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I like the SR-71 and all, but there's nothing like the sound of a four-engined Douglas. I'd post pictures, but I'm usually busy gawking when I see one fly by. I actually chose my dorm room so I could see the C-54s, DC-6s and C-46s flying by. Anyone who can tell whether it's a DC-4 or DC-6 just by the sound of the engines is all right in my book.
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Mar 8, 2010 02:20
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Godholio posted:I guess I need to represent. The E-3 is not sexy at all, is a maintainer's nightmare, smoky as gently caress, and the engines sound like banshees, but drat if it doesn't get the job done. I saw one crash while standing next to a kid whose dad was on board. That was not a good day. Advent Horizon fucked around with this message at 08:59 on Mar 11, 2010 |
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Mar 11, 2010 08:42
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Ola posted:I went to click your profile looking for Alaska before I noticed it in your title. Was it the one that lost its engines due to birds? That would be the one. We were sitting at the bus stop before school. The smoke cloud drifted over my Jr. High and made that day's Friday Run suck. I'll never forget that smell. On a different note, my dad used to do remote site camps, and he once talked my mother into coming along. They were flying in a Caribou from Southwest Alaska when they encountered bad clouds and icing conditions. They sat in the back watching the wings build ice and the engines suck ice when the co-pilot came back. He told them the controls were covered in ice and they were aimed straight at Mt. Iliamna. He told them that he and the pilot were doing everything they could, but that they should be ready. Then he went back to the cockpit. My parents sat for a while in the back and took in what he said. My mother wasn't taking it horribly well, from what I understand. A little while later, the co-pilot came back again. He said that he and the pilot had managed to stand on the controls hard enough that they'd pulled to the side of Iliamna, but that the plane had built so much ice it was in a slow descent and probably wouldn't make it across Cook Inlet (a 20 mile wide body of water). He said he did have some good news, and that was that even if one of the engines suck enough ice to die that they should be able to restart it since the plane had a backup electrical system. As they slowly descended over Cook Inlet, the plane got low enough and warm enough that some of the ice melted. They wouldn't crash into the ocean! They just didn't have enough fuel to make it to Anchorage. So they diverted to Homer. A close friend of theirs, whom they met for the first time later but he remembered the incident, happened to be sitting on the runway waiting to take off. He said when their Caribou landed he thought it exploded. All the ice came off in one huge smashing cloud. They pulled up to the fuel pump, shut down, and the pilot got out to fill 'er up. It turned out they'd pulled up to a closed pump, so they'd need to taxi over across the airport to the FBO. The pilot got back in the plane and...nothing. The entire electrical system had shorted out. My mother never went on another bush trip again.
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Mar 11, 2010 18:25
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That's the same reason Francis Gary Powers got shot down - we flew the same routes every time. I know the military is conservative, but not changing that stupid idea in 50 years is a bit much.
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Mar 12, 2010 00:18
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Godholio posted:You were at Elmendorf? Yeah, there have been 2 Class-A mishaps resulting the loss of an aircraft. Yukla 27 ingested a flock of canadian geese and lost two engines immediately after leaving the ground, too late to abort. They tried to go around for an immediate emergency landing, but only made it about 2 miles before going down into a wooded area. 24 on board. I wasn't at Elmendorf, I grew up in Eagle River. It's a small town/sorta suburb just north of Elmendorf AFB/Ford Richardson. I was in 7th grade at the time. I can't find too many pictures online, but I distinctly remember the shape of the wreckage field. I've camped less than a mile from there several times. It shook up a lot of people in the area.
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Mar 12, 2010 00:30
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Godholio posted:I've never found pictures of the wreckage, just the scorched area where 80k lbs of fuel turned everything to ash. That was the wreckage. The only things easily identifiable were an engine or two and landing gear.
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Mar 12, 2010 00:57
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MrChips posted:The Air Force considers a B-52, B-2 or B-1 orbiting for hours at a time in a combat zone to be too expensive and too risky. That's why they're entertaining the idea of small counter-insrugency aircraft once again, such as a weaponised version of the T-6 Texan II trainer, or the hilariously named Cessna Combat Caravan, amongst others. After all, you don't really need a $150 million stealth fighter aircraft or a billion-dollar bomber to operate in an environment with virtually no air- or ground-based threats, apart from MANPADs and small arms fire. If they're thinking about using Caravans, what about the Twin Otter? Seems like that might be a better idea. If an engine goes out you've got a spare, and you can haul more weaponry around (or more fuel for more loiter time).
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Mar 12, 2010 05:24
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azflyboy posted:De Havilland Canada stopped building Twin Otters in 1988, so I doubt the USAF would have been interested in buying aircraft that aren't made anymore. The first all-new-production aircraft flew last month; there are supposedly 10 more already in various stages of production. I wouldn't have suggested something out of production if there weren't good odds of it being back into production soon...Here's to hoping Viking gets their production certificate ASAP. Once they get their production certificate, I'm hoping the put the Beaver and Otter back into production. Especially in the case of the Otter, I think there's a real market for new-production aircraft. I can't think of another single-turbine (yes, I know they were originally piston, but when was the last time you saw one without a nose job?), single-pilot aircraft that can operate on floats and carry 14 passengers. When you look at the operating economics for flightseeing, the Otter bests the Twin Otter hands down. I've noticed that all of our local operators are favoring their Otters over their Beavers, and I'm pretty sure it's because the numbers work out better there, too. In the case of the Mk.3 Beaver, I don't even see it competing. Same engine, half the passengers? No go. Biggest problem for the Beaver? Getting more Wasp Juniors. Oh, how I want those to go back into production too.
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Mar 12, 2010 19:11
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InitialDave posted:He was also madder than a box of frogs. He kept that thing stored, serviced and ready to fly at the drop of a hat for years, at enormous expense. He did that with several aircraft, including some that he flat-out lost and his accountants kept paying the storage fees on. There are several incidents where he flew into an airport and took another mode of transport out, and the aircraft stayed until his death. One such aircraft, his personal DC-6, is still flying out of Fairbanks for Everts Air Cargo. I believe it's the lowest-hour airworthy six in the world. Oh, and Hughes once publicly argued against an aqueduct to Las Vegas because he felt it would be detrimental to the health of residents, since they should be drinking milk instead. Tindjin posted:Yea I love that it has a longer wingspan and taller than the AN-225 and the Airbuss A380 (beats the A380 height by 4 inches!) and the whole thing is made outa wood with prop engines. I can't help but think that Airbus did that on purpose. It just seems like one of those records you'd honor for the sheer insanity of the thing. Too bad the Hercules never technically flew. Advent Horizon fucked around with this message at 05:12 on Mar 13, 2010 |
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Mar 13, 2010 05:08
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Being a 500 pound chain smoker doesn't disqualify you from getting your Sport Pilot. You don't need to pass a medical. You do, however, need to have not failed a medical. So if you fail your regular medical you can't fly, but if you know you're going to fail and just let it expire you're fine. Edit: I'd also like to see the plane that could fit a 500 pound chain smoker and still qualify as a Light Sport. Maybe if you moved the controls to center in a Skycatcher...
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Mar 15, 2010 21:31
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Ola posted:But this is the complete opposite. This is the most incredible NTSB report on a GA accident I have ever read. Put something soft on your desk, your jaw will be doing multiple drops. Goddamn. We need to rename bad electronics after that guy. The ONLY reason duct tape should be holding your plane together is because you were out hunting and a bear attacked the skin.
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Nov 27, 2010 21:18
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Ola posted:This guy didn't bother with the Phase 1 testing... That's not what the logbooks say.
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Nov 28, 2010 14:22
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I've been really out of it for a while, so I'll post this from my wedding:
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Jan 1, 2011 06:36
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You guys can oogle all the little stuff, I'll take those two lonely looking C-123s off their hands. Or maybe a few of the Convairliners I see. There should be enough R-2800s in those piles to keep them going for a while.
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Jan 12, 2011 17:57
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I don't think many people (anybody?) were actually using LORAN as a primary navigation system anymore. It was a backup for GPS. The thing that sucks is if you were in a place that had several LORAN towers, now you can't sight-navigate by them. In Cook Inlet you used to be able to figure out where you were on a map 20 miles from shore just by spotting the towers, even over fog banks. Oh, and we actually still have LORAN stations running. We have treaties that require them operational (I think a couple near Canadia are still operating). At least, that's the last I heard. Back to aircraft... Kitfox has an LSA kit now with the Rotec 2800 engine. Man, when the day comes to get my license it'll be tough to choose between that or a Super Sport Cub.
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Jan 15, 2011 17:43
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I'm honestly not up on all of the latest aircraft navigation systems (heck, I'm not up on the old stuff - I'm not a pilot yet), but I can say that I definitely appreciate them. On our flight out of Juneau Wednesday we took off into a headwind then aimed directly at a mountain less than a mile away to gain altitude and turn around. I don't think they made that departure at night even 5 years ago, but since they've been testing the new equipment in Juneau more and more departures/arrivals have been possible. I have to say I was quite amused to see Southwest advertising that they have it at 11 airports on their route system now - All of Alaska's planes have had it for years and they use it a very large portion of the time.
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Jan 17, 2011 06:51
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I knew that much, the state (not the airline that I know of) has also been the testbed for ADS-B.
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Jan 17, 2011 08:36
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If you want loud try watching an Antonov AN-124 take off sometime. They land in Fairbanks fairly often on refueling stops and I could hear them from inside my dorm room several miles from the airport with the windows closed. I can only imagine how loud (and awesome) it would be to see a TU-95 flying over. I still prefer the sound of an R-2800 though. There's nothing like the sound of a four engined Douglas, but I'll be darned if I didn't prefer seeing the C-46s fly over. They can't climb as fast as a DC-6 so they'd fly over campus balls-out low enough to count rivets. UNF. Content!: After spending probably millions of dollars designing a mobile control tower system, they put it into a trailer that looks like this? Couldn't somebody have had the vision to stick it into a conex or something? Or is it just so they can install them incognito in trailer parks when the NWO takes over? 
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Feb 3, 2011 18:29
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The FEMA trailers are/were newer.
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Feb 3, 2011 19:01
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Godholio posted:No, that would be the XB-36, the nuclear-powered nuclear bomber. That was never nuclear-powered, it only carried a reactor (that they did light off to see if it would work without crashing the plane). If we're going to go for most  project, I nominate Project Orion. They calculated around one fatal cancer from fallout for every liftoff.
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Feb 4, 2011 06:49
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They're stretching the definition of 'minor work'. The other guy they sold one to spent over a million dollars (using skilled volunteer labor) to get the thing in the air. If it can't be seen flying, it isn't worth buying.
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Feb 8, 2011 09:45
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Lilbeefer posted:Why does every forward point of the Blackbird point down? Something to do with airflow in supersonic flight? I think a lot of it has to do with subsonic flight. A lot of those older aircraft that were designed to fly fast were horrible at slow speeds. One way to keep razor-thin wings aloft was just angle the plane up and overcome it with the engines. http://www.dfrc.nasa.gov/gallery/movie/SR-71/HTML/EM-0025-04.html You can see in that video just how much they have to keep the nose up to keep the plane flying. So, yeah, static lift, basically.
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Mar 10, 2011 20:06
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slidebite posted:A forest firefighting company Those have been for sale for a while now. I hope they're restored to flight soon in some form. They're only about half the price of a new Super Cub, but I'd bet even a free dog wouldn't hold a candle to their expenses.
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Apr 5, 2011 22:02
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azflyboy posted:At high power settings (takeoff and climb), each engine will burn through about 6 gallons of oil per hour, although that drops to about 2.5 gallons per hour each during cruise. Regarding the B36 (different engines from the same family), I've heard it said: "I don't recall an oil change interval because the oil consumption factor handled that." My dad said when he would charter DC6s (back when you could still hitch a ride on a cargo flight) the pilots told him to watch and make sure oil was coming out, because if it stopped that meant they were out. I think each R-2800 costs in the low six-figures to overhaul now. I suspect that modern rebuilders have some automated trickery to help with the labor hours. I know that Everts will buy entire planes just for the engines, ferry them to Fairbanks and dump them (engineless) in their back yard.
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Apr 6, 2011 07:19
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slidebite posted:The google streetview of that place is pretty drat depressing. Look across the street and make sure you keep going until you get down by Rig Road. That's the lot where they park Convairliners and C-46 Commandos missing wings. Up the road past the terminal (where Google has Bettles Air listed) is where Brooks Air Fuel is located. He's his own graveyard; none of the planes are abandoned, they're just waiting for him to crash the ones ahead in line  On a much much happier note, here in Juneau I see that the Wings of Alaska Otters are all getting their tails installed for the summer season. They pull the tails off every fall so that they'll fit through the Beaver-sized door of their hangar for winter servicing. From the not-so-depressing-but-not-so-happy files, I came across this the other day looking for information on the Alaska Airlines planes that need inspection: http://www.sitnews.us/Kiffer/AlaskaAirlines/040511_ak_airlines.html.
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Apr 6, 2011 23:09
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Nebakenezzer posted:OK, I knew about the pitot tubes Icing over. Maybe this shows my lack of understanding about this sort of thing, but I don't understand how that by itself could have been fatal. Specifically I don't understand why the computer would "shut off all built in protections as a result of data loss." I assumed that the crash was caused by pitot tubes icing + another unspecified problem, possibly to do with the storm. I remember reading those automated service messages that the plane broadcasted, and just to my Layman's ears, it sounded like there had been some sort of major electrical failure. Imagine driving a car in the dark without a speedometer and the headlights are out. You don't know how fast you're going, and in fact (because it's an old Cadillac or some other equally numb land yacht) you can't feel that you're actually moving at all. Your two choices are assume you're going too slow and speed up, or assume you're going too fast and slow down. Also assume that if you go more than a few mph faster than you're supposed to the steering wheel will suddenly fall off the car. What would you do? If you answered 'slow down and try to get my bearings', you just made the same choice the computer did. Congratulations, you crashed an Airbus.
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Apr 6, 2011 23:18
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Are the carrier aircraft going anywhere other than the desert?
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Apr 14, 2011 01:13
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Godholio posted:I think it's more likely that NASA will either convert them to carry something else or mothball them (maybe at DM) until they have something worth carrying. I don't see these really getting scrapped, and I agree they'll never end up in a museum...they're just not interesting enough on their own for most people (even most aviation museum patrons). I don't see them being converted to anything else. They're both old as gently caress and have been extensively modified to carry orbiters. On top of that, they had commercial lives before NASA bought them. I'd like to see a shuttle farewell tour. Bring one around to all the major air shows. Race the unlimiteds around it like a pylon
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Apr 14, 2011 17:58
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gigButt posted:In other news, WN is getting the B738! And the FL WN merger is taking shape. They will operate the 717, FL business class will be phased out, and WN stated they will try to keep as many small cities (please keep Akron/Canton) as possible. I really have to ask - what's so great about Southwest? I really don't understand why you would want to fly without assigned seats. It's so much nicer to be the last person on the plane, staying longer out in the terminal where the air is fresh yet knowing I have a seat near the front. No baggage fees I understand, but I've flown mostly carry-on for years because I've lost luggage my entire goddamn life, and the one time that should have been a good experience (when they delivered it to my grandparents house over an hour away from the airport) they threw the luggage over the fence into the pool. I always see cheap fares advertised, but how often do you actually get that low rate?
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Apr 19, 2011 23:09
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They really make me wonder where the 797 is going to end up. If they keep the same-old, same-old with the engines under the wings they spend a lot of money essentially to get where Airbus is now. If they put them in the rear they'll have to hang huge engines sideways. Not to mention that we don't even know what engine design they'd go with. I'd love to see them end up around where MD was with the propfan designs. I think they have them quiet enough now, don't they? Another thought would be mounting them on top of the wings like a HondaJet. That could be fun.
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Apr 24, 2011 05:27
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Off the top of my head I have 5 different backpacks that I currently use and I'm planning on buying another later today or tomorrow. Only one of those was under $100, and even that went over when you consider that I took it to a tailer and had custom work done to it. This is also not counting luggage or duffle bags.
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Apr 28, 2011 00:49
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Heel height or shoe size?Mr.Peabody posted:Who the hell takes a backpack to the tailor? I had a pocket modified to be a proper padded laptop pocket. It's very nice and you can't tell it didn't come that way. I've had that backpack for right at 10 years now and there's not a torn bit on it despite my abuse. primitive posted:Saddleback Leather is made in the US. Saddleback stuff is actually made in Mexico.
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Apr 28, 2011 22:54
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I can't be the only one who thinks that's a fake, right? That plane moves entirely too much to keep the wings attached. Even assuming they could stay attached through movement that violent, they'd at least be flapping a bit. Instead it looks like a plane attached to a string, I just can't see the string. I want to believe.
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May 4, 2011 05:48
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How's this for aeronautical insanity: I rented a Forest Service cabin on top of a mountain last night and most of the people I work with went up for a party. One woman and her husband hiked up with the intention of going back down later because he had to catch a boat to work at 5 in the morning (he's an equipment operator doing some work at a mine for the next several months). After having a couple of drinks they decided they wanted to stay. I'm not sure what number he called, but at about 10pm he arranged for a helicopter. At 6am on the dot that thing landed next to the cabin, picked them up, and whisked them home. He actually had to charter it home to get his stuff and then on to the mine since the boat had long since left. Given the model whirlybird (MD 500) it was kind of like a real-life Magnum, PI with snow.
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May 13, 2011 04:13
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I've seen the cable setup before (never in action), and that really seems like the way to go. gently caress trying to land on that moving crash scene.
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May 13, 2011 22:10
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This B-36 movie...What's the title?
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Jul 30, 2011 19:19
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Anybody going to Reno? We're starting to plan a trip for the 2012 races, but I'm not sure how many days to plan for or how much to spend. Pit passes are obviously a must, are reserved seats?
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Aug 23, 2011 03:26
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Tentative plans are Fri-Sun, maybe stay at the Peppermill (which is disturbingly affordable) since the shuttles stop there. I'm curious how the reserved seating works, since I didn't really see any seating charts online. My wife isn't nearly the nut I am, so that's why only 3 days. Would 2 days be a better bet with a non-nut wife in tow?
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Aug 23, 2011 06:16
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They don't do any circles to land here, since the weather is usually way too bad for it (and our doppler coverage is severely lacking, especially in the winter), but the do it on takeoffs pretty often: http://m.youtube.com/index?desktop_uri=%2F&gl=US#/watch?v=2o46rxK8Lpw I hope that link works... Oh, and that white thing you stare at the whole length of the runway is a glacier. Our airport is pretty badass. We were leaving in January a couple years ago, in a blizzard, and snow was falling at about a foot an hour. We lined up on the runway, the plows lined up in front, they scrambled and we followed. Hell. Yes.
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Sep 10, 2011 06:08
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I don't care how much more comfortable they are, I hate the look of planes with the wing spar above or below the fuselage. Those ATRs look great until you realize that the spar is hidden in the clouds and it really looks like a hunchback in person. The old Fairchild Merlins - those were some good looking planes. Too bad they were slightly smaller in diameter than e people crammed inside
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Sep 11, 2011 01:03
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