Aces High Bulletin Board
General Forums => The O' Club => Topic started by: Nilsen on September 19, 2007, 01:27:37 PM
-
http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/boeingaerospace/2003889663_boeing180.html#AF
This guy sais the dreamliner is unsafe. I bet he is just a pissed ex dude at your company but until you can prove its safe by documentation I will assume that its true and i will spread negative propaganda against Boeing ;)
lol j/k.
Do you know this fella? There are not that many peeps working at the Boeing shop so i guess you do :D
-
Nilsen,
for every single Boeing plane type new to service, there has been a fired (aka disgruntled) ex engineer saying the plane is unsafe, its just a part of the Boeing design process, unfortunately.
-
Aha.. Can you remember if the same was true with the 747?
Do you work there too?
-
Yes. I remember some fired boeing employee engineer saying the 777 was unsafe because of its composit tail. That was the most recent full build before the 787. As far as the 747, I cannot say with certainty, but I would bet a days pay someone who was involved in that plane, and then got fired, went on record saying the plane was unsafe. Its a predictable cycle and I would be very suprised if Airbus never had to deal with one of these guys. The big question is always "how much traction will the naysayer get in the media?. The 787 has been tested in a lot of virtual models and Im quite certain its going to be a safe plane. These sorts of things dont get to the billion dollar mark on some fluke.
-
hell, I don't know Nilsen. Perhaps we can ask your country to do some static testing, like dropping the fuselage 15 feet with real people in it and confirm its structural integrity! :D
I can remember a story about a 747 engineer saying the 747 would be unsafe to fly due to its size.
I seriously doubt any airplane company this size would jepordize their business reputation by putting an unsafe aircraft on the market knowingly.
Oh, and yes, Yeager, Sabre, myself (and probably others that surf but don't post) are Boeing Slackers. :D
-
jezuz... there must be alot of workers at the plant. 100 maybe? :)
-
But as Dan Rather says "The story, is true" :p :cool:
Way to go Dan, two journalism witch hunts in a row!
-
Its worth noting the Beech Starship was the first FAA Certified bird to sport a carbon fiber/composite fuselage. Other planes use it (the Eclipse VLJ comes to mind, among many others).
-
The guy is probably right about toxic fumes from burning composites, but I doubt it's any different from the effects you get from burning existing aircraft materials. It doesn't matter how flame retardant your seat cushions are... Soak them in jet fuel and light them off, and the fumes will kick your butt.
My question is how long 787 crash sites will remain federal toxic cleanup sites. Burning or powderized carbon fiber is nasty and there are no long-term studies to determine what happens when you let carbon fiber traverse your body for a while. That stuff never degrades so it could worm its way around your system for a very long time.
But calling the 787 less safe than other aircraft designs... I think you're talking about shades of gray there. The amount of force required to flat-out shatter composite materials that have crossing fiber grains (like rip-stop nylon) would probably split open an aluminum plane like cheap tinfoil. "shattered" composites often (usually?) end up with the structure of a rather strong bag. So instead of completely tearing in half, a plane might have a rather intact front and rear section held together by a flexible section that is "shattered", but did not tear apart. I'm not sure if that would be good or bad in an accident.
-
Here is Dan Rather's evidence - its true! Note the black smoke from toxic fumes fire, oh the horror.
http://www.smurfy.com/videos/5059/b-52_model_crash.html
-
I don't recall many survivors in any "crash" where a plane made of aluminium flames on in a determined sort of way. I'm curious though, how many planes are typically destroyed in certification testing?
-
I watched that on HDNet last night. The only things they came across with that made me wonder was the lack of test equiptment the airlines have to inspect for skin damage. Minute damage to the carbon fiber would allow moisture to seep in. After many, many cycles of this happening it could weaken the fiber internally and go unnoticed to the human eye.
The other concern is lightning strikes. The composite body is naturally non-conductive so Boeing is using a copper mesh embedded in the skin to disperse the charge. I don't think copper and carbon fiber would expand and contract at the same rate and could cause damage to either the skin or the mesh. Either way that would be a bad thing.
It will either be a great airliner or the next deHavilland Comet. I guess we will let the Japaneese be the guinea pigs.
-
Originally posted by rpm
The other concern is lightning strikes. The composite body is naturally non-conductive so Boeing is using a copper mesh embedded in the skin to disperse the charge. I don't think copper and carbon fiber would expand and contract at the same rate and could cause damage to either the skin or the mesh. Either way that would be a bad thing.
They are copper inlays, not mesh. I would imagine they're close tolerance inlays (+/- .030)but the copper is not actually poured into the resin prior to curing.
-
RPM,
The potential for hidden damage in composites is great, but from everything I've read it is in actual practice no worse than the potential for hidden cracks in metal structures. Every year you read about an aluminum plane that came apart in flight, and in the end they found either a hidden crack, or a known crack that was improperly repaired. How often do you hear about airplane crashes caused by delaminated composites? I haven't personally read a single one, although that doesn't mean anything because there just aren't very many large composite airframes out there yet.
We spend millions of dollars each year on NDI (Non Destructive Inspection)tests and equipment, to detect hidden damage in metal airplanes. That should tell you something about how inherently "safe" making planes out of aluminum is. Composites are no different. They just need different NDI technology and different maintenance techniques. Different is not always bad, but it sure is scary to people who are either ignorant or who have a vested interest in maintaining the status quo.
I would be VERY suprised if Boeing isn't participating with industry partners already on developing the technology and products required to safely inspect and maintain the 787. I know that industry groups are already working on 787 quick fix kits and maintenance resource sharing, so I'm pretty comfortable about assuming that 787 operators will be able to inspect the airframe and composite parts for hidden damage. That's one nice thing about properly designed composites - they don't rip like aluminum does so hidden damage may not result in a critical failure prior to detection like it can with hidden aluminum cracks. The key is to develop the right inspection technology and come up with the appropriate inspection cycle that will catch new damage before it grows bad enough to be a safety problem.
That's no different from aluminum airframe maintenance.
-
I'm sure the Boeing employees have seen the destructive wing test videos that were floating around within the firewall recently. I've not found them out on the web, but it's truly incredible how much abuse composites can take...certainly ahelluva more than aluminum.
Of course, the Fuselage drop test (http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/business/330685_boeingdroptest07.html) that occured in early September doesn't get the front page news that some disgruntled Boeing employee does either. ;)
-
I'm not trashing composites. But they did make a case that maintenence and inspection might be an issue. The rudder separations on aircraft with composites later found to be contaminated made a good point for closer inspections.
-
7-late-7 will be safe.
-
Well RPM should be getting an autographed tinfoil hat from Dan Rather any day now. His fanclub finally has one member :p
-
Originally posted by LePaul
Well RPM should be getting an autographed tinfoil hat from Dan Rather any day now. His fanclub finally has one member :p
Rather had nothing to do with it. FAA inspectors did. I guess we could fit them all with tin foil hats.
-
courage.
-
Originally posted by Ripsnort
I can remember a story about a 747 engineer saying the 747 would be unsafe to fly due to its size.
It sounds funny because at the time 747 was introduced USSR already had a much bigger An-22 flying.