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The Fundamental Forces of Aircraft

Hey, what is up folks? Hope you all are having a beautiful day! In the last blog, we talked about the control surfaces, and in doing so, we came across terms like LIFT and DRAG several times. Well, this is a follow-up article to that and today we will be discussing the FUNDAMENTAL FORCES that govern an A/c. Now without ant further ado lets get straight into it, shall we?

Alright, so we have 4 Fundamental Forces that govern an A/c and help it fly. Them being:

  1. Lift: This is defined as the net force generated perpendicular to the relative airflow or the flight path of the A/c. In simpler terms, the Lift is the upward generated force and it opposes wight. The wings mainly generate the Lift, and there needs to be a motion for the generation of lift. No motion, no Lift.
  2. Drag: This is the aerodynamic force that resists the forward motion of the A/c. It acts parallel to and in the same direction as the relative airflow that is opposite to the flight path. Every part of the A/c generated drag, even the engines. And just like lift, there needs to be a motion for the generation of drag. No motion, no drag.
  3. Thrust: This is the force that enables the A/c to move forward through the air. It is this force that is used to overcome the drag on an A/c. Thrust is generated by the engines of the A/c.
  4. Weight: Well, I don't think this one needs much explanation, but like us and every other object on the earth, even A/c's are subjected to the earth's gravitational force, thus giving it weight.
And with that, we can conclude our discussion. Hope you got the basics of the fundamental forces that govern an A/c. Just a reminder you will be highly mistaken if you think that this is all you need to know about these oh-so essential forces. We will be discussing each of them in much more details when we start our discussion on Aerodynamics until then keep dreaming big, and this is your Soaring Pilot signing off 🛫💖.

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