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Most importantly, the maximum lift-to-drag ratio is independent of the weight of the aircraft, the area of the wing, or the wing loading. It can be shown that two main drivers of maximum lift-to-drag ratio for a fixed wing aircraft are wingspan and total wetted area. One method for estimating the zero-lift drag coefficient of an aircraft is the ...
For a given lift distribution and wing planform area, induced drag is reduced with increasing aspect ratio. As a consequence, aircraft for which a high lift-to-drag ratio is desirable, such as gliders or long-range airliners, typically have high aspect ratio wings.
Like winglets, they increase the effective wing aspect ratio and diminish wingtip vortices, decreasing lift-induced drag. In testing by Boeing and NASA, they reduce drag by as much as 5.5%, compared to 3.5% to 4.5% for conventional winglets. [1] While an increase in span would be more effective than a same-length winglet, its bending moment is ...
At about Mach 2, a typical wing design will cut its L/D ratio in half (e.g., Concorde managed a ratio of 7.14, whereas the subsonic Boeing 747 has an L/D ratio of 17). [21] Because an aircraft's design must provide enough lift to overcome its own weight, a reduction of its L/D ratio at supersonic speeds requires additional thrust to maintain ...
Wing loading is a useful measure of the stalling speed of an aircraft. Wings generate lift owing to the motion of air around the wing. Larger wings move more air, so an aircraft with a large wing area relative to its mass (i.e., low wing loading) will have a lower stalling speed.
The lift-to-drag ratio, or L/D ratio, is the amount of lift generated by a wing or vehicle, divided by the drag it creates by moving through the air. A higher or more favourable L/D ratio is typically one of the major goals in aircraft design; since a particular aircraft's needed lift is set by its weight, delivering that lift with lower drag ...
Boeing received a $3.9-billion contract in July 2018 to build two 747-8 aircraft for use as Air Force One, set for delivery by December 2024. Boeing said it wanted extra time of about a year to ...
High-lift devices compensate for this design trade-off by adding lift at takeoff and landing, reducing the speed and distance required to safely land the aircraft, and allowing the use of a more efficient wing in flight. The high-lift devices on the Boeing 747-400, for example, increase the wing area by 21% and increase the lift generated by 90 ...