The speed is gained from thrust. It has nothing to do with wheels. Thus, it doesnt matter if the plane has ground/conveyor belt/air/whatever under its _free spinning_ wheels.

30. jeffd: The myth is that the plane cant move forward, thus cant get up.

The conveyor belt was moving at take off speed. You would THINK the plane would remain stationary. This is the whole confusing part. Think of it this way…

Take a little toy car with plastic clip on wheels. Hold it on a treadmill. The wheels will spin freely. Now move your hand forward at the same rate the treadmill is running. The car will move forward. Now think of the conveyor belt as the treadmill and the plane’s engine as your hand.

Does that help out?

It really is confusing because we’re so used to the idea of objects remaining staionary on a conveyor belt.

i liked what you said until the end. your comment is worse… 30 had spelling errors, you’re just plain misogynistic.

Put down the physics textbook and pick up a dictionary.

Meanwhile the girl may know calculus, but she still acts dumb. My favourite part is when they pan the camera to her and she summarizes what the guys have already said. More boobs, less talking please! Cute women should be seen, not heard.

What I thought they might have been debunking was if verticle take off would have been possible if the conveyor belt matched take off speed. That would have been an obviouse no, cause take off is cause by air lift and unless the plane is actually moving through air, it wont take off. The propeller provides thrust, it does not provide enough air to push the wings up.

prolly the worst mythbuster experiment ive seen.

Mythbusters.S06E03.Airplane.on.Conveyor.Belt.720p.HDTV.x264-DHD
http://d01.megashares.com/?d01=52e37d0

NZB :

http://tv.releasecrawler.org/1/Download-Mythbusters-All.html

Of course the plane will gain forward motion, because the whole point of the theory is that if there is no friction in the wheels’ bearings the plane will not move anywhere when the belt’s on if the engines are dead.
When the jets are started up, it gives thrust and the plane will move forward. Easy as that.