ANGLE OF ATTACK

Angle of Attack

Angle of Attack is the angle of an object relative to the direction that it is going in.

Take the airplane wing in the accompanying picture. When an aircraft is speeding down the runway before taking off, there is zero (or very little) angle of the wings relative to the direction of the airflow passing over it.

As soon as the aircraft is going to take off, the nose pitches up and the angle of the wings relative to the airflow starts to increase, up to the point that the aircraft lifts off and then the angle of the airflow narrows until it is once again in direct line with the direction of the wing.

It is this period where that angle is greater than zero that we are interested in because the same applies to land vehicles where the angle of the wheel changes relative to the direction that the vehicle is traveling in.

The higher the speed of the vehicle:

The less this angle of attack should be.
The slower should be the change in the angle of attack.

When the angle of attack is too great for the speed of the vehicle, then the risk arises of inducing a slide or flipping the vehicle.

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