I just finished reading the captivating thread, and I hope you don't mind me dredging up a couple of technical points that were touched on earlier. (Very simple technical points, or they would have gone over my head entirely.)
Early on there was a discussion of sliding hydraulic seals (necessary to allow for thermal expansion of the airplane). It occurred to me that sliding hydraulic seals are nearly as rare as hydraulic cylinders. But that raises an obvious question: what kept the seals from acting like cylinders, and fully extending under pressure?
And then a very picky observation on the discussion about excess moisture evaporating vs. boiling off during flight at temperatures up to 100C. Wouldn't water boil well below 100C at FL 600?