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And meanwhile, in the real world, electric planes are a real thing, actually rather popular in the light aircraft world, and a market that's growing by leaps and bounds every year. And actually have excellent performance vs. price figures compared to their ICE equivalents. Ranges are usually similar to those of electric cars, 150-400km.

Can we ditch with the old battery-energy-density-versus-fuel-energy-density canard, as if a gallon of petrol is an entire vehicle? Even the long-range versions of the Model S, the batteries are only a third of the vehicle weight. There are other parts to a vehicle. An electric motor the size of a roomba has the power output of an entire typical gasoline engine in a typical passenger car. And you can ditch the transmission and a lot of other hardware as well. And it's only logical that this size difference would be the case. Electric motors have vastly less heat to dissipate - heat dissipation means mass. Electric motors have vastly fewer parts; complexity equals mass. Electric motors create force directly applied as torque on a driveshaft linkage (or even directly on the wheel), while ICEs produce it as pressurized gas, change that to linear momentum, then change that to rotational. Obviously the latter is going to cost you signfiicantly in terms of mass.

This headline makes it sound like electric airplanes are new. They're not. They're not even in the one-off-prototype stage, there are a number of serial producers out there. The market is expected to be over 22 billion a year three years from now. I'm not sure I believe it's going to scale up that fast, but it most definitely is growing. It's not even just small manufacturers, even Airbus is currently tooling up to market their E-Fan.

I'm sure we will have electric planes but they will almost certainly remain the domain of small aircraft. The car analogy works well. Electric cars make sense but electric 18-wheelers don't and probably never will. A radical and fundamental shift in how we move cargo and people is more likely to me than an electric A330.

And meanwhile, in the real world, electric planes are a real thing, actually rather popular in the light aircraft world, and a market that's growing by leaps and bounds every year. And actually have excellent performance vs. price figures compared to their ICE equivalents. Ranges are usually similar to those of electric cars, 150-400km.

Can we ditch with the old battery-energy-density-versus-fuel-energy-density canard, as if a gallon of petrol is an entire vehicle? Even the long-range versions of the Model S, the batteries are only a third of the vehicle weight. There are other parts to a vehicle. An electric motor the size of a roomba has the power output of an entire typical gasoline engine in a typical passenger car. And you can ditch the transmission and a lot of other hardware as well. And it's only logical that this size difference would be the case. Electric motors have vastly less heat to dissipate - heat dissipation means mass. Electric motors have vastly fewer parts; complexity equals mass. Electric motors create force directly applied as torque on a driveshaft linkage (or even directly on the wheel), while ICEs produce it as pressurized gas, change that to linear momentum, then change that to rotational. Obviously the latter is going to cost you signfiicantly in terms of mass.

This headline makes it sound like electric airplanes are new. They're not. They're not even in the one-off-prototype stage, there are a number of serial producers out there. The market is expected to be over 22 billion a year three years from now. I'm not sure I believe it's going to scale up that fast, but it most definitely is growing. It's not even just small manufacturers, even Airbus is currently tooling up to market their E-Fan.

“Due to GPS Interference impacts potentially affecting Embraer 300 aircraft flight stability controls, FAA recommends EMB Phenom pilots avoid the testing area and closely monitor flight control systems,” the Notam reads. http://www.avweb.com/avwebflas...

"Lean of peak" is common on modern piston-engine aircrafts; you trade off a little power for a significant fuel economy. John Deakin wrote a fantastic piece on the subject.

According to this story at AvWeb, the US registry will require registration of all drones over 250 grams.

At least it will be free and simple, according to the story.

The same FAA that "ensures the safety of aviation" by pinning the blame on pilots for readback errors, even when they were told their readback is correct.

Here's the short version:
Pilot receives ATC instruction. Per regulations, pilot reads these instructions back to ensure they were heard correctly. What the pilot says back is NOT correct (due to being misheard because of shoddy signal from the ground), but due to shoddy reception, ATC hears incorrectly as well. ATC, thinking that what the pilot said matched the instructions given, responds "confirm , readback is correct." Pilot rightfully assumes he heard right, acts on the information, and an accident happens. Under this rule, the pilot is placed solely to blame for acting on instructions they were told was correct. This has lead to some pilots erring on the side of caution by requesting "words twice" for ATC clearances, meaning exactly that. The repetition (repetition) of every (every) single (single) important (important) word (word). This can GREATLY slow down procedures in the airspace and lead to more stress for everyone involved.

It's gotten better in the past 10-15 years, but it's a prime example of how the FAA's draconian, and often outdated bureaucracy is doing more to hinder aviation than innovate it and improve safety.

I've only got ten hours experience, not even a pilot; but I've never encountered wind shear.

Um. With all due respect, when you're coming in with 10 hours of experience, you could go easy on calling another /.er's dead friend an idiot for dying. If nothing else, recognize that bad things do happen to good and experienced pilots - and sometimes to great and very experienced pilots.

If you keep flying, you WILL encounter wind shear. And it will scare the hell out of you. Yes, we've gotten pretty good at predicting shear...at a macro level. At the micro level it's still unpredictable and unavoidable, and probably always will be because wind gusts are chaotic. There is no such thing as "that kind of weather"; sure, there are days when it's more likely than others, but it can and does happen at any time. It's happened to me on both takeoff and final approach on fairly calm days...it's a quick and very effective refresher on respecting safety margins and keeping your wits about you.

That said, the kind of gusts/shear that cartwheel a plane and smash it back into the ground on takeoff are EXTREMELY rare. As in, maybe double digits in the entire NTSB database. A catastrophic blowout on the highway is indeed much more common.

In aircraft engines, the lead is only an octane booster. It's not there to lubricate the valve seats. The thing about valve seats is a myth, at least in the case of aviation engines. Certainly the workhorse engines of most the GA fleet (4 and 6 cylinder normally aspirated opposed piston engines) don't need the lead at all, not even as an octane booster. Since I have a Lycoming engine, I've been following it, and they've been steadily adding more engine types to the list approved to run on the new 91UL unleaded avgas (our engine, an O-320-B2B was approved many many years ago to run on a 91 unleaded used by some militaries, but they only just approved it for the new 91UL standard). The O-320 series has been around for decades.

See: http://www.avweb.com/news/pelican/182149-1.html - on some of the old wives' tales about lead.

Sure.

http://www.avweb.com/news/news/184281-1.html

So require the pilots of commercial planes to have no electronic devices. They sit next to most of the equipment anyway.

http://www.avweb.com/avwebflash/news/faa_approval_ipad_jeppesen_paper_chart_replacement_204145-1.html

Is this the same 4G that is going to kill GPS functionality? http://www.avweb.com/avwebflash/news/4G_Broadband_May_Jam_GPS_204069-1.html?CMP=OTC-RSS

Thus far, in the police tests, drones have been limited to a maximum altitude of 200 feet and 1,000-foot range from their operator. The FAA is expected to issue an NPRM (notice of proposed rulemaking) this year to streamline the Certificate of Authorization process for law enforcement. The NPRM process will likely include an opportunity for the public to comment.

According to this earlier article, the police and TSA talked to him, but surprisingly didn't charge him with anything. He said they were "more curious than confrontational."

Oh, they're working on it. Here is an article about the TSA refusing aircraft access to people who bought houses beside an airport and paved taxiways to their houses (which used to be a pretty common arrangement: there are lots of small communities built around runways, with each house having a combination hangar/garage.) All small airports are now supposed to have access to the runway and all aircraft controlled by fences and in many cases private security.

Actually, hydrogen has very good energy density by mass (the best of any chemical fuel). By volume, it's very poor. That's why you see hydrogen used as a fuel for rockets (where mass matters much more than volume), but not aircraft. A commercial airliner running on hydrogen would require a huge insulated tank that would add lots of weight and drag; you can't just tuck the fuel into the wings like you can with jet-A. It may become usable for small aircraft, but I don't think you'll see it used for anything larger (except maybe super-high-altitude UAVs and exotic hypersonic vehicles).

However, I do agree that biomass-based synthetic fuels will be far more prevalent in the future. Assuming we don't try to force the use of inefficient food crops for production through heavy-handed government and lobbyist actions (coughcorncough), and instead focus on using mroe efficient plants, algae, and leftover/waste biomass, it will likely work out. I know that there are already a few promising replacements for piston-engine avgas and diesel and jet fuel under development, and I think such things are a far better investment of funds for several reasons. They are essentially carbon-neutral once applied on a large scale, they eliminate strategic and economic dependence on politically volatile nation-state cartel members, and they are essentially "drop-in" replacements for current fuels, allowing current infrastructure to be used and changed over much more cheaply than drastic changes.

Actually, hydrogen has very good energy density by mass (the best of any chemical fuel). By volume, it's very poor. That's why you see hydrogen used as a fuel for rockets (where mass matters much more than volume), but not aircraft. A commercial airliner running on hydrogen would require a huge insulated tank that would add lots of weight and drag; you can't just tuck the fuel into the wings like you can with jet-A. It may become usable for small aircraft, but I don't think you'll see it used for anything larger (except maybe super-high-altitude UAVs and exotic hypersonic vehicles).

However, I do agree that biomass-based synthetic fuels will be far more prevalent in the future. Assuming we don't try to force the use of inefficient food crops for production through heavy-handed government and lobbyist actions (coughcorncough), and instead focus on using mroe efficient plants, algae, and leftover/waste biomass, it will likely work out. I know that there are already a few promising replacements for piston-engine avgas and diesel and jet fuel under development, and I think such things are a far better investment of funds for several reasons. They are essentially carbon-neutral once applied on a large scale, they eliminate strategic and economic dependence on politically volatile nation-state cartel members, and they are essentially "drop-in" replacements for current fuels, allowing current infrastructure to be used and changed over much more cheaply than drastic changes.

I know this was from the website so I don't refute you, but.

* Rutan said WhiteKnightTwo is very manueverable, and he expected to put the vehicle through aerobatic manuevers at the Oshkosh show next year;
* Whitehorn didnâ(TM)t seem to like this idea very much, vigorously shaking his head and trying to dissuade the designer from such an idea.

Burt Rutan http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burt_Rutan
has a brother Richard "Dick" Rutan http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dick_Rutan
Burt designs aircraft, and Dick flies them.

Richard had been a fighter pilot, and asked Burt for years to build him an Aerobatic plane, Burt wouldn't do it because the liability insurance on such a design would be too expensive.

Instead Burt built an airplane called Voyager to fly around the world, and Richard flew it around the world with his then girlfriend as the copilot.

Dick also flew a Rocket Powered Long EZ for XCOR a test bed for their Rocket motor, and other Rocket Racing League technologies.

Knowing how conservative Burt is, and the fact he doesn't like Aerobatics;
http://www.avweb.com/news/profiles/182970-1.html

I have to believe it was Dick not Burt that said he'd fly aerobatics in WhiteKnightTwo at Oshkosh next year.

Um, no. It was a Bellanca Super Decathlon, not a homebuilt. Hit up the wikipedia article for more details. What you heard was completely wrong.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steve_Fossett#Death

AvWeb confirmation;
http://www.avweb.com/avwebflash/news/SteveFossett_MissingAviator_SuperDecathlonWreckageFound_198901-1.html

This was definitely not a crash. No, definitely not, really. Honest. Accidentally parking a 747 on a golf course could happen to anyone, and in no way constitutes a crash.

As a pilot, I was made aware several years ago about a moratorium placed on the 100LL (Low Lead) fuel for general aviation piston powered aircraft. This moratorium requires that aviation fuels must be lead free by 2010. Unfortunately, many GA engines are built on old tech and the aircraft themselves operate in harsher environments, and thus require leaded fuels for anti-knocking, to decrease it's freezing point, and to a lesser degree, anti-corrosion.

Swift Enterprises they had a similar solution to this issue with synthetic fuels derived from bio-mass, similar to that of this Vertroleum product. Here is the AvWeb announcement on the subject, and an update with an interview of the people involved.

Apparently these guys have a working fuel that can seamlessly transition to the current market. What's more, this tech can also be adapted for jet fuel and mogas as well. Because there are several of these companies working on similar technologies, I have hopes that this isn't just a one off scam. Let's hope these companies can promise what they preach.

As a pilot, I was made aware several years ago about a moratorium placed on the 100LL (Low Lead) fuel for general aviation piston powered aircraft. This moratorium requires that aviation fuels must be lead free by 2010. Unfortunately, many GA engines are built on old tech and the aircraft themselves operate in harsher environments, and thus require leaded fuels for anti-knocking, to decrease it's freezing point, and to a lesser degree, anti-corrosion.

Swift Enterprises they had a similar solution to this issue with synthetic fuels derived from bio-mass, similar to that of this Vertroleum product. Here is the AvWeb announcement on the subject, and an update with an interview of the people involved.

Apparently these guys have a working fuel that can seamlessly transition to the current market. What's more, this tech can also be adapted for jet fuel and mogas as well. Because there are several of these companies working on similar technologies, I have hopes that this isn't just a one off scam. Let's hope these companies can promise what they preach.

It's easy to understand once you look at radio communications (which is essentially a communication network). If I jam your radios I disrupt your communications. If I jam your radars your equipment doesn't work right. If I actually get into your radio network, I could pretend to be someone on your side and feed you false info or propoganda.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electronic_Warfare
http://www.avweb.com/news/avionics/182754-1.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radio_Free_Europe

Turns out maybe those Thielert diesels aren't all that great after all. The FAA just issued an emergency airworthiness directive (AD) for the Centurion 2.0 to solve cracking in a high-pressure fuel line brought on by the intense vibration of a diesel engine. The article also explains that so far, no one has been able to mate a metal prop to a diesel engine due to early fatigue cracking in the metal, which can't take the vibrations.

I'm not sure if that's a byproduct of the Thielert's automotive-based design (it's basically a Mercedes-Benz inline-four) or if it's an inherent problem in diesels of all designs (for example, an opposed-four or V-8 might be less susceptible, dunno).

p

Retrofits *are* required starting 2 years later (07-Mar-2012).

(per this page: http://www.avweb.com/eletter/archives/bizav/1068-full.html#197351)

If GPS fails, they just go down to the next lower level of surveillance. Heck, they often go right down to the original method of ATC control where pilots report their position over a fix, and estimated time to the next fix and people on the ground with pencil, paper, and a stopwatch separate traffic blind. That happens whenever RADAR fails, and if you believe Don Brown at AvWeb, columnist and former NACTA safety rep (retired) at Atlanta Center, RADAR going down isn't a rare event.

http://www.avweb.com/news/sayagain/

--Carlos V.

Lead Myths

* Lead does NOT "cushion" or "lubricate" valves. There is nothing in the serious literature, and no known scientific data to support this notion. If you know of something, please write. I said DATA, not some mechanic or overhauler mouthing this decades-old gossip

[...]

* Lead does NOT cause valves to run cooler or hotter. Lead does NOT prevent (or cause) "valve recession."

[...]
Just for one example, the FAA ran a twin with flat sixes for several hundred hours, one engine running 100LL, and the other side with unleaded fuel. Then they tore both engines down and used some custom-built instrumentation to measure the valve wear. The lead did no good, at all. That's pretty good data, but I'd like to see more of it. Well done, FAA!

Absolutely. If life and limb depend on it, the most low-tech controls are better than high-tech controls. Of course, the best controls are none at all. One could reasonably argue that a sanely designed aircraft should have automatically switched to the second tank with an appropriate "You are now past the point of no return" warning.

For whatever it's worth, the problem with John Denver's plane had nothing to do with the selector being confusing. It was placed in such a way that you could not physically reach it to change it without getting out of your seat unless you were in the rear seat (not the pilot's seat). From the NTSB's reports on the subject:

According to the designer of the airplane and the drawings issued to the builder, the fuel selector is to be located just aft of the nose wheel position window between the pilot's legs. The accident airplane's fuel selector handle was positioned by the builder on the bulkhead behind the pilot's left shoulder. The selector valve was installed inside the engine firewall 45 inches aft of the selector handle. The handle and valve were joined by steel and aluminum tubing, connected by a universal joint.

***

The National Transportation Safety Board determines the probable cause of this accident was the pilot's diversion of attention from the operation of the airplane and his inadvertent application of right rudder that resulted in the loss of airplane control while attempting to manipulate the fuel selector handle. Also, the Board determines that the pilot's inadequate preflight planning and preparations, specifically his failure to refuel the airplane, was causal. The Board determines that the builder's decision to locate the unmarked fuel selector handle in a hard-to-access position, unmarked fuel quantity sight gauges, inadequate transition training by the pilot, and his lack of total experience in this type of airplane were factors in this accident.

Yeah. That's good engineering. Oh, and the fuel gauges were also only visible to the rear seat. From the same reports:

The technician provided a shop inspection mirror to the pilot so that he could look over his shoulder at the fuel sight gauges. The mirror was recovered in the wreckage.

So basically, you had a homebrew aircraft that should never have been allowed in the air without two pilot occupants, and really should never have been in the air at all without design changes.

>even most turbines on jet aircraft are built to contain their massive, extremely high-speed turbines,

I'm not sure I believe this.
Here's a 2004 NTSB report on a helicopter crash where the entire turbine wheel shot out of the helicopter after breaking.
Here are reports of four uncontained turbine failures on Delta aircraft in the last 10 years, using recent aircraft.
John Deakin who has 36,000 hours flying 747's, says that often a turbine can operate for hundreds of hours after throwing a blade, so it's not like it's always a catastrophe, but a cursory survey of google and the NTSB literature indicates that there's no way failures of the turbine section are always, or even usually, contained.

By the way, everything other than fighter jets already mixes the turbine exhaust with ambient air: they're called high-bypass engines, and they're essentially ducted turboprop engines.

No one would pay to lay cable etc without some reassurance of profitability... so if you wanted to stifle telecomm as a whole, then sure, Libertarianism would have worked.

Nobody should be guaranteed profits, only the potential to make profit. Intel didn't have a government guarantee when they first built their fabs yet look how big they are. Microsoft's Bill Gates and Paul Allen didn't either, yet MS has created more wealthy people than any company I know of. Admittedly that's not really says much but MS has created a few of the people of the world's wealthiest. Sergey Brin and Larry Page didn't have a guarantee either. All these people had was the potential to make profits. Well, and the knowhow and drive to create something.

The natural setup of the industry would have resulted in monopolies anyway, so would you rather that they can wield those monopolies to the detriment of the consumer, or would you rather that they are regulated?

Laws and regulations can just as easily stifle competition as encourage it. Like with the net neutrality being debated I'd only agree to regulations once a problem has been identified and it is known what is a solution. In this case I don't agree with prior restraint. The only tyme I can think of where I lean towards prior restraint is dealing with ecology and the environment or people's health. Here's one place I disagree with many Libertarians. Oh also while previously the high cost of infrastructure may of needed monopoly conditions, it's not really much like that now. With few exceptions, say maybe the building of spaceports, there isn't so much the need of high cost infrastructures.

Aircraft are regulated by the FAA.

This activity on Los Angeles' part got the attention of a certain pilot's association which apparently put lots of ice on the project.

So it doesn't appear to be flying anywhere above LA County anytime soon...

If you think the "computers" the FAA uses are so great, please read what an actual controller has to say about them (and a lot of other subjects as well).

Computers don't keep the tin apart, people do.

I hadn't been reading Phrack but (in general) yes, that sort of thing. See here for a more credible source.

Of course jamming civilian GPS isn't the same as jamming military GPS but you get the idea, it can be done.

You, sir, haven't driven through New Jersey -- most drivers here will prove you wrong, especially this chap.

It's not just Tom Clancy who wrote about it - a 9/11 style hijacking actually happened for real in 1994 (using a FedEx DC-10 cargo plane rather than a passenger airliner). The crew managed to overcome their attacker though. There is a very good article about the attempted attack here:

http://www.avweb.com/news/profiles/182918-1.html

You might want to read this article about two pilots struggling to get control back from the autopilot and autothrottles of a Boeing-777 before you trust the autopilot that much, Chief.

At least add it to your considerations. It shows what happens when malfunctions happen in an otherwise normal flight.

Adding circuitry and logic that could potentially lock out hijackers from the aircraft's controls certainly could potentially lock the good guys out too. Maybe not even on a hijacked flight. Cuts both ways.

As with most things computer-related, it's rare that a computer or device can solve a human psychological or sociological problem. Those machines and devices that do, usually are called "weapons".

A popular aftermarket wing mod is vortex generators... little pieces of metal or plastic carefully positioned at stretegic intervals along the top of the wing skin, usually just a little ways aft of the leading edge. This induces vortices in the airflow to help keep the boundary layer across the top of the wing from separating off from the surface, and thus lowers the stalling speed by some small amount.

I am a pilot who flies my own small plane and prefer to simply keep my airspeed up to avoid stalling the wings, and keep the music in my headsets. An iAudio X5 mp3 player fed thru a set of Lightspeed Thirty 3G ANR headsets while you're flying is a great experience. ...and yes one of the very first times I took off with music playing just had to be with Steppenwolf's Magic Carpet Ride, as I was haulin' ass down the runway thru rotation and climb-out (ST:First Contact reference).

It's probably worth noting that this aircraft crashed shortly afterwards and there is no other functional prototype. Here is some more info. Both pilots walked away, the vehicle is a total loss.

aren't airports way out in the countryside
I fly out of KLGA, KJFK, and KEWR; Not really countryside. I have also flown into KLAX and KORD. Still not country side. Even the local 'small plane' airport KTEB isn't anywhere near countryside; in fact, when planes roll off of the runway there, they cross highways and roll into industrial buildings.

Because these problems will only occur over time - they won't start showing up until the airframes reach a certain number of flight hours and a certain number of compression/decompression cycles.

The risks of delamination is very real. That was very likely to have been a contributory cause of the crash of Flight 587.

Let's review the data, shall we:

• Flight 587: Aircraft lost rudder in flight, crashed.
• Air Transat Flight 961: Loss of rudder in flight
• A FedEx aircraft demonstrates damage to rudder actuator section right where the damage to those two other flights occurred.

If I'm spouting such "uninformed nonsense" then please explain to me why the French government issued an Emergency Airworthiness Directive on A300 series rudder assemblies.

Any competent safety official would not ignore these trends. Visual inspection is not enough to determine if stress has caused voids in a carbon fiber component. Only ultrasound inspections can reveal those voids. Airbus currently does not mandate ultrasound inspections. The current inspection procedures are not adaquate to deal with the dangers of severe structural damage - damage that has already produced one fatal accident and damn near another.

This is a serious problem, and God help us if this kind of reaction is the way the FAA approaches the issue of safety or Flight 587 won't be the only incident of this kind. Such a lax attitude for safety is simply appalling.

You didn't even look, did you? Lazy, presumptuous sod! (-:

Note especially the 4th paragraph below the picture of the airliner.

Max. gross t.o. weight: 4,500,000 lb

Max landing weight: 256,000 lb [ref]

So that's a ratio of 17.6:1. Stick that in your pipe and smoke it!

Some brief stories from AVWeb about the destruction of the Meigs runway and closure of the airport can be found here, here , and here. Apparently the Mayor wanted the place for a park...

Some brief stories from AVWeb about the destruction of the Meigs runway and closure of the airport can be found here, here , and here. Apparently the Mayor wanted the place for a park...

Some brief stories from AVWeb about the destruction of the Meigs runway and closure of the airport can be found here, here , and here. Apparently the Mayor wanted the place for a park...

• Flight ZG-28 from Fort Lauderdale, FL - Saturday, Mar 12, 2005 - $3,750.00 + Tax
• 
  Flight ZG-29 from Fort Lauderdale, FL - Saturday, Apr 09, 2005 - $3,750.00 + Tax

Thank you.

That is what set of my bullshit detector on this one.

That, and there's absolutely no mention on AvWeb, which would be all over this if it were legit.

Entering a flat spin during a cross-country flight sounds pretty suspicious. A little research turns up this article in which it is stated that there is radar data showing the plane in a spiral dive.

A spiral dive is a high-speed descending turn which a typical result of loss of control due to disorientation in instrument conditions. It could also happen, as the article claims, when the plane is unbalanced (much more fuel in one wing than the other) and the autopilot reaches its control limits.

The only story like that I can find is about a simulated landing. Is that what you are referring to? It is an interesting story though, particularly because the problem was with the actual simulation hardware. Therefore it wasn't an intentional simulated emergency. The simulation ended with loss of vehicle and crew, caused by nothing more than a stuck gauge needle.

I'm not sure, I haven't been flying long enough - I have seen that a number of people do have STCs for autogas. Here is a reference that talks about some of the current wisdom on avgas vs. autogas issues.

That said, Honda/Teledyne are working on an engine designed for autogas. And then there's that German diesel engine that has just become available...

This could end up being a problem for general aviation funding, since (I'm told) taxes on avgas help subsidize a lot of general aviation projects for smaller craft.