Whenever I see an explanation about how airplanes can fly, I see that the shape of the wing is different on the top side to create a dragging force that pushes the airplane up. The top is curved and the bottom is flat. If a airplane turn upside down, should it fall faster because it’s dragging down ? I saw airplanes doing acrobatics on air , and some of them looks impossible because of this.
In: Engineering
The shape of the wing has more to do with being aerodynamic than creating lift. The vast majority of lift comes from the angle of attack, which is the angle of the wing relative to its motion through the air. You can create lift with a flat wing, it just won’t be very efficient and will have a higher stall speed.
There are several different wing shapes depending on the needs of the aircraft, like how fast it is designed to cruise at, how low the stall speed is, etc. They might have more curve underneath, which creates more lift but also more drag, or even diamond shaped to reduce the negative effects of supersonic flight.
Acrobatic planes that are designed to spend an unusual amount of time upside down have wings that are symmetrical from top to bottom. They are more of a teardrop than most wings, which are more like a flattened teardrop.
The symmetrical wing is less efficient in normal, level flight but is equally efficient when flying upside down.
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