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Quiz: Basic Aircraft Aerodynamics

Flight Training Central

The term 'angle of attack' is defined as the angle between the airplane's longitudinal axis and that of the air striking the airfoil. Air traveling faster over the curved upper surface of an airfoil causes lower pressure on the top surface. The horizontal component of lift. The vertical component of lift.

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The No Longer Invisible Angle of Attack: AOA Indicators

Learn to Fly

An angle of attack (AOA) indicator can determine the aerodynamic health of the airfoil (wing). This flight instrument measures the angle between an aircraft’s wing and the relative wind, providing a visual representation of how much lift the wings are generating at a given airspeed or angle of bank.

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Passing the torch

Air Facts

The Four Forces of Flight (Lift, Thrust, Drag & Gravity) obey Newton’s Three Laws of Motion. irplane controls work per the Lever Principle, and a wing’s airfoil shape increases lift via the Bernouilli Principle and Coanda Effect. Like Moses and the Ten Commandments, aviation is limited by 10 laws of physics and chemistry.

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Recognising NASA Technology on Modern Airliners

Fear of Landing

Supercritical Airfoil During the 1960s and 1970s, NASA scientist Richard Whitcomb led a team of researchers to develop and test a series of unique geometric shapes of airfoils or wing sections that could be applied to subsonic transports to improve lift and reduce drag.

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There’s Something Essential in the Bank

Flying Magazine

Otto Lilienthal did it by shifting his weight, but for the much larger Wright Flyer the solution was to make one wing produce more lift than the other by twisting them in opposite directions. In other words, the lift change that results from deflecting the aileron is not confined to the aileron itself.

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