Posted: 4/19/2010 8:40:39 AM EDT
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Look what they're rolling into the McKinley Climatic Lab at Eglin today...
http://i961.photobucket.com/albums/ae94/redfish86/20100419_0439.jpg http://i961.photobucket.com/albums/ae94/redfish86/20100419_0440.jpg Initial impressions: Bigger than I expected. Engines are HUGE! |
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I've always been a fan of redundancy (more is better)....why have the plane builders gone to twin engine vs. four..??.. Enough power to fly on one engine and enough reliability to get there without concern that you'll lose both. Lots of certification went into the process before two engines were allowed long overwater flights. In the 'good ol' days' the US Navy and/or Coast Guard had ships patrolling at the midway point in the Pacific as the old prop planes went down with enough regularity to justify having a picket out there for the plane to ditch by if needed. When was the last time you heard of a jet ditching in the mid-ocean? |
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It's come out in recent days that there have been two 747 incidents over the years which experienced quadruple flameouts due to volcanic ash. Four dead engines are just as quiet as two.
In each case they got successful restarts at lower altitude. Many years ago, an L1011 experienced a triple engine flameout (it might have been a crew shutdown of all three) after all three engines lost all of their oil because the mantenance guys neglected to replace the oil tank caps and the tanks were sucked dry. As I recall, they got one restarted long enough to make it back to the runway. The 767 Gibli glider (spelling?) had both engines flame out 'cause they ran out of fuel––ground and flight screw screwup allowing less than the intended fuel load to be put on board. Safe gliding landing at an abandoned Canadian airstrip. A few years ago, I believe it was an A330 lost both engines in the North Atlantic to to fuel starvation––massive fuel leak. A LOOONG successful gliding landing was the result. If there's a point to be made, loss of an engine(s) leading to an iminent crash/landing on modern airplanes has been caused by human error with the number of engines being irrelevant. |
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Quoted: Many years ago, an L1011 experienced a triple engine flameout (it might have been a crew shutdown of all three) after all three engines lost all of their oil because the mantenance guys neglected to replace the oil tank caps and the tanks were sucked dry. That was a Delta bird, and it wasn't the tank caps, it was the fact that during service check, all chip detectors were pulled, o ring removed for replacement, then they broke for lunch. After lunch the same mechanic thinking that he put new o ring on the detectors slapped them in, resulting in a massive oil loss. As a result, FAA changed the rules where one mechanic can do one engine's chip detectors, or if one mechanic does more than one, all engines touched by that mechanic must be ran to check for oil leaks. |
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Many years ago, an L1011 experienced a triple engine flameout (it might have been a crew shutdown of all three) after all three engines lost all of their oil because the mantenance guys neglected to replace the oil tank caps and the tanks were sucked dry. That was a Delta bird, and it wasn't the tank caps, it was the fact that during service check, all chip detectors were pulled, o ring removed for replacement, then they broke for lunch. After lunch the same mechanic thinking that he put new o ring on the detectors slapped them in, resulting in a massive oil loss. As a result, FAA changed the rules where one mechanic can do one engine's chip detectors, or if one mechanic does more than one, all engines touched by that mechanic must be ran to check for oil leaks. Yeah––the memories come floating back. Good call. |
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It's snowing indoors. Boeing performs cold weather tests in Florida!
by GLENN FARLEY / KING 5 News NWCN.com Posted on April 22, 2010 at 7:03 PM EGLIN AIR FORCE BASE, Florida - Boeing Dreamliner number three is in the middle of a cold soak, despite the fact that it's 83 degrees outside. This base may be near the resort destinations of Destin and Ft. Walton Beach, which flank the warm waters of the Gulf of Mexico along Florida's panhandle, but that's not what Boeing and some 98 engineers and technicians came for. They're wearing heavy parkas. Eglin is home to the 46th Test Wing, which punishes airplanes and other equipment through extreme cold, extreme heat and even runs aircraft through sand storms - all inside a controlled, indoor environment. It's called the McKinley Climatic Chamber. Actually, McKinley is several chambers that have tested everything from the giant Air Force C-5 transport to M-1 tanks. Tents, generators, even automobiles are tested there. The McKinley facility was opened up in the mid-1990s to private companies who can pay the $20,000 to $30,000 a day it costs to operate it. "Sometimes we have downtime. We don't always have an Air Force or a military system to go into the laboratory," says Col. Evan Thomas, the Vice Commander for the 46th Test Wing. OK, so why is Boeing here? Normally, Boeing and other companies test their aircraft for cold weather by chasing that weather around the world. Boeing typically goes to Fairbanks, Alaska or parts of Northern Canada. But if the test engineers want to chill down an airplane to 45 below, they can't always expect Mother Nature to deliver. "Here we say minus 45 and they set the knob to minus 45, and work their magic and get minus 45 and it stays there as long as we want it," says Tom Sanderson, one of the flight test directors for this airplane. Besides, since it's spring in the Northern Hemisphere and fall in the Southern Hemisphere, the timing isn't right to find those conditions now anyway. Think of this test this way and you'll know what Boeing is after. Remember the time when you got in your car after a very cold winter night, only to find a dead battery. Boeing doesn't want its airline customer to park the 787 overnight someplace only to find that the plane won't start. So far, so good. Several tests find that the batteries did fine and were able to start up the auxiliary power unit, a small jet engine that usually lives in the plane's tail that provides power to an airliner as the plane sits at the gate. If the APU can start, then the rest of the airplane's environmental control systems, mainly heat, can be brought on line. Dreamliner number three is the so-called "interior's" airplane that has passenger seats and an an actual interior for certain tests. Although, Sanderson says, this test is not required for FAA certification. The chill's been on the 787 starting hours after it rolled into the sealed hangar on Monday. In a few more days, the temperature will swing the other way, to 115 degrees Fahrenheit to test the airplane's performance in heat, but Sanderson says the heat doesn't strain the jet to the degree the cold does. As for the fact that the Dreamliner is made mostly of composite carbon fiber plastic, he says that's really not a factor in the tests. The composite should do fine. The Dreamliner is expected to be in the chamber for about two weeks. |
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There's a cool flutter test video near the bottom of this page:
http://787flighttest.com/787-flight-test-program-progressing/ |
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Other than the immensely dorky name "Dreamliner," that could be a really game changing aircraft. It's going to join the list of official airplane names that nobody calls the things. See also: Thunderbolt II, Fighting Falcon, Stratotanker, Tweet, etc. What else did YOU call the tweet? 
7,000# dog whistle Tadpole ? |
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Other than the immensely dorky name "Dreamliner," that could be a really game changing aircraft. It's going to join the list of official airplane names that nobody calls the things. See also: Thunderbolt II, Fighting Falcon, Stratotanker, Tweet, etc. What else did YOU call the tweet?
7,000# dog whistle Tadpole ? Converter? (Converts fuel into noise) I've just heard it referred to as ta T37. |
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And the test fleet has finally passed 200 flight tests, currently running at 210 flight tests with over 624 flight hours:
787flighttest.com |