VATSTAR

P2 Rating: Flight Fundamentals

(Part 1: Basics of Flight)
Lesson 2: What a Drag
Introduction

This Lesson will examine the four main forces of flight and how they interact with one another.

Can I Skip This Lesson?

Q: Which is the correct pairing of the four main forces of flight?

a. lift versus downforce, weight versus drag
b. lift versus weight, thrust versus drag
c. altitude versus airspeed, climb versus descent

If you answered "B", you are correct, and can drag yourself to the next Lesson. Otherwise, lift yourself up and keep
reading.

What You Need to Know

Vocabulary

In the last lesson, we covered lift and thrust (it

almost sounds like it was a weightlifting lesson,
doesn't it?). Here we'll add the other two primary
forces of flight:

• drag: think of it as "wind resistance"; it's a

force, caused by turbulent airflow, that
tends to slow an airplane.
• weight: the force that pulls the plane back
toward the earth. Also referred to as
"gravity," but, we'll refer to it as "weight"
since that's a measure we're all familiar
with.

You'll also need to know these words:

• altitude: the airplane's height above the Earth. We'll get into more detail on this later, but, for now, that's
enough of a definition.
• climb: to gain altitude; to go higher.
• descend: to lose altitude; to go lower.
• level flight: when a plane is traveling at a constant altitude; i.e. it is in the air, but neither climbing nor
descending.
• accelerate: to gain airspeed; to go faster.
• landing gear: the wheels of an airplane, which it rests on while on the ground.

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Concepts

• There are four main forces that act on an airplane; lift, weight, thrust, and drag.
• Lift counteracts weight. When there is more lift than weight, the airplane climbs. When there is less lift than
weight, the plane descends.
• Thrust counteracts drag. Where there is more thrust than drag, the aircraft accelerates. When there is more
drag than thrust, the plane slows down.
• Increasing the wing's angle of attack increases lift (as discussed in the previous lesson), but it also increases
drag -- the more the airflow is separated, the more turbulent airflow results, producing more drag. Once the
wing stalls, it is in a state where it is producing little or no lift, and massive amounts of drag.

More Detail

When speaking of the forces that control and affect flight, the four most basic are the four that pull the plane up and
down (lift and weight), and forward and back (thrust and drag).

Lift is the upward force produced by the wings as they flow through the air, as we discussed before. When there is
enough lift to overcome the plane's weight (roughly speaking, the amount of gravity that is acting on it), the plane
will ascend, or "climb" as they say in pilot-speak. When lift is reduced, either by a loss of airspeed or a reduction in
the angle of attack, the plane will climb more slowly until the lift and weight are equivalent at which point the plane
will fly in level fight. Further reducing lift causes the plane to descend; a complete loss of lift means the plane falls
to the Earth just like any other heavy object made of steel and plastic would do.

Thrust, like we've said already, is the pushing power produced by the aircraft's engine(s). This power is translated to
the air either by spinning a propellor, which acts like the blades of a fan, pushing the air rearward; or a jet turbine,
which burns fuel in highly compressed air to produce a jet of air streaming out of the back. (Turboprop engines
actually use both a propellor and a turbine.) In either case, Newton's Third Law of Motion (which we touched on in
the first lesson) kicks in, and the backward push of air pushes the airplane forward.

Drag is caused by turbulent airflow over non-smooth surfaces. We discussed how a steeply angled wing causes
turbulent airflow in the lesson on stalls; but really, any surface of an airplane has the potential to create drag, even if
in small amounts. Drag is most pronounced on the surafces that stick out into the airflow, such as the landing gear
or windshield, but even the most aerodynamically-designed plane has drag-inducing surfaces. Aside from lowering
the angle of attack, reducing drag without reducing airspeed is generally a matter of retracting any control surfaces
or other protruding parts, such as landing gear, if they are retractable. Drag doesn't really push the plane backwards
per se, but, it is a force that acts in the backward direction, counteracting the thrust. The higher the airspeed, the
more drag there is, until the airplane eventually gets to a maximum speed where its engine can no longer produce
enough thrust to overcome it, meaning that the best it can do is sustain the airspeed it has. Reducing airspeed
reduces drag, until the plane stops and the drag is essentially zero. (Only in a very unusually severe headwind would
drag be so pronounced as to actually cause the plane to travel backwards.)

Summary

Lift is the upward force that the wings produce. Lift counteracts weight. When lift is greater than weight, the
airplane climbs; when lift is less than weight, the plane descends. The same plane loaded more heavily will need
more lift to get it off the ground. Similarly, thrust and drag are counteracting pairs. Thrust is produced by the
airplane's engine or engines, and drag is essentially the "wind resistance" that comes from slamming the rearward
airflow into parts of the plane, especially the protruding ones like the landing gear. Some landing gear are
retractable, reducing the drag on the aircraft between its initial climbout and its final descent to landing. Drag
increases with angle of attack as well as with airspeed; there is a point at which the drag overcomes the thrust and
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the airplane cannot accelerate any further. When airspeed drops to essentially zero, drag reduces to essentially zero
as well.

More Resources

• YouTube: "VATSTAR VATSIM Pilot Rating P2 Course Lesson 2" -- VATSTAR's companion video for
this Lesson.
• YouTube: "The Aerodymanics of Flight" -- another video that explains the four fources of flight.

Quiz

1: Which of the following is true about weight?

a. it is also referred to as gravity.
b. it is counteracted by lift.
c. it is a downward force acting on the airplane.
d. all of the above.
e. none of the above.

2: Which of the following is true about thrust?

a. it is counteracted by lift.
b. it is produced by the engine or engines of the aircraft.
c. any amount of thrust will increase the airplane's airspeed.
d. all of the above.
e. none of the above.

3: Which of the following actions will result in a reduced amount of drag?

a. retracting landing gear, if equipped accordingly.
b. reducing the wing's angle of attack.
c. reducing airspeed.
d. all of the above.
e. none of the above.

ANSWERS: 1. D ... 2. B ... 3. D

Back to Section Table of Contents

Rob Shearman, Jr. (cfi@vatstar.com)

Chief Flight Instructor, VATSTAR
DISCLAIMER: all information contained herein is for flight simulation purposes only.
revised June 2017

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