Originally Posted by
SLFinAZ
Dozy,
I could care less where the aircraft is made and it's not the technology....it's the core concept. Conceptually the Airbus does everything possible to remove aviator from aviation....right down to the name....BUS. In effect it trivializes the pilots and equates them with being a bus driver. Accordingly many are now paid like one.
So your belief stems from a knee-jerk emotive response rather than a well-reasoned one. I don't say this to denigrate what you're saying, but if this is all it's about then it's the honest truth.
The use of the term "Airbus" was in fact originally a design specification for BEA (meaning British European Airways, not the French accident investigation branch), and this goes all the way back to 1965. See DeHavilland's HS.134 design to meet this specification below (and in the process note how much it looks like the eventual configuration of the B757 - now remember this was drawn up in *1967*.)
British Airliners 'Nearly Get It Right' Shock!
The concept is not therefore about "remov[ing] the aviator from aviation" and turning him into a bus driver - although let's be honest, the glamour was fading from the airline profession even by the mid-'70s, and Ronnie's union-busting antics meant that the only way pay and conditions could go from the '80s onwards was down. In fact the aviators who were instrumental in designing the Airbus FBW system would probably be mortally offended by that insinuation, and I for one wouldn't blame them.
"Airbus" was simply (at the time) a convenient umbrella name for the collaboration of European aviation companies - nothing more to it than that.
Anyways, back to the topic at hand...