Air brake (aeronautics)

Not to be confused with Aerobraking.
Not to be confused with Air brake (road vehicle).
Air brakes on the rear fuselage of a Eurowings BAe 146-300
Convair F-106 Delta Dart air brake deployed
A U.S. Air Force F-16 Fighting Falcon showing its split speed brakes inboard of the stabilators or "tailerons"
An F-15 landing with its large dorsal air brake panel deployed
Extended DFS type air brakes on a Slingsby Capstan

In aeronautics, air brakes or speed brakes are a type of flight control surface used on an aircraft to increase the drag on the aircraft.[1] When extended into the airstream, air brakes cause an increase in the drag on the aircraft. When not in use, they conform to the local streamlined profile of the aircraft in order to help minimize drag.[2]

Air brakes differ from spoilers in that air brakes are designed to increase drag while making little change to lift, whereas spoilers reduce the lift-to-drag ratio and require a higher angle of attack to maintain lift, resulting in a higher stall speed.[3]

  1. ^ Wragg, David W. (1973). A Dictionary of Aviation (first ed.). Osprey. p. 13. ISBN 9780850451634.
  2. ^ Aircraft Design, Kundu 2010, ISBN 978 0 521 88516 4, p.283
  3. ^ "Speed brake". Britannica. Retrieved 28 December 2019.