Boeing Blended Wing Body Aircraft

pcolley writes "I love it when Science Fiction becomes reality. Boeing is nearly finished designing their super efficient Blended Wing Body (BWB) airplane. It looks like the BatJet." Boeing is considering both civilian and military roles.

Comments

what exactly is the revolution here?

[elmegil]

There've been delta-wing type aircraft since the 50's. Always touting the "lift of the entire aircraft". What exactly is the issue that 1) they have never caught on with the airlines or public and 2) Boeing thinks it's solved? What am I missing?

FUD

[heby]

Boeing calculates that a BWB seating 480 passengers would use 32 percent less fuel than the proposed A380-700 [...] The plane would weigh 19 percent less, suggesting that it would cost less to build. And it would need 19 percent less thrust, saving on engine manufacturing and maintenance costs.
We at Boeing have the solution you are waiting for. Yes, our 747 is outdated and someone else is making a better product. We don't have an alternative to show but if you hold off buying your new big planes just another few years we'll supply you with a cheaper, better and more efficient product.
Now, why exactly does this all sound so terribly familiar to most of us?

Time to rebuild the airports

[ebh]

There's an international standard that all commercial aircraft have to fit into a 262ft (80m) square footprint, which drives design issues like how far apart the gates have to be at airports.

This thing has a projected wingspan of 289ft (88.1m), which means that at airports where it can't "accidentally" fit, special gates will have to be built for it. (Then again, it'll probably have such a weird arrangement of doors, that you'll need multiple oddly-arranged jetways anyway.)

Re:OK, but what about engines?

[mikefoley]

Insightful??

Speaking as a former jet mechanic in the Air Force (NH Air Guard) on KC-135A and E models, I have to assume you haven't read a thing about jet engine development in the past 20 years.

Todays engines are extremely powerful, quiet, and fuel efficient. The GE engines on a 777 are AMAZING!

I don't understand what you mean about all this "friction". Even jet engines designed in the early 50's (The J57's on the KC-135A) didn't have a hell of alot of "friction". Oh, they burned fuel like crazy and were extremely noisy, but friction wasn't the cause of inefficency and noise. It was the design of the blades and airflow thru the engine that caused noise and affected efficiency. I've been *under* a J57 at idle and I can attest to their noise! (I was adjusting the fuel control)

The engines on the 777 put out about 100,000lbs of thrust EACH. I'll assume the BWB will have engines that put out AT LEAST that much, while running on less fuel and running quieter than anything else in the air.