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Aircraft Motion Activity
If so instructed by your teacher, print out a worksheet page for these problems.


Beginner's Guide to Aerodynamics is a "textbook" of information prepared at NASA Glenn Research Center to help you better understand aerodynamics. Click Beginner's Guide Index to access the list of slides. Open the slide called Aircraft Motion (with text) and read the explanation on Newton's Second Law and how it applies to the motion of an airplane. Then using the information shown at Aircraft Motion Activity, complete the problems designed to demonstrate your ability to complete calculations involving the motion of an airplane.

  1. What is the smallest angle in degrees between the lift and drag forces?

    (a) 0o (b) 90o (c) 180o (d) 270o (e) 360o 

  2. What is the smallest angle in degrees between the weight and lift forces?

    (a) 0o (b) 90o (c) 180o (d) 270o (e) 360o

  3. What is the smallest angle in degrees between the thrust and drag forces?

    (a) 0o (b) 90o (c) 180o (d) 270o (e) 360o

  4. What is the smallest angle in degrees between the weight and thrust forces?

    (a) 0o (b) 90o (c) 180o (d) 270o (e) 360o

  5. When an airplane (or any object) is moving at a constant speed, the forces acting on the airplane must be

    (a) unbalanced, which means that the total force is not zero

    (b) balanced, which means that the total force is zero

    photo of fighter jet

    A fighter jet is flying at 37,000 feet with a constant speed of 1,310 km/h. The jet has a weight of 110,000 N and its engines provide a thrust of 106,752 N (using afterburners).

     

  6. What is the jet's height (altitude) in meters?
    Equations for this problem
    (a) 1.13 x 108 m (b) 61,248 m (c) 8,679 m (d) 356 m (e) 11,277.6 m
  7. What is the jet's mass? [Hint: Use F = mag = W, where ag = 9.8 m/s2.]

    (a) 520,120 kg (b) 11,224.49 kg (c) 3,527 kg (d) 614,853 kg (e) 215 kg

  8. How much lift force is being applied to the jet?

    (a) 512,128 N (b) 5,634 N (c) 110,000 N (d) 9,935 N (e) 106,752 N

  9. If the jet engines are creating a thrust of 106,752 N, what is the drag force applied to the jet?

    (a) 512,128 N (b) 5,634 N (c) 110,000 N (d) 9,935 N (e) 106,752 N

     

    Suppose the jet engines are providing a thrust of 100,102 N while the drag force is only 90,167 N.

  10. What is the total unbalanced (or net) force on the jet?

    (a) 512,128 N (b) 5,634 N (c) 110,000 N (d) 9,935 N (e) 106,752 N

  11. What will be the jet's acceleration?

    (a) 0.89 m/s2 (b) 4.35 m/s2 (c) 0.36 m/s2 (d) 4,253 m/s2 (e) 65.3 m/s2

  12. If the jet is cruising at 223.47 m/s and accelerates at 0.25 m/s2 for 1,530 seconds, what is the jet's final speed?

    (a) 401.28 m/s (b) 605.97 m/s (c) 731.67 m/s (d) 634,521.6 m/s (e) 3,452 m/s

  13. Using the data from the previous problem, calculate how far the jet traveled while it accelerated during the 1,530 seconds.

    (a) 401.28 m (b) 605.97 m (c) 731.67 m (d) 634,521.6 m (e) 3,452 m

  14. If the jet cruised at a speed of 1,310 km/h for 2.53 hours, how far did it travel?

    (a) 517.79 km (b) 4,639.00 km (c) 218.42 km (d) 6,547.23 km (e) 3,314.30 km


Related Pages:
Standards
Worksheet
Lesson Index
Aerodynamics Index

 

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Editor: Tom Benson
NASA Official: Tom Benson
Last Updated: Thu, May 13 02:38:26 PM EDT 2021

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