Introduction to Airplanes

HistoryMain articles: Aviation history and First flying machine

Many stories from antiquity involve flight, such as the Greek legend of Icarus and Daedalus, and the Vimana in ancient Indian epics. Around 400 BC in Greece, Archytas was reputed to have designed and built the first artificial, self-propelled flying device, a bird-shaped model propelled by a jet of what was probably steam, said to have flown some 200 m.^[7][8] This machine may have been suspended for its flight.^[9][10]

Some of the earliest recorded attempts with gliders were those by the 9th-century poet Abbas Ibn Firnas and the 11th-century monk Eilmer of Malmesbury; both experiments injured their pilots.^[11] Leonardo da Vinci researched the wing design of birds and designed a man-powered aircraft in his Codex on the Flight of Birds (1502).

In 1799, Sir George Cayley set forth the concept of the modern aeroplane as a fixed-wing flying machine with separate systems for lift, propulsion, and control.^[12][13]Cayley was building and flying models of fixed-wing aircraft as early as 1803, and he built a successful passenger-carrying glider in 1853.^[14] In 1856, Frenchman Jean-Marie Le Bris made the first powered flight, by having his glider "L'Albatros artificiel" pulled by a horse on a beach.^{[citation needed]} In 1883, the American John J. Montgomery made a controlled flight in a glider.^{[citation needed]} Other aviators who made similar flights at that time were Otto Lilienthal, Percy Pilcher, and Octave Chanute.

Sir Hiram Maxim built a craft that weighed 3.5 tons, with a 110-foot (34-meter) wingspan that was powered by two 360-horsepower (270-kW) steam engines driving two propellers. In 1894, his machine was tested with overhead rails to prevent it from rising. The test showed that it had enough lift to take off. The craft was uncontrollable, which Maxim, it is presumed, realized, because he subsequently abandoned work on it.^[15]

In the 1890s, Lawrence Hargrave conducted research on wing structures and developed a box kite that lifted the weight of a man. His box kite designs were widely adopted and became the prevalent type of aircraft until 1909.^{[verification needed]} Although he also developed a type of rotary aircraft engine, he did not create and fly a powered fixed-wing aircraft.^[16]

The Wright brothers flights in 1903 are recognised by the Fédération Aéronautique Internationale (FAI), the standard setting and record-keeping body for aeronautics, as "the first sustained and controlled heavier-than-air powered flight".^[17] By 1905, the Wright Flyer III was capable of fully controllable, stable flight for substantial periods.

In 1906, Alberto Santos Dumont made what has been claimed as the first airplane flight unassisted by catapult^[18] and set the first world record recognised by the Aéro-Club de France by flying 220 metres (720 ft) in less than 22 seconds.^[19] This flight was also certified by the FAI.^[20][21]

An early aircraft design that brought together the modern monoplane tractor configuration was the Bleriot VIII design of 1908. It had movable tail surfaces controlling both yaw and pitch, a form of roll control supplied either by wing warping or by ailerons and controlled by its pilot with a joystick and rudder bar. It was an important predecessor of his later Bleriot XI Channel-crossing aircraft of the summer of 1909.^[22]

World War I served as a testbed for the use of the aircraft as a weapon. Initially seen by the generals as a "toy", aircraft demonstrated their potential as mobile observation platforms, then proved themselves to be machines of war capable of causing casualties to the enemy. The earliest known aerial victory with a synchronised machine gun-armed fighter aircraft occurred in 1915, by German Luftstreitkräfte Leutnant Kurt Wintgens. Fighter aces appeared; the greatest (by number of air victories) was Manfred von Richthofen.

First attested in English in late 19th century, the word aeroplane derives from the French aéroplane, which comes from the Greek ἀήρ (aēr), "air"^[1] + πλάνος (planos), "wandering".^[2][3] An ancient Greek term coined from these two words was ἀερόπλανος (aeroplanos), "wandering in air".^[4][edit]

Following WWI, aircraft technology continued to develop. Alcock and Brown crossed the Atlantic non-stop for the first time in 1919. The first commercial flights took place between the United States and Canada in 1919.

Aircraft had a presence in all the major battles of World War II. They were an essential component of the military strategies of the period, such as the German Blitzkrieg or the American and Japanese aircraft carrier campaigns of the Pacific.

The first jet aircraft was the German Heinkel He 178, which was tested in 1939. In 1943, the Messerschmitt Me 262, the first jet fighter aircraft, went into service in the German Luftwaffe. In October 1947, the Bell X-1 was the first aircraft to exceed the speed of sound.^{[citation needed]}

In 1948-49, aircraft transported supplies during the Berlin Blockade. New aircraft types, such as the B-52, were produced during the Cold War.

The first jet airliner, the de Havilland Comet, was introduced in 1952. The Boeing 707, the first widely successful commercial jet, was in commercial service for more than 50 years, from 1958 to 2010. The Boeing 747 was the world's biggest passenger aircraft from 1970 until it was surpassed by the Airbus A380 in 2005.

A Boeing 737 airliner - an example of a fixed-wing aircraft

Controls

Main article: Aircraft flight control system

A number of controls allow pilots to direct aircraft in the air. The controls found in a typical fixed-wing aircraft are as follows:

• A yoke or joystick, which controls rotation of the aircraft about the pitch and roll axes. A yoke resembles a steering wheel, and a control stick is a joystick. The pilot can pitch the aircraft down by pushing on the yoke or stick, and pitch the aircraft up by pulling on it. Rolling the aircraft is accomplished by turning the yoke in the direction of the desired roll, or by tilting the control stick in that direction. Pitch changes are used to adjust the altitude and speed of the aircraft; roll changes assist the aircraft in turning in conjunction with the rudder. Control sticks and yokes are usually positioned between the pilot's legs; however, a sidestick is a type of control stick that is positioned on either side of the pilot.
• Rudder pedals, which control rotation of the aircraft about the yaw axis. There are two pedals that pivot so that when one is pressed forward the other moves backward, and vice versa. The pilot presses on the right rudder pedal to make the aircraft yaw to the right, and on the left pedal to make it yaw to the left. The rudder is used mainly to balance the aircraft in turns, or to compensate for winds or other effects that tend to turn the aircraft about the yaw axis. Several aircraft including the Ercoupedispensed with rudder pedals by linking the rudders to the ailerons for simplicity.
• A Throttle or thrust lever for each engine. These control the power produced by the engines and hence airspeed. On piston-engine powered aircraft Engine Mixture Control levers will also be present.
• Brakes, used to slow and stop the aircraft on the ground, and sometimes for turns on the ground.

These were largely standardized during World War I - prior to which many aircraft manufacturers had their own systems.

Other controls can include:

• Flap levers, which are used to control the position of flaps on the wings.
• Spoiler levers, which are used to control the position of spoilers on the wings, and to arm their automatic deployment in aircraft designed to deploy them upon landing. The spoilers reduce lift for landing.
• Trim controls, which usually take the form of knobs or wheels and are used to adjust pitch, roll, or yaw trim. These are often connected to small airfoils on the trail edge of the control surfaces called 'trim tabs'. Trim is used to reduce the amount of pressure on the control forces needed to maintain a steady course.
• A tiller, a small wheel or lever used to steer the aircraft on the ground in conjunction with or instead of the rudder pedals (primarily found on larger aircraft).
• Undercarriage retraction levers, to raise or lower the undercarriage, for reduced drag while in flight.
• A parking brake, used to prevent the aircraft from rolling when it is parked on the ground.

The controls may allow full or partial automation of flight, such as an autopilot, a wing leveler, or a flight management system. Pilots adjust these controls to select a specific attitude or mode of flight, and then the associated automation maintains that attitude or mode until the pilot disables the automation or changes the settings. In general, the larger and/or more complex the aircraft, the greater the amount of automation available to pilots.

On an aircraft with a pilot and copilot, or instructor and trainee, the aircraft is made capable of control without the crew changing seats. The most common arrangement is two complete sets of controls, one for each of two pilots sitting side by side, but in some aircraft (military fighter aircraft, some taildraggers and aerobatic aircraft) the dual sets of controls are arranged one in front of the other (in tandem). A few of the less important controls may not be present in both positions, and one position is usually intended for the pilot in command (e.g., the left "captain's seat" in jet airliners). Some small aircraft use controls that can be moved from one position to another, such as a single yoke that can be swung into position in front of either the left-seat pilot or the right-seat pilot (e.g., Beechcraft Bonanza).

Aircraft that require more than one pilot usually have controls and displays intended to suit each pilot position, but still with sufficient duplication so that any of the pilots can fly the aircraft alone in an emergency. For example, in jet airliners, the controls on the left (captain's) side include both the basic controls and those normally manipulated by the pilot in command, such as the tiller, whereas those of the right (first officer's) side include the basic controls again and those normally manipulated by the copilot, such as flap levers. The unduplicated controls that are required for flight are positioned so that they can be reached by either pilot, but they are often designed to be more convenient to the pilot who manipulates them under normal conditions.

An unmanned aircraft is controlled remotely or via means such as gyroscopes or other forms of autonomous control.

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• Modern glass cockpit - the screens display the same information as dials would have