Quote:
Originally Posted by Ancient Seraph
Actually.. both turn radius and rate of turn have nothing to do with lift, but a lot with speed.
Low speed = Low turn radius, and high rate of turn. The extra lift provided by the bi-wings only means it can maintain a way lower airspeed, thus a lower turn radius and high rate of turn.
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I'm sorry, but that's not true. How well can you turn when your elevators have been shot out?
Lift is only lift when you are flying with level wing tips. As soon as you roll your plane onto it's side, that lift then becomes turn. Which is why you lose altitude if your wings are exactly perpendicular to the ground.
Lift and turn are relative to the ground, not the plane. But the force resulting from the shape of the wing is relative to the orientation of the plane. So as you change the plane's orientation, you alter the effect of the wing relative to the Earth. What you say would be true if you use the rudder to turn. But you don't. You roll the plane onto it's side then use the elevator to turn.
Again, I'm not going to go into the physics of a wing because you can google it if you don't already know, but the upward force on a wing (i.e. lift on a level plane) is a function of it's forward speed (and curvature of the top surface).