Wing

Awing, or airfoil, is a surface that produces a lifting force when it moves through air. A flat surface creates lift if it moves through air at the correct angle, like a kite. A curved sur­face produces more lift and less drag.

Wing Shapes

Most aircraft wings are curved on top and flatter underneath. Fixed-wing air­craft generally have one of four types of wing: straight, swept, delta, or swing. Small, slow airplanes usually have wings that stick straight out from the sides of the plane’s body, or fuselage. Straight wings are not suitable for high­speed flight, because they create too much drag. Wings that are angled back­ward, called swept wings, are better for high-speed aircraft, such as jet airliners. A delta wing is a triangular wing that
is very efficient for supersonic flight. It produces little lift at low speeds, how­ever, so delta-wing aircraft have to take off and land faster than other aircraft, and they are not very maneuverable. One solution is to fit the plane’s nose with small, movable wings called canards. The canards create more lift and swiveling them makes the plane react faster during maneuvers.

A few planes have swing wings, which are straight at low speeds and swept back at high speeds. Their wings actually move, swinging backward as a plane accelerates. This is called variable geometry, or swing-wing technology. These planes are rarely built, however, because the swing-wing mechanism is heavy and complicated.