PT6A posted:

God bless the person who figured out how to make turbine engines, is all I can say.

Captain Apollo posted:

Everybody post your favorite Insignias/Arts/Patches/Girls from WW2 era airplanes. be sure you add the context '490th bomb group' etc

quote:

SINCE the moment that three British Airways Concordes touched down at Heathrow in 2003, on their final journey before being retired from service, air-heads have pined for the days of supersonic passenger jets. Concordes were cramped and noisy, but they were the very emblem of the jet-setting elite. One’s time had to be very valuable indeed to justify paying thousands of pounds extra to shave three-and-a-half hours off of a transatlantic trip.

One of Concorde’s most wide-eyed fans was Richard Branson. The airline boss apparently kept a model of the plane—with his Virgin livery replacing British Airways’, naturally—on his desk. Little wonder, then, that he is putting his effort behind the latest in a line of pretenders to the supersonic crown.

This week Boom Technology unveiled a prototype of a plane that will eventually be capable of flying at Mach 2.2. That would allow the three-engine, 50-seat jet (pictured above) to cross the Atlantic in three hours and thirty minutes, about the same as the old Concorde. It hopes to test a one-third-sized model in the skies next year, with the final version ready to take paying passengers in 2023—20 years after the Concorde’s final flight.

That might be optimistic. According to the Wall Street Journal:http://www.wsj.com/articles/supersonic-passenger-jet-edges-closer-to-reality-1479242115

"The project, which could cost more than $1bn, has initial support from several venture funds and is taking an unusual approach by adopting various technologies already certified by regulators. Still, future funding remains uncertain, daunting regulatory hurdles remain and the tight test schedule, aiming to certify a jetliner able to cruise 10% faster than the now-mothballed Concorde, could stretch due to unexpected challenges."

The project, which could cost more than $1bn, has initial support from several venture funds and is taking an unusual approach by adopting various technologies already certified by regulators. Still, future funding remains uncertain, daunting regulatory hurdles remain and the tight test schedule, aiming to certify a jetliner able to cruise 10% faster than the now-mothballed Concorde, could stretch due to unexpected challenges.

Nonetheless, Boom has some big-hitting partners. It will source engines from General Electric and avionics from Honeywell. Meanwhile Virgin Galactic, Mr Branson’s space firm, will help with manufacturing and flight-testing.

But even if the concept flies, it will have to overcome more prosaic hurdles. Blake Scholl, Boom’s chief executive, says that supersonic tickets will cost about the same as subsonic business-class ones. He calculates the market to be worth $100bn. But here lies the rub. Life at the front of a conventional jet is now a pampered one. Boom’s planes will not feature lie-flat beds, showers and cocktail bars. How many executives will be prepared to forgo such luxuries to arrive for their meetings early?

Nebakenezzer posted:

I'm not sure if this is behind a paywall or not, but the Economist has some words on the new SST:

http://www.economist.com/blogs/gulliver/2016/11/return-mach

MrChips posted:

It is sort of behind their pay wall, but you can still read it for free under many circumstances.

And no, they are wrong unfortunately. Even for the well-heeled, supersonic air travel is in the coffin. Barring a massive and heretofore unseen improvement in engine technology, as well as sonic boom mitigation, there just isn't any way it can be made to work at a level that any manufacturer would spend the billions of dollars to build a supersonic passenger aircraft, and a corporate aircraft even less. Sales in all size classes of corporate aircraft have been falling steadily, even in the face of economic recovery. That does not bode well for the future.

Nebakenezzer posted:

Really? The boom problem (pun sorta intended) is so bad that even limiting supersonic to oceanic flight it's pretty much a deal killer? I'm skeptical of Boom's efforts, but I gotta admit that I'm surprised the problems are so bad even a fancy plane exclusively for the 0.01% can't surmount them.

tactlessbastard posted:

As awesome as SSTs are, I feel like the internet and telepresence have made them obsolete more than airline economic forces.

Slo-Tek posted:

I'd much MUCH rather spend another 2 hours in my G5, fly out of my local executive airport, and into any airport I want.

Platystemon posted:

If CHINA could build a SST, you know they would.

BIG HEADLINE posted:

As long as billionaires keep accruing more billions, they'll always be valued as 'something I have that lesser people can't justify owning.' The ability for them to be able to get from A-B-C in the time it takes someone with a ~subsonic~ private jet to get halfway from A to B is intrinsically valuable...to them.

Mortabis posted:

The 2008 financial crisis coinciding with high fuel costs had a lot of companies looking hard for places to tighten the belt; they're not loosening it back up now that it's over.

Platystemon posted:

Nebakenezzer posted:

I'm not sure if this is behind a paywall or not, but the Economist has some words on the new SST:

http://www.economist.com/blogs/gulliver/2016/11/return-mach

hobbesmaster posted:

Business class doesn't feature the ridiculous showers and poo poo though, that's "first" or "suites" or whatever the gently caress and those aren't on short transatlantic routes.

They don't necessarily need lie flats either, they'd need excellent wifi instead though.

PT6A posted:

Lie-flats are the best because they have excellent legroom sitting down, as well as lots of positions other than fully flat for you to get comfortable in on a long flight.

Frankly, if the BA flight I flew business on across the ocean had had wifi, it would've been superior to being in my house in most every single way -- comfy, and people bring me food and great booze whenever I ask for no additional money. I don't think, for the same price, I'd give that experience up just to save a few hours.

sellouts posted:

Just fly American. I flew it 2 weeks ago to London and the wifi was spectacular and the seat far better than Club World.

Flying private isn't comfortable for long transatlantic flights compared to First. But it is private and is flexible.

PT6A posted:

Lie-flats are the best because they have excellent legroom sitting down, as well as lots of positions other than fully flat for you to get comfortable in on a long flight.

Frankly, if the BA flight I flew business on across the ocean had had wifi, it would've been superior to being in my house in most every single way -- comfy, and people bring me food and great booze whenever I ask for no additional money. I don't think, for the same price, I'd give that experience up just to save a few hours.

KYOON GRIFFEY JR posted:

I would gladly trade the amenities of business class to cut my travel time by 50%.

Mortabis posted:

You're looking at a lot more than 4x the price I'd wager.

KYOON GRIFFEY JR posted:

I would gladly trade the amenities of business class to cut my travel time by 50%.

Tetraptous posted:

It is possible to reduce (but not eliminate) the acoustic effects of sonic booms by shaping the fuselage. NASA and DARPA had the Shaped Sonic Boom Demonstrator program a decade or so ago, which modified an F-5 with a bulbous nose.




This shaping causes the energy from the boom to be more distributed over time/space in the far field, resulting in the peaks of the typical N-wave to be rounded off--there's still a lot of low frequency energy left, but the parts of the boom that bother people are somewhat attenuated. The renewed push for SSTs relies on people convincing FAA/ICAO that modern vehicles can be designed to have low booms that will be accepted by the community, and to allow the ban on supersonic flight to be replaced with some sort of noise certification.

bennyfactor posted:

Wait, are the pinstripes on the side of the jet literally the chart of its sonic boom performance? I've looked at pictures of that funny jet for years and just now realized it.

Tetraptous posted:

As for boom.aero, I think it's a ridiculous endeavor, bordering on the fraudulent. They simply don't have the resources to build, but more importantly certify, anything like the 1/2-size Concorde they've been pushing. Companies like Boeing and Airbus nearly bankrupt themselves developing new subsonic airliners and getting them to production. You can look at boom.aero's about page to see their best people; they have a couple people who know a thing or two, but nothing special compared to the rest of the traditional aerospace industry. Nothing like the advance concept divisions of the big companies, or even smaller ones like Cessna and Gulfstream. What fairy dust do they have that the rest don't?

slidebite posted:

In other news, Canada just announced it's going to buy 18 Superhornets to supplement the old as gently caress A's as a stopgap until the government decides whether we're going to poo poo or get off the pot with the F35 partnership.

Nebakenezzer posted:

My gut instinct is to describe this as good news.

slidebite posted:

No poo poo. I hope Boeing is giving them a minimal set of choices for customization so we'll actually get something. Like maybe the spotlight.

At least with the C-17/CC-177 they didn't gently caress that one up royally (AFAIK at least).

MrChips posted:

I think for such a small fleet of aircraft, the number of RCAF wrenches on those Super Hornets will be minimal. They'll contract out the maintenance for sure.

I don't think are exactly a ton of options available to customise a modern combat jet. If you want something different, my impression is you need to pay for the engineeribg and certification yourself.

That said, I hope they get the spotlight in the nose again!

CarForumPoster posted:

You can do a pretty wide range of avionics and subsystems things without a new airworthiness/type cert but the engineering and qualification of said subsystems will screw you hard as none of the commercial stuff will have been tested to fast jet specs and use cases.