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Aspect ratio (aeronautics) An ASH 31 glider with very high aspect ratio (AR=33.5) and lift-to-drag ratio (L/D=56) In aeronautics, the aspect ratio of a wing is the ratio of its span to its mean chord. It is equal to the square of the wingspan divided by the wing area. Thus, a long, narrow wing has a high aspect ratio, whereas a short, wide wing ...
The wingspan (or just span) of a bird or an airplane is the distance from one wingtip to the opposite wingtip. For example, the Boeing 777–200 has a wingspan of 60.93 metres (199 ft 11 in), [ 1 ] and a wandering albatross ( Diomedea exulans ) caught in 1965 had a wingspan of 3.63 metres (11 ft 11 in), the official record for a living bird.
The wing configuration of a fixed-wing aircraft (including both gliders and powered aeroplanes) is its arrangement of lifting and related surfaces. Aircraft designs are often classified by their wing configuration. For example, the Supermarine Spitfire is a conventional low wing cantilever monoplane of straight elliptical planform with moderate ...
Ground effect (aerodynamics) For fixed-wing aircraft, ground effect is the reduced aerodynamic drag that an aircraft's wings generate when they are close to a fixed surface. [1] During takeoff, ground effect can cause the aircraft to "float" while below the recommended climb speed. The pilot can then fly just above the runway while the aircraft ...
Effect on performance. 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.
An increase in wingspan or a solution with a similar effect is one way to reduce induced drag. [6]: 4.10 The Wright brothers used curved trailing edges on their rectangular wings. [13] Some early aircraft had fins mounted on the tips. More recent aircraft have wingtip-mounted winglets to reduce the induced drag. [14]
In aeronautics, the thickness-to-chord ratio, sometimes simply chord ratio or thickness ratio, compares the maximum vertical thickness of a wing to its chord. It is a key measure of the performance of a wing planform when it is operating at transonic speeds. At speeds approaching the speed of sound, the effects of Bernoulli's principle over ...
Aircraft flight dynamics. Flight dynamics is the science of air vehicle orientation and control in three dimensions. The three critical flight dynamics parameters are the angles of rotation in three dimensions about the vehicle's center of gravity (cg), known as pitch, roll and yaw. These are collectively known as aircraft attitude, often ...