Inverted Flight
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Inverted Flight
I wonder if anyone could help me to understand prolonged inverted flight? as far as I am aware wings are designed to produce lift by creating low pressure on the top surface, if an aircraft went inverted surely the aircraft would want to fly back to the ground, I realise that control surfaces can help in the short term but are they sufficient for prolonged inverted flight ? I am thinking along the lines of the "Reds" Synchro Pair type of flying. Thankyou in advance. Steve
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Essentially, for level inverted flight, all you have to do is create a negative angle of attack with the wing, equivalent to the positive angle of attack needed to sustain level 'verted' flight. You get this by reducing the positive AoA of the wing, through zero AoA and out the other side, to negative.
Some aerofoil sections are symmetrical, especially on aerobatic aircraft, which makes the process easier.
You are correct when you say that the aircraft would want to descend, inverted but this is because it is trimmed for positive 'g' flight. So you push...hard.
Some aerofoil sections are symmetrical, especially on aerobatic aircraft, which makes the process easier.
You are correct when you say that the aircraft would want to descend, inverted but this is because it is trimmed for positive 'g' flight. So you push...hard.
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... Although wandering from the technical aspects
of inverted flight - In the book of his airforce life - W.Cmdr. L Strange who served in both world wars describes an experience during ww1
in an open cockpit bi-plane when during combat he needed to stand up on the seat to reach onto the top wing to change the magazine - when
the a/c suddenly went into an inverted spin leaving him dangling completely out of the cockpit with only his hands holding on to the gun
magazine which by some good fortune had jammed. After some hair raising moments of struggle he managed to swing his legs back into the
cockpit and regain control.
With typical humour he went on to say that on returning to base
his C.O. complained about the damage caused to the seat and instrument panel !
...
of inverted flight - In the book of his airforce life - W.Cmdr. L Strange who served in both world wars describes an experience during ww1
in an open cockpit bi-plane when during combat he needed to stand up on the seat to reach onto the top wing to change the magazine - when
the a/c suddenly went into an inverted spin leaving him dangling completely out of the cockpit with only his hands holding on to the gun
magazine which by some good fortune had jammed. After some hair raising moments of struggle he managed to swing his legs back into the
cockpit and regain control.
With typical humour he went on to say that on returning to base
his C.O. complained about the damage caused to the seat and instrument panel !
...
