SchorschFrom the system i come from it is the duty of the accuser to actually come up with the proof/evidence to prove his point .
For example you could say something to the the twelve engineers that started work in 1999 on preliminary design. By chance I am in aircraft design and so I see the tremenduous amount of work necessary, the loops and many other things. Basically a team of twelve would need a dozen years to come to a point where the basic issues are identified and the business case can be set up.
If the allegation is that boeing didnt have a through technical base and spent billions on testing and development , then i agree they didnt , the SC was cancelled before it got to that design phase , most of the money is spent after product launch ( as a indicator roughly 90% of 787’s 6 billion odd allotted was spent after it got launched) Most of the pre launch money is for product verification , wind tunnel testing ,model conceptulaizaiton , basic performance parameters , finding correct production balance , finding the partners , working with the partners , Risk assesment , Study of alternatives , Figuring out Design milestones , getting everything ready , rallying customers etc etc The SC acheived many of those but was terminated before it could fulfill the others .
Do you have any indication for the last sentence or how do you conclude that they did that all? One press release actually talks of wind tunnel tests, stating it were the first tests. While you can maybe do some more CFD on a conventional aircraft, most design tools will be unreliable near the speed of sound where aerodynamic modelling is toughest. The regular talk of “modern design tools” is an indication that they did not invest the money for the real design tools (transonic windtunnel-hours are pricey!).
If the allegation ist boeing used the SC as a smoke screan then you dont have any evidence to support your hypothesis and it is up to the person that provides the theory to proove it right . The Lack of factual evidence is MY EVIDENCE in this case !!
I not obsessed and actually don’t care much about your opinion in this case, as I am pretty sure that you won’t buy it whatever I do. But the complete lack of any real sources, sketches, anything is a clear indicator. I found something more elaborate from the DLR (German Aerospace Research Center).
PDF
Funnily, the figure you posted recently with the local Mach numbers is from that very study, it is not from Boeing. :diablo:
Boeing cannot be not serious and claim to be serious this would get them in trouble with the SEC for lying to the investors . Even false press releases can land a CEO in jail technically , they have to be very careful . Lucky? Maybe boeing got lucky with 911 as they started to listen to the voices inside there managment which were right . Both ? probably , they had atleast 3 publically revealed concepts at that time , and going for one finally doesnt mean that the other 2 were smokescreans !!
I am not saying that they technically lied. If they say they talked about something with subcontractor, I am sure they did. I don’t think the press releases were fake. I say that the “development” was kept very superficial with low resources spent on it while much more resources were invested into the B787 preliminary design. And that was the reason for the SC: to be unsuspicious. They talk to Spirit Aerosystems about a composite fuselage? No problem, they want to fly higher and need a stronger fuselage. Turns out, they didn’t want to fly higher but have more differential pressure at conventional altitudes. Many system issues are pretty much independant of the airspeed or Mach number (electric brakes).
Aren’t you surprised that no press release covers the most important question of aircraft design: “Which engine do we take?” Putting a high-bypass (BPR) engine on such an aircraft would be very tricky, possibly demand an elaborate intake. Lower BPR engines for civil use were not available. And engines take their time to develop.
Technically, nodoby needed to lie, they just did not say that the whole program was not meant serious from the start, which actually needs not to be communicated to the lowest level.
I am not accusing Boeing of violating any law.
At the time of its “design” and the cancellation in 2002, I think the majority of people in the industry just considered the issue emberrassing: hail a new concept, say it is the best in the world, stay unspecific about it in many ways, and then axe it and hail the new concept.
SchorschSeconded!
And spending less time in, & getting to, airports would save time more efficiently (i.e. without the fuel burn) & more comfortably, than saving flight time.
Concur.
The terrorists actually won as we are burning our time waiting to get checked. Somebody recently estimated the annual costs of extra security (assumed 30 min extra time @20USD per hour) in excess of 15 billion USD per year just for lost time.
Are you sure about that? I thought it was scheduled for 8th July.
[remember – this is a British forum :diablo: ]
If I was Boeing executive I would shot the guy who came up with the idea. Better be unspecific. In Europe the date trick doesn’t work anyways
8th July 2007:
US: 07-08-07
Europe: 08-07-07
SchorschIIRC boeing PR after a while just started using Mach .98 instead of .95-.98
See:
http://www.boeing.com/news/feature/concept/factsheet.html
It says .95 to .98
I guess they didn’t really figure it out. More speed, more drag. With best design for transonic, drag rise can be postponed to M0.93 or even .95. Boeing engineers obviously found another sweet spot close to Mach 1. On this sweet spot the whole SC concept was based.
Also IIRC the SC was 200-250 PAX aircraft so a 767 replacement.
The size doesn’t matter, from the aerodynamic point of view a 400 seat SC is not much different than a 100 seat SC.
Thats a very entertaining theory , and it would seem very “street smart” however i dont know how credible it is . Infact no one knows if such was the case . If any one did have evidence then i believe the SEC would like to take a good look at it .
SEC? :confused:
Your neither can prove the opposite, namely that detailed design work was started, given that the Boeing leaders really thought about commiting themselves to the SC.
The lack of market prospective, the enormuous technical risks, the sensitivity to fuel prices, the environmental problems with noise and high-level emmissions, the incompatibility to traditional manufacturing processes, the incompatibility to traditional family concepts, the issues in airport compatibility and finally the lack of any useful engine made the concept a no-go from the beginning.
Charts and texts on the Boeing webpage are shiny and tell us many things, but it does not address any of the issues I raised above. The statement is always “… it will …”
And here directly from Boeing webpage:
In 1999, a team of about a dozen engineers first began significant work on this new design. By fall 2000, they had developed an airplane that looks very much like the current design concept. Additional resources were added to the effort, and it soon became clear that a revolution was at hand.
In early 2001, resources again were added to the effort. Discussions with airlines in North America, Asia and Europe in the first quarter of the year confirmed the design offered exactly what airlines and passengers are looking for: the ability to fly quickly and directly to their destinations while avoiding time-consuming and costly stops at major hubs — a concept known as point-to-point service.
They started with 12 (in words: twelve) engineers and added resources in early 2001. That says all. Preliminary design of an aircraft already involves thousands of man-hours, for conventional aircraft.
Press release talks of initial wind tunnel tests in late 2001 (which indicates that no tests have been done before). Surfing through the press releases I recon that Boeing more or less constructed its supplier base for the B787 in 2002, but talked about the Sonic Cruiser all the time. JAI, Alenia and Spirit are all featured.
Schorschinteresting, i seem to recall an interview with one of Boeing’s vice presidents leading the SC and he said that SC actually is slightly less efficient in terms of comparing with what a theoretical aicraft with the same technology flying at ~M0.82. I recall him saying something on the order of getting that extra 10% faster would require each passenger to pay roughly 20% more and they found that most airlines after post 9-11 decided that it’s not worth it to today’s frequent flyers (that’s what the SC is targeting) and it’s not fast enough to give an extra trip within 24 hours on all the major routes anyways….so no go. But, yes, especially the fuselage is all the hype about the SC and it was turned into the 7E7 technology. However, I do personally believe all of this is a ruse by Boeing to trick Airbus into continuing ahead with the 380. Recall plenty of articles in the early 2000s cautioning airbus’s potential hazard in locking up a huge part of their R&D on a product and leave no extra cash for badly needed improvements to the existing fleet during…….. around this time! In the end, yes, it seems like Boeing (so far) had a slightly better crystal ball! Boeing seems to play the “Oh Airbus we dont’ know what we’re doing so please come and put us out of our misery with the A380” At least that’s what i felt like what Boeing was doing at the time, simply playing dead by claiming point-to-point is better while offering a more expensive airframe for point-to-point (SC) when i do believe they know 10% faster doesn’t make any sense, waiting to bait Airbus to think “Boeing has absolutely no clue with their ‘inferior’ product. You can easily loose 10% of fligth time by sitting at the gates! Wasn’t that too obvious to Airbus as a ruse?
At that time arrogance established at Airbus, then there were several years were Airbus outsold Boeing. At that time you had to convince people that Boeing will not go out of business. Today it is other way around, mainly triggered by A380 delays and the A350 woes, while the latter will turn out to be healthy medicine.
SchorschI think the problem with the SC was that it was radical , eff. was pretty good , however the increase in speed wasnt as significant for airlines to commit . Loosely one can say that the technology which is required to increase speed by 15-20% maintaining similar operating cost can also be used to generate 15-20% more eff. using same cruising speed. Having done that the latter tradeoff was what would make much more money for airlines unless oil becomes very cheap . I think had the SC been 25-30% faster yet with similar Operating cost then it would have appealed more .
SC was supposed to cruise at M0.95 to M0.98, that in an altitude of appr. 45.000ft. A380 and B787 cruise at M0.85 at – let’s say – 35000ft. They can fly up to M0.89.
Related ground speeds:
SC (.98): 1041 km/h
A380/B787: 908 km/h,
Advantage: 15%
SC (.95): 1009 km/h
A380/B787 (.89): 908 km/h
Advantage: 6%
SchorschThat is absurd argument , name me one serious technology on the 787 that will not find its way into future boeing aircrafts ? It is very rare these days to find technology development projects at high scale/stake that are one program specific , most are there to maximize utilization for future products .
Biggest problem of the SC would be transonic drag rise and control at those speeds, additionally engine efficiency, high-lift devices on a highly swept wing, structural arrangement for high dynamic pressures. Nothing to do with a plastic barrel. Actually the fuselage was the only thing you can make quite conventional.
With dynamic pressure being so high Boeing engineers would have had hell of a time making is safe against flutter without building a tank. VD would be beyond supersonic speeds, with controllability maintained you are practicallly building a supersonic jet with all its problems.
SchorschOfcourse one could argue that this was all fake and a cover up , possibly the biggest and most succesfull cover up in recent aviation history (Hey even the CFO of airbus thought that boeing was BS’n with the 7E7) and those scientist , partners , researchers were just playing PS1 in there shops but unless you provide evidence your cover up theory is not going to be acceptable !!
Yeah, you can quote fuzzy press releases and news stories that say “we use the best technology available” for the next decade. It still does not answer the fundamental questions:
My theory:
2: No, no specific Sonic Cruiser technologies.
3: No serious interest. Development of oil prices and customer behavior did not change so dramatically with 9-11.
In conclusion 1: the SC was most likely never considered a likely program for Boeing, at least not by the executive level.
Damn, they didn’t even have a suitable engine!
SchorschVery rarely do they develop technology worth millions or billions of dollars and not develop it with future projects in mind . When boeing considered the Sonic cruiser , they began doing prelimenary preperation for it . This was also the case with the 777 program . My company recieved and completed a production line contract before the 777 was even formally launched . A lot of the work is done before the launch . Boeing probably beleived in the SC for some time however as the situation changed the airlines had different priorities , boeing was forced , they could not ignore the fact that 911 caused a down turn in the market , aviation suffered the most , airlines were going under , what was needed wasnt an aircraft that wa 15-20% faster but one which was 20+% more eff. which could save money for airline , offer more profit etc etc . Obviously boeing had its future airliner lineup when they developed the CFRP barrels for the SC however it wasnt used for the SC because the SC was never launched formally , but a large portion of the research for the SC wasnt specific to it , the Barrels , the elecrical systems , other components such as high humidity and higher cabin pressure etc were not exclusive but could be used basically for any other project . As boeing transitioned to the Project yellowstone they took those aspects and moved on !
There never was anything like a market for the SC. The world was amazed by Boeing’s ideas and at the same time quite amused about its naivity. Turns out, Boeing did never intend to offer an SC seriously (or they could be sure they don’t get board permission). What they needed was time to consider their next step and figure out the market. The B787 was announced in 2003, first flight in 2008. That period of time is far too short to make a whole new aircraft. In fact, they were preparing the field for a new airliner and tried to keep it dark until the business case and technology was dry. Not another B747X proposal which became a running gag in the late 90s.
The move was good and well thought.
Exactly what happened! My sources (ex boeing ) tell me that boeing was about 12-14 months from launching the SC before they switched !
12 to 14 month means: no serious money invested.
Thats official boeing press release!
Which means in straight English: the content of the press release may have connections to the reality, but it may also be pure fiction and “newspeak” .
(@bmused55 and other Boeing fanboys: no, I don’t consider the Airbus’ press releases more serious).
SchorschIf you need to know, I am a Swiss national.
But what you meant to say still doesnt make much sense to me – if the lines of production have been shared between Toulouse and Hamburg, this certainly does not mean that the Germans can claim to have developped and produced the A-320 line alone (and the same apply for the French for the 330/340/380).
I am just saying that one line of Airbus (take Toulouse if you like it more :rolleyes: ) produces more aircraft than all “competitors” except Boeing. Same can be said if say Boing Renton or Boeing Everett. The message: The “big two” are so far ahead of the nearest competitor in terms of
– technology
– customer base
– numbers already delivered and current output
– backlog (A380 has more than Sukhois little jet)
– supplier base
that any competitor would need long breath to come even close. And I think if Boeing and Airbus can agree on one thing, then that they don’t really need a third man in the arena of the 100+ seaters. Embrear knows that and is always busy saying they don’t want to enter the market. Bombadier scrapped its CSeries despite reasonable market outlook. China hasn’t produced anything yet and Sukhoi will lose Boeing support if the extend the “SuperJet” (what a bl00dy name) beyond 95 seats.
If somebody enters the market, or even dares to enter the market for larger ACs, he seriously gets his butt kicked by A&B, using all techniques they have (prices, customer base, government).
It was the arrogance and lack of attention by Boeing, combined with the strong will from airlines, and some mildly innovative aircraft designs, that let Airbus to close up.
SchorschJust found the reference barrel –
And they just had the Sonic Cruiser in mind, then suddenly the Sonic Cruiser was out and somebody said … “Why don’t we use this plastic stuff on the next aircraft?”
Actually, I consider this story non-sense. Boeing did research, tested and iterated. I doubt the research had any special program affiliation. I would like to hear from Boeing internal people that actual work packages have been issued for the Sonic Cruiser. I guess the thing stalled in priliminary design.
SchorschCould you be so kind and expand on your statement, that I find to an extent surprising!!
What are you saying, that only Germany was instrumental in making what Airbus is today, and that the French have been a drag all along??? That all Airbus woes can be linked to the French ??? That Germany would have the capacity to develop such programmes as the 380, 350 and 400m all on its own???
I find your interpretion attempts very interesting. Are you French?
But what I basically wanted to say:
That Airbus Deutschland produces more aircraft (FAR25) than China, Russia and Brasilia togehter. The A318/319/321 line is in Hamburg.
SchorschMaybe BCA but boeing could have tapped plenty of engineers from its ID and PW devision .
I had no major in Boeing abbreviations. Please write in digestable language or publish a list of commonly used abbreviations.
That is assuming that both companies are in form , remember the scenario i was talking was where one was being mismanaged and making wrong descision , bleeding money , making losses and making bad descisions .
It is assuming finacial back-up by investors from the private sector and public backing within WTO limits. That should suffice, as long as no player builds an entirely unsellable aircraft.
True these small players will someday become big ( Logical growth curve) and will try to do better , that is what most growing buisnesses do . Also With incresing outsourcing by boeing and airbus many smaller companies will gain expereince and they can be hired by other emb. like companies as development and production partners .
They don’t need to become big. I think the market can happily live without heavily subsidised Suchoi and Chinese industry. China hasn’t produced any commercially successful aircraft since it is in the business, Russia hasn’t sold anything in numbers. If Airbus seperates into Airbus Germany and France again, Airbus Germany would outsell all manufacturers of the world excluding Boeing with a margin in number and a huge margin in USD.
The only manufacturers that made it out of the woods in the last 30 years are Airbus and Embrear, both based on favorable circumstances. In the same time we saw many go off the stage:
Lockheed, MDD, Fairchild-Dornier, BAe, all Russian manufacturers except Suchoi which picks up the remaining resources.
Building aircraft will become an even more risky business in future, and margins will remain low and oscillating (as always). As such investors will be very picky who to give money for something.
SchorschIn many circumstances high lift comes at the expense of high drag.
When the lift coefficients are high and lift production depends on non-linear phenomena (like vortex-lift). Not the case for B-2 or any airliner, more a problem of delta wings. Check out sustained turn of MiG-23 with 72° sweep, that is what people call “energy bleed”.
SchorschThe sonic cruiser was a decent aircraft and would have sold ok ( nothing like the dreamliner) but the situation changed drastically since boeing floated the idea , 911 happened , oil prices went over the roof , US airlines took a great hit and the aviation community in general was posting losses . They took the technology they researched for the SC and turned it around into the 787 dreamliner which has close to 650 orders and this is before the US majors ( or europe majors such as BA,LH etc) jumped the wagon. I think the upside started with the 77W project , it was ovebudget but they kept on getting better eff. results then they had promised to there customers . When the 747 sales slowed down and profit margins with that aircraft declines they had the 77W waiting in the wing , as there new flagship model which is in high demand ( for slotS) and generates probably the best profit margin in the boeing current lineup ( currently in service) .
The Sonic Cruiser was so far away from market demand and so risky (Boeing never build anything faster than the B747), that professional people see it as a shadow operation to do the homework for the 787 in the meantime.
I still would like to know which technology they researched for a transonic airliner can be used on a conventional aircraft. Aerodynamics? Structures? Systems?
Both arent going anywhere no doubt. The airline industry needs a duopoly atleast .However if either one of them slips for too long there are manufacterers waiting in the wing . Embraer , bomb. etc can easily upsize there aircrafts for bigger markets if they feel one of the competitors is vulnerable , and there is always a threat from existing manufacters such as Lockheed etc which may enter the game in the comming decades . Then there is an emerging chinese industry and sukhoi is also climbing back up . They can afford to make bad descisions as long as they crawl back up but it would be increasingly tough to do so in the comming decades.
Due to the experience in design and production, Airbus and Boeing can always top the products of any other competitor. If it gets close, they can re-arrange production and profit from lower labor costs (fortunately both still produce the majority in “expensive” countries).
And surely no manufacturer can “easily” upsize something. With exception of Embrear all other manufacturers have a low to non-existent (Chinese, Russia) cash-flow and would have to borrow all risk money from the government, which would in exchange call for Europeans/Americans and the WTO.
SchorschSmall man’s airline, in the truest sense of the word.
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