“AIRPLANE STRUCTURES – STRUCTURAL UNITS” 1941 U.S. ARMY SIGNAL CORPS AVIATION TRAINING FILM 52194

This WWII era training film produced by Signal Corps in 1951 looks at the different structural units of an aircraft, the materials used in each one, and discusses elementary physics that affect airplane performance and durability. These structural units are the fuselage, wings, control surfaces, and landing gear. The film ends by showing how different loads affect the structure of the aircraft. The airplane shown at the start of the film appears to be a North American P-64, also known as the North American Aviation NA-68 fighter. Six NA-68s ordered by the Royal Thai Air Force were seized before export by the US government in 1941, and used by the USAAC as unarmed fighter trainers. 0:09 Official Training Film 1-211 War Department, produced by Signal Corps, 0:24 “Airplane Structures – Structural Units, 0:47 aircraft taking off, 1:11 a blueprint showing the four main structural units of an aircraft, 1:51 a single engine aircraft taking off, 2:10 the horizontal and vertical stabilizers and ailerons on a single engine aircraft, 2:41 landing gear being retracted on the ground, with the plane on a scaffold or jack 2:56 an aircraft engine, 3:07 workers transporting aluminum alloy sheets, 3:34 different types of tubing needed for structural integrity, 3:55 different types of parts and materials needed in an aircraft including gaskets, fabric hoses, copper pieces, bronze bearings, 4:24 cockpit canopy, 4:30 protective coating being applied to aluminum sheets materials, 5:08 steel and aluminum parts being coated to prevent corrosion, 5:42 aircraft doing combat maneuvers, 6:04 animation highlighting how maximum positive and negative loads might be induced on the aircraft fuselage, 6:55 animation showing where drag hits the aircraft, 7:01 aircraft landing, 7:13 aircraft demonstrating combat maneuvers. We encourage viewers to add comments and, especially, to provide additional information about our videos by adding a comment! See something interesting? Tell people what it is and what they can see by writing something for example: “01:00:12:00 -- President Roosevelt is seen meeting with Winston Churchill at the Quebec Conference.“ This film is part of the Periscope Film LLC archive, one of the largest historic military, transportation, and aviation stock footage collections in the USA. Entirely film backed, this material is available for licensing in 24p HD, 2k and 4k. For more information visit