'Meara, Sean, URL: https://apps.dtic.mil/sti/tr/pdf/ADA3...