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Nebakenezzer posted:The ask the Pilot guy at Salon has a pretty good write-up of everything that went wrong with the Quantas A380: And while that's a whole load of bad poo poo happening, what gets glossed over is how much went right. One catastrophic engine failure causing a cascade of worse and worse problems, and yet the system worked. One weak link didn't break the entire chain, and aside from the groomers having to change a load of seat cushions and some inconvenience, everybody got home safe and alive not much more than a day or two late. When you consider how bad it could have been, it's a good thing the safety nets are there, and this incident highlights that they should never be lessened or removed in the name of cutting costs. As for repairing the plane for pride's sake, it's really out of Quantas' hands. Repairs like those required are well beyond the scope of an airline's maintenance organization. It'll be Airbus's own specialists and engineers who do this one, and if they can't do it, it can't be done. Beyond that, it'll be the underwriters who decide whether the it's even worth trying to repair. Quantas can probably still get out on loophole since I doubt they actually own the plane anyway, it's likely leased.
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Nov 22, 2010 04:06
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Nebakenezzer posted:*This is of course presuming defence contractors are not purposely proposing things that are insanely complex and over ambitious to begin with to keep the thing perpetually in development Defense contracts 101:
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Nov 22, 2010 04:47
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grover posted:And keep the Harrier around another 30 years? No, there should've been a purpose-built aircraft to fill that niche role, rather than force a square peg in there. The B is going to be the least-produced, but is responsible for most of the cost overruns and design delays. Force-feeding the Marines to buy off on an F-35 variant has driven up the cost for every other buyer, US and overseas, and all in the name of parts commonality...but by it's very nature, it can't take advantage of that "benefit." I agree the Marines needed a new aircraft...but the F-35B was the wrong answer.
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Nov 22, 2010 05:08
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Godholio posted:No, there should've been a purpose-built aircraft to fill that niche role, rather than force a square peg in there. The B is going to be the least-produced, but is responsible for most of the cost overruns and design delays. Force-feeding the Marines to buy off on an F-35 variant has driven up the cost for every other buyer, US and overseas, and all in the name of parts commonality...but by it's very nature, it can't take advantage of that "benefit."
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Nov 22, 2010 05:16
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BonzoESC posted:If you think the B is expensive, wait until you see what a new VTOL airframe with different avionics, engines, controls, &c. from any other airplane costs. The cost of American R&D and production is mind boggling compared to other countries
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Nov 22, 2010 07:00
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grover posted:The F-35B is, of the 3 variants, the one where there is really NO alternative at all but to fix it. In the whole scheme of things, reinforcing parts of the structure doesn't seem to be that big of a deal. There are always engineering changes/updates in projects this big. Fatigue cracks aren't always as easy as 'just add more metal' because load will usually take a single path unless it has reason to evenly distribute through others, which is difficult since metal isn't very elastic and so they have to both contain similar overall stiffnesses. More often than not, fatigue failures require a fundamental change to the design i.e.: reduction of sharp radii/corners or reconstruction of the load path so that spot stresses are reduced. Fatigue failure is also very hard to predict because by virtue of it being initiated by highly stressed regions, the material in said regions behaves in a very plastic manner (as opposed to elastic) and so crazy non-linear effects come in to play. It may be quite easy to patch this up, but especially with carefully designed, light things such as airframes, it's always possible that it is in fact very hard to solve too. Also, a lack of a fatigue limit is a bitch to deal with, for example when working with aluminium.
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Nov 22, 2010 10:28
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Godholio posted:No, there should've been a purpose-built aircraft to fill that niche role, rather than force a square peg in there. The B is going to be the least-produced, but is responsible for most of the cost overruns and design delays. Force-feeding the Marines to buy off on an F-35 variant has driven up the cost for every other buyer, US and overseas, and all in the name of parts commonality...but by it's very nature, it can't take advantage of that "benefit." And gosh durn it, nobody wants old airplanes.
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Nov 22, 2010 14:22
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So, back to jet porn. Sadly, cannot find a higher res. RAAF F111 does a very low flyby somewhere in Queensland.
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Nov 22, 2010 14:26
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Is that a model aeroplane? The F111 is loving huge, that one looks tiny with respect to the boat and dingy in the background EDIT - Nope, I'm wrong. Found this on flickr: 
Megillah Gorilla fucked around with this message at 14:32 on Nov 22, 2010 |
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Nov 22, 2010 14:28
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Revolvyerom posted:And gosh durn it, nobody wants old airplanes. B-52 C-130 RIVET JOINT AWACS The list goes on and on, for most of these planes they have either tried to develop replacements and found them to either fail to exceed the current aircrafts specifications or abilities or the solution was far too expensive.
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Nov 22, 2010 14:43
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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LTNMcs4-29Y The arrestor cable was a good idea.
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Nov 22, 2010 14:46
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Gorilla Salad posted:Is that a model aeroplane? The F111 is loving huge, that one looks tiny with respect to the boat and dingy in the background They are pretty big, at least the one in static display at Sheppard AFB seemed MASSIVE.
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Nov 22, 2010 15:05
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The F-111s are pretty drat big...wiki says 73 feet by 63 feet with wings spread.
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Nov 22, 2010 15:55
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Pretty funny to think that it was originally intended to be a carrier borne fighter.
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Nov 22, 2010 15:59
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Godholio posted:I don't think a dedicated observer aircraft is launched, but usually when blue air (the good guys, now usually F-22s since the F-15s are gone from Tyndall) flies they're in a 2-ship or 4-ship formation. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xISpZYajveA I always get a kick out of watching this clip (I have a .avi of it from a few years ago) as I grew up and still live in close proximity to their base airport (PDX). You can see and hear them take off regularly. The flash video doesn't show everything. When the missile is fired at 4:08, you can't really see it go off course due to the flares. I'll have to post the .avi if it's not too large. It's at home on my desktop and I'll be there later this week.
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Nov 23, 2010 08:04
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^^^That's exactly the video I had in mind, actually. One of my best memories from being stationed at Tyndall was sitting at the red light at the main gate from the non-flightline side of the base (a major highway splits the base into two sections) a few weeks after I got to the base. I saw an F-4 dressed in old-school camo take off...followed by a 4-ship of F-15Cs...followed by a 2-ship of F-22s. All in the duration of a single red light. I was rock hard for hours. Revolvyerom posted:Would it be cheaper to develop an entire line of aircraft to fit a niche role? That's a huge reason right there. More likely is that the airplane was designed to fit other roles slightly better, as it's expected to be required to fill them more heavily, but can be somewhat adapted to fit another role if need be, for less than the cost of an airplane that might do it better, but needs to be developed. I don't think the Marines need a 5th generation VTOL fighter to replace the Harrier. So yeah, I actually do think they could've done better than drive the cost of the F-35 into Raptor territory. Godholio fucked around with this message at 12:24 on Nov 23, 2010 |
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Nov 23, 2010 12:21
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Do the Marines really need fighters at all?
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Nov 23, 2010 12:48
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2ndclasscitizen posted:Do the Marines really need fighters at all?
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Nov 23, 2010 13:37
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Having an aircraft with a decent air-to-air capability gives them a lot more autonomy so they don't have to rely heavily on the Navy or Air Force for air superiority. I think they can justify it, but it shouldn't be their primary goal. Now I'm curious if the Marines actually wanted in on the F-35 program and wanted to stay in it as the program spun out of control, or if they were politically driven into it.
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Nov 23, 2010 13:40
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drunkill posted:So, back to jet porn. Sadly, cannot find a higher res. NO DADDY DON'T TAKE THE AWESOME PLANES AWAY FROM ME  I'm really going to miss the F-111 
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Nov 23, 2010 15:30
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They're very much going the wrong way with military aircraft these days. Simple is good. These flying supercomputers are putting way to many eggs in a basket.
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Nov 23, 2010 15:55
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The trend now with a lot of the higher ups in the Air Force and defense community is smaller, slower and cheaper. There's several proposals out there to take a plane like the Texan II http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beechcraft_T-6_Texan_II and instead of just using it as a trainer, 'put a kit on that bitch' and use them for CAS and CAD roles. I know other countries are doing it, and it's about time we did the same. We can't afford to have F-22's and F-35's zooming around at plaid speed while the guys on the ground have nothing for Close air support. Fun fact I can't prove about the Texan II: The ejection seats make up half the planes total cost.
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Nov 23, 2010 17:07
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Nerobro posted:They're very much going the wrong way with military aircraft these days. Simple is good. These flying supercomputers are putting way to many eggs in a basket. Simple isn't really going to get the job done the way we want to get it done. Sensors to the shooter is the trend that kind of took it a step too far. Its very easy to oversubscribe your pilots/shooters. Now there is some more thought going into *what* gets to the operators. Atleast from what I've seen.
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Nov 23, 2010 18:16
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Used Sunlight sales posted:The trend now with a lot of the higher ups in the Air Force and defense community is smaller, slower and cheaper. That's why they're considering smaller, slower, and cheaper DRONES. The utility of an orbiting Hellfire platform that's a laser-designator away from destroying the poo poo out of anything you want is far, far higher than anything else in a CAS role, especially given that there is no pilot to put in harm's way and no worry about how hazardous the airspace is. F-22s + Predator-style drones = the future Air Force.
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Nov 23, 2010 18:20
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JBark posted:New pictures of the Qantas A380 damage: Has anyone come across the leaked report or just what reports are writing about?
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Nov 23, 2010 18:51
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Tremblay posted:Simple isn't really going to get the job done the way we want to get it done. Sensors to the shooter is the trend that kind of took it a step too far. Its very easy to oversubscribe your pilots/shooters. Now there is some more thought going into *what* gets to the operators. Atleast from what I've seen. I think they're making lots of mistakes. Stealth is passive tech. Jets need only minimal electronics to keep users from doing stupid poo poo and making them flame out. It takes less horsepower than is available in a micro controller to keep an inherently unstable aircraft pointed forward. And yet, somehow, we're running around with the equivalent of a cray supercomputer in these things? IIRC, there's two of them, for redundancy. We're to the point where the price for aircraft and maintenance means we need to maintain very, very small stocks of them. That single F22 going down took out what, 0.8% of the entire inventory? I can think of half a dozen ways of defeating such a small force of aircraft. What immediately comes to mind is very large bags of gravel... Or any opposing force with numbers 4x greater than the attacking sortie. Unless we're talking naval vessels, taking out a single anything shouldn't make that sort of change to the inventory. The design groups, and number of roles we want a single aircraft to fulfill is downright stupid at this point. Multi-role never beats specialist. I am not "all for" drones. I think if there's a place where they can have clear room to defend against anything, I think they've got a place. (I'm thinking fleet defense, and foreign airspace patrols in particular) Taking great care as to what information reaches your pilot matters. I think not nearly enough thought has been put into this. I think this is something that would easily be solved by a very small group of people, instead of the very large committee style planning that goes on now.
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Nov 23, 2010 19:09
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BonzoESC posted:If you think the B is expensive, wait until you see what a new VTOL airframe with different avionics, engines, controls, &c. from any other airplane costs. This is the argument. It really boils down to if you think the F-35B will be worthwhile or not. I see the thing like the space shuttle: too complex, built for too many jobs, and going to be stupidly expensive to maintain. Build a new VTOL airplane with modern, proven technology, and even if it costs a lot up front, having a reliable, easy to maintain plane will be worth it in the long run, both financially and militarily. It also confuses me why the Brits want carriers that don't have catapults on them. Carriers are expensive; you might as well go the whole hog. Nerobro posted:Taking great care as to what information reaches your pilot matters. I think not nearly enough thought has been put into this. I think this is something that would easily be solved by a very small group of people, instead of the very large committee style planning that goes on now. This. This is one of the reasons the A10 turned out so well.
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Nov 23, 2010 19:28
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Nerobro posted:I think they're making lots of mistakes. Stealth is passive tech. Jets need only minimal electronics to keep users from doing stupid poo poo and making them flame out. It takes less horsepower than is available in a micro controller to keep an inherently unstable aircraft pointed forward. I really can't get into this in a fashion that does it justice. The electronics suites on these planes are used for a lot more then keeping it aloft. I agree that the number of roles a platform is required to perform fucks things up.
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Nov 23, 2010 21:23
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Tremblay posted:I really can't get into this in a fashion that does it justice. The electronics suites on these planes are used for a lot more then keeping it aloft. I agree that the number of roles a platform is required to perform fucks things up. This x1000. Flight training in the Air Force isn't just learning how to steer an airplane, it's how to operate SYSTEMS. I don't even sit in the front of the pointing the drat thing at anything, and I spent almost 2.5 years getting my wings. Why? Because my poo poo was designed before my dad started first grade. Bring on the computers. PLEASE.
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Nov 24, 2010 02:01
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-11842597quote:Boeing Dreamliner 'a failure', says Qatar Airways boss Is this the first time that the head of an airline has come out attacking a manufacturer like this? I've never heard of it happening before.
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Nov 26, 2010 00:23
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Mahmoud Ahmadinejad posted:http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-11842597 Akbar Al-Baker has done this before. In fact, airline CEOs do this fairly often, and for one reason; they want to rework their deal. By bringing down some bad press, it will put pressure on the manufacturer to give them more of a discount. Qatar Airways has 30 787s on order, with options on 30 more, which in total would be worth something like $10 billion at list prices. That's a lot of change, especially for a product that will be at least three years late when all is said and done. And by calling out Bombardier, he's basically saying that he might be amenable to re-ordering the CSeries, if the terms are favorable to the airline. That said, there seem to be more questions than answers regarding the performance of the CSeries right now, especially with respect how much of its performance advantage is down to the engines, as opposed to the airframe. If most of the advantage is in the engines, Airbus and Boeing can simply re-engine the A320 and 737 and retain their dominance of that market. Airlines typically have quite a bit of power to negotiate and re-negotiate terms with an airframer, especially if their aircraft haven't entered the production pipeline, and they have been known to resort to some pretty shameful tactics to get their way. MrChips fucked around with this message at 01:13 on Nov 26, 2010 |
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Nov 26, 2010 01:10
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I'm a private pilot. It's pretty much the best thing ever. I want a DA40 like the deserts miss the rain.
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Nov 26, 2010 01:16
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I really liked the original 2 seat Katana. I flew 152's for my flight training and every time we stopped in London and saw those sleek new Katanas I felt I was missing out. We got to see the prototype DA40 and it is a really nice plane. I got checked out on the Katana a few years later and really liked it. Nice little plane with good performance with low fuel consumption.
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Nov 26, 2010 04:02
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I looked at the DA20. Unfortunately it can't do IFR
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Nov 26, 2010 07:27
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I don't know which thread this should go in, but I'll post it here because it's both airplane and car related: Some friends and I were discussing James Bond cars and the essential features thereof. An ejection seat is mandatory, of course. That got me thinking about Martin-Baker's Tie Club. So I emailed Martin-Baker on the issue, and amazingly, they actually replied: If you were to use one of their seats to eject from a car, they'd give you a tie. ("driving off a cliff" and "armed villain passenger" were the exact car-ejection scenarios I asked about).
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Nov 26, 2010 08:58
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Bad Angus! Bad!
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Delivery McGee posted:I don't know which thread this should go in, but I'll post it here because it's both airplane and car related: Some friends and I were discussing James Bond cars and the essential features thereof. An ejection seat is mandatory, of course. That got me thinking about Martin-Baker's Tie Club. Martin-Baker is now the coolest company ever.
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Nov 26, 2010 09:45
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ApathyGifted posted:Martin-Baker is now the coolest company ever. Yeah. I replied to that asking if you'd get a tie for using an ejection seat turned into an office chair (with the rocket motor and canopy breakers still attached, and assuming you're on the top floor with a conveniently-placed skylight) to escape from a burning building. Will post the verdict when I get it. He should be in by now, it's past 10am there. Edit: they also still own and use a pair of Gloster Meteors (half the still-flying Meteors in the world -- there's one other in the UK and one in Australia) for testing ejection seats. I am far too amused by the fact that neither has a canopy over the rear seat (I mean, it makes sense not bothering to replace it after every test, but still).  Click here for the full 800x508 image.  Click here for the full 800x532 image. Chillbro Baggins fucked around with this message at 10:48 on Nov 26, 2010 |
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Nov 26, 2010 10:25
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It would be amazing to get an old ejector seat installed in a beauty salon, with yellow/black handles holding the perm-dome thing.
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Nov 26, 2010 13:32
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Look at those sexy bitches.
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Nov 26, 2010 16:15
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Canceling the F35B would be hilarious just for how much it would screw over the Italians, them having built a new carrier that I don't think can be converted to CATOBAR. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Italian_aircraft_carrier_Cavour_%28550%29
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Nov 26, 2010 18:42
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