Airfoil Cockpit Drag 
Pilot Institute
JUNE 4, 2025
This setup makes the wing less efficient overall, but it can reduce drag, weight, and cost compared to using a separate tail. High aspect ratio wings reduce drag and improve performance during climb or slow flight. On the flipside, a decrease in aspect ratio will result in higher drag. This type of design is a reflex airfoil.
Pilot Institute
JULY 11, 2025
Lift, drag, and handling correlate well with IAS in the lower atmosphere. Making the wing relatively flat on top with a blunter leading edge and more curvature on the bottom gives you a supercritical airfoil. This type of wing redirects the shockwaves further aft on the wing, reducing drag. roughly) up to about Mach 5.0.
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Vintage Aviation News
MAY 2, 2025
The drag chute was used on landings to help brake the airplane’s speed. The door to the cockpit area is open, showing a view of the ladder that folds down to be used by the pilots to enter and leave the area. The B-47A represented a significant departure from earlier, more rigid aircraft designs. NASA Photo
Vintage Aviation News
JUNE 18, 2025
Palmer and his team created wooden models of various airfoils, engine cowlings, and tail surfaces in a rented garage before bringing them to Caltech in Pasadena, where they utilized the school’s wind tunnel to test the designs until they were satisfied with the results. Raymond Delmotte in the cockpit of a Caudron C.460
Pilot Institute
JUNE 12, 2025
As you reach high speeds, especially near or above the speed of sound, you can then sweep the wings back to reduce drag. They delay the formation of shock waves that cause wave drag. You can adjust the wings using a manual control in the cockpit. But when you’re doing high-speed dashes, sweeping the wings back will reduce drag.
Flying Magazine
MAY 30, 2025
That combination of requirements was incompatible with very thin wings, and in the early days of aviation it was widelythough not universallybelieved that thin birdlike airfoils were best. Early builders probably did not realize how great the drag of wires was. One of Munks findings was that stagger had little influence.
Simple Flying
JUNE 14, 2025
One of the most influential cockpit levers on a jet’s take-off is the flap handle. Hinged panels at the wing’s trailing and leading edges transform a sleek airfoil into a low-speed lift sail. Increasing camber, flaps propel an airliner to lift off at lower speeds, trading a little drag for a lot of lift.
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