Helping learners understand the Four Forces that balance an aeroplane

Jul 17, 2026

I updated the Four Forces component interactive component this week - the 3D component that helps learners see the four forces balancing an aeroplane in flight in real-time.

Here’s a screenshot - click on it to view the actual 3D scene that you can manipulate and fly:

Four Forces — a 3D aeroplane with labelled lift, weight, thrust and drag arrows and airspeed and climb gauges

This component was actually the first one which I created at the start of the year, so it was fun to come back and see what I could improve (I need it for my next briefing on steep turns).

What I changed

I updated so the aeroplane itself is translucent by default, which allows…
Using the one true scale for all four forces (rather than exaggerating thrust and drag as is done in most text books) - thrust is really only a fraction of the weight;
I enabled each arrow to start where its force actually acts - lift high in the wing, thrust at the propeller etc., which also enables
grey lines extending those lines of actions into a moment quadrilateral that becomes a neat rectangle in straight and level flight. This makes the pitching couples visible.

You can brief straight and level flight, the climb, the glide, the stall and (with the banking control enabled) turns, all against the same aircraft. The speeds are configurable per aircraft — never-exceed, normal operating and stall speeds, plus a nominal cruise — so the gauges and 3D model can match the aeroplane your students actually fly.

Try it out

Have a play with the live Four Forces component on the components site. That page also documents the attributes for pointing it at your own aircraft model and calibrating the speeds, so with a little bit of html/web skills you can tailor it to the type you brief most often. For an overview of the whole library, see Open Aviation Components.

And, like every Open Aviation Component, it’s free to embed anywhere — your school’s website, a web-based ground briefing, or a slide deck. Improvements to the component flow back to the community under the same licence.

If you build something with it, or have an idea for another component, get in touch — I’d love to hear about it.