What Are The Different Parts Of An Airplane?
Airplanes come in many shapes and sizes, but they all have similar parts. Look at
this picture to see what they are!
The body of the airplane is called the fuselage. This includes the
cockpit, where the pilot sits during the flight.
Airplanes have wings to lift them up into the sky. On the rear side of
each wing is a part that moves up and down called an aileron. Ailerons help
the airplane turn right or left. Flaps help the airplane fly slowly for
landing.
The tail that sticks straight up like a shark's fin has a part called the rudder.
The rudder helps turn the nose of the airplane right or left.
The flat part of the tail has a part called the elevator. The elevator
makes the airplane's nose move up or down.
Since the wings on an airplane don't move up and down like a bird's wings do, something
has to make the airplane go forward. That's where the engine and the propeller
come in. The engine turns the propeller and the propeller pulls (or in some cases pushes)
the airplane through the sky!
A Typical Airplane Cockpit
The pilot sits inside the airplane in what is known as the cockpit. There
are many instruments and switches to operate things like radios so that the pilot can talk
to the tower.
The pilot controls the airplane by using either a control wheel or a control
stick. These controls let the pilot move the elevators on the tail and the
ailerons on the wings, which in turn move the airplane.
The elevators move by pulling back and pushing forward on these controls. When
the pilot moves the controls to the right or to the left, the ailerons on the wings move
up or down.
On the floor of the cockpit are pedals that operate the brakes and rudder. When
the pilot pushes the right pedal, the rudder turns to the right. It will turn left
when the left pedal is pushed.
click photo to see a real cockpit in a plane that you might get to fly! This is the cockpit of the Cessna 172 typically flown by our Flight Leader, Steve Taylor.
For fun, you can learn about the common instruments &
radios in a typical aircraft cockpit at the Cyber-Cockpit website
The Four Basic Forces of Flight
There are four forces that affect an airplane in flight: Lift, Gravity, Thrust
and Drag.
GRAVITY is the force that keeps all objects on earth. If we pick up a ball
and let it go, it will drop quickly to the ground because of gravity.
LIFT is a force that an airplane must create to overcome the force of gravity.
An airplane does this by making lift with its wings as the airplane moves forward.
An airplane's forward movement is produced by THRUST. Thrust is created by
the engine and the rotating propeller.
Just as lift overcomes the force of gravity during flight, thrust must overcome the
force known as DRAG, which resists movement of an object — in this case, our
airplane!
Flying
Facts