Sunday, 15 January 2012

"How can a 1.2 million pounds (540,000 kg) aircraft fly?




This report is focused on a research question ''How aircraft's are manoeuvred both on air and on ground flight'', and "how aircraft's try to be efficient". In this case the aircraft which my report would be focusing on is the RAF Vigilant T1, a Glider/Air Experience Flight (G/AEF) used by the Air Training Corps; this means it is both capable of being a normal aircraft but also a glider.

RAF Vigilant T1 in the background being cleaned


To answer the question ''How aircraft's are manoeuvred both on air and on ground flight''; the information is found in ACP 33 Volume 2 on Principles of Flight, first of all I am going to break it down by answering the question on air only so that you can easily understand.

Aircraft's as a matter of fact are manoeuvred in air using 3 main axes'; one of which is the longitude, vertical/normal and horizontal axis.
1)                The longitudinal axis is responsible for the rolling movement of the aircraft, normal for the yaw and lateral for the pitching. To roll is a movement by the wings to raise one side and to drop one side to get a left or right roll, which runs along the longitudinal axis.
2)                To yaw is a movement where by the whole aircraft moves side to side on its centre of gravity where all points meet on the normal axis.
3)                Finally to pitch is a movement where the nose of the aircraft moves up and down on its lateral axis.

There are actually controls which enable the roll, yaw and pitching movement, the controls are called the ailerons, elevators and the rudder which are all external parts. To roll the aircraft the movement of the ailerons are used which is simply to push the control column to the left or to the right, similarly to yaw the aircraft uses the rudder by simply pushing on the right pedals to yaw right or vice versa. Finally to pitch is simply the movement where by the nose of the aircraft moves up or down using elevators, the pitch movement is controlled by pulling back on the control column to pitch up and push forwards to pitch downwards.

On the ground the controls for movement around the airbase really depends on the type of aircraft or what it has just been through or about to do; in this case I am still going to focus on the Vigilant T1. As it is a small light aircraft that does not require a Jeep to pull it around with a wing span of 17.4 metres; the propeller is used to apply thrust to the aircraft. They are manoeuvred depending on the day before they start with a brief from the admin of the airbase, normally aircraft's fly against the wind and depending on the weather this also means creating a certain course around the airfield. This is how aircraft's are manoeuvred but in a different prospective where how aircraft's move from one place to another is similar to flying, but only the controls of thrust and yaw are used for the simple reasons that one direction is only being used.

Now I will answer how aircrafts such as the Vigilant T1 try to be as sustainable as possible or also known as economically friendly. One of the ways in which this is done is the way the aircrafts has been designed, as you would see modern aircrafts has a more streamlined shape than all the other old aircraft designs. This is not obvious but the less the streamlined and aircraft is the more drag it created, this intern makes the aircraft use more fuel than necessary.
Having a streamlines aircraft does not just have an advantage of being a bit more economically friendly but it also allows the aircraft to travel at much faster speeds, in this case the Vigilant T1 is able to save a lot of fuel as it is able to glide due to its aerodynamic shape; it used its long wing span of 17.4 metres which make it really friendly to the environment compared to some other aircrafts.
Another point which makes the Vigilant and modern aircrafts today very strong and efficient is the way they structure their wings; a factor they have to include is the fact that it needs to be light, so in this case creating it to be hollow.


Arguments to support my answers are just basic knowledge and common sense; such as a child would not run with the wind to try to fly a kite, but they would automatic notice which and how to fly their kite although not necessarily knowing why. 

These are the links to retrieve my bibliography, such as the Air Cadet Publication Books:

                        Principles of Flight             ACP33 Vol. 2


                        Airmanship 2           ACP 34 Vol. 2


                        Airframes                  ACP 33 Vol. 4

Other Website’s:



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