Should the aisle be level while cruising?
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Join Date: Jul 2001
Location: Washington, D.C.
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Should the aisle be level while cruising?
Traveling on an ANA 777 to Japan a while back, a child across from me sometimes dropped a toy truck into the aisle. If the wheels were aligned with the aisle, it would always roll slowly toward the rear of the aircraft. I thought that was odd.
Join Date: Mar 2008
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Not at all! Most airliners will cruise with a body angle that is slightly tilted rearwards - not hugely though, just enough so that you might notice it when walking to/from the forward loo!
In general, if the aircraft is heavy, the angle will be more pronounced as the wings need to be at a greater angle to the horizontal to create enough lift to balance the aircraft's weight. The same applies if the aircraft slows down but stays at the same altitude - at lower speed there is less air moving over the wings to create lift and this is compensated for by flying the aircraft at a higher "angle of attack" i.e. with the cabin (and therefore the wings too) tilted rearwards a bit more.
The aircraft I fly tend to cruise with the nose tilted about 2 degrees nose up, sometimes 3 if we're high, heavy and travelling at a lower Mach number than usual.
This is a very simplistic view of things but hopefully it's helpful!
Completely normal anyway
In general, if the aircraft is heavy, the angle will be more pronounced as the wings need to be at a greater angle to the horizontal to create enough lift to balance the aircraft's weight. The same applies if the aircraft slows down but stays at the same altitude - at lower speed there is less air moving over the wings to create lift and this is compensated for by flying the aircraft at a higher "angle of attack" i.e. with the cabin (and therefore the wings too) tilted rearwards a bit more.
The aircraft I fly tend to cruise with the nose tilted about 2 degrees nose up, sometimes 3 if we're high, heavy and travelling at a lower Mach number than usual.
This is a very simplistic view of things but hopefully it's helpful!
Completely normal anyway
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Pushing a cart from the back to the front will usually require 2 x FA's for that reason - the other way, and you're laughing - unless your knees are struck, in which case...
Join Date: Mar 2008
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The stretched version of the aircraft I fly sits more nose-up than the conventional version, so much so that you can quite easily have the CC's feet in the forward galley in line with the eyes of the CC in the rear galley!
You definately feel a bit more "reclined" in the cockpit on these aircraft too...which is a bonus
You definately feel a bit more "reclined" in the cockpit on these aircraft too...which is a bonus
