Ever since i’ve began playing infinite flight i’ve noticed, when cruising the plane is almost always tilted upwards, and i’ve always wanted to know if its normal or am I doing something wrong, the only planes i know that don’t do this are the 737 series, a320 series and A333
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How much upwards is it, if it is only a few degrees it’s fine…
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Yes on most heavies like the 777 series its just a few degrees, but sometimes it still looks as if its acending still, and the 787 always looks like its still climbing, i usually cruise at M 0.87
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It is perfectly normal for planes to have a few degrees of angle of attack.
In the B787, at least, this is quite fast. The B787 usually cruises at M0.85, and most planes are between M0.78 and M0.84.
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I think there was a thorough discussion regarding this somewhere in the forum but I can’t find it. Was it that either you’ll need to trim or you don’t need to trim because that’s the normal state of the wings - as the fuselage were installed at a different angle in relation to the wing, that’s why at normal cruise the fuselage seem to be tilting upwards?
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This is normal, and required. Otherwise planes couldn’t fly. The wings need the uplift of the air floating over and beneath the wings.The angle is low and most passengers don’t recognize that the plane isn’t aligned 90 degrees horizontally. This is also taken into account when it comes to interior design. The seats and desks are also adjusted to the aoa. Otherwise menu and stuff could slip of the desk.
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Just a note, the nose pitch of an aircraft is not an indication of whether its climbing or descending. Thats mainly related to the power setting. Pitch primarily controls airspeed.
An aircraft pitched very high upwards with not enough speed or power will certainly come down very quickly, with catastrophic results!
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Yes…today I did a flight from Jeddah to Athens in a 777 and was cruising at FL370…I also noticed this thing
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From what I recall, planes normally fly slightly nose high. Also @Awesome_Aviation welcome to the community!!!
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The 787 has a feature that enables a bit of flaps in cruise to improve efficiency IRL which is not in IF, which results in higher-than-usual AoA. Some people will use flaps 5 to compensate (it uses a bit less fuel apparently as well)
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Although normally flaps cause a lower nose pitch and lower AOA…
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IF doesn’t simulate cruise flaps so the 787 has higher AoA than IRL
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Its as normal as you may expect!
Take this example. Took this just the other night. You can see that in cruise at FL360, our nose was about 2.5 degrees up while our flight path was level with the horizon. Giving us an angle of attack of… yep, you guessed it, 2.5 degrees.
Aircraft weight, speed and altitude will all play a factor in how high up your nose will be in cruise.
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I remember some long haul flights many years ago on B747s, and you really felt like walking uphill when coming back from the toilet!
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As long as its not too much its normal.
The tilt upwards during cruise is a hugely important effect. It’s how the wing makes enough lift to exactly compensate the weight, which is what keeps the aircraft flying along a constant path.
There is some speed (in theory) fast enough that this tilt or AoA (Angle of Attack) should be able to approach zero and still make enough lift to overcome weight. But that may be faster than the rated max speed of the aircraft.
So all practical flying speeds require AoA to be more than zero. And the slower you fly, the bigger the angle needed:
Less speed means less mass of air moving over the wings generating lift. So to compensate for the lower amount of air being forced to curve over the wing, you need to increase the amount of the curve. Less speed → lower airflow → more airflow curve needed ( a way of doing more with less).
So in this irl case, at cruise speed, the angle is a miserly 2.5 degrees. When back down to 250knots it’s going to be a noticeably higher tilt to get the curved path shape of the airflow to make up for the lower amount of airflow. Just prior to flap speed, it will have to be higher still.
And you put on flaps because there are design limits on how far you can use AoA alone to make enough lift at the slowest speeds.
Isn’t it true that at a given weight and IAS, your straight and level AoA will be the same at all altitudes, because IAS measures the same dynamic pressure irrespective of altitude?
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