Wow, it sure is easy to kick someone when they are on the ground. Sure, some people at Boeing have screwed up, but they are paying for it financially and with their reputation and fortunately not with lives. However there are many great things about this plane. I don’t have an issue with the battery box except it’s a little late. It should have been in place years ago. The issue is getting the battery fire rate down to that 1 in 10 million figure that was quoted earlier. It seems like Boeing are working on this, just the specifics have not been released.
I think we are seeing a natural progression here. The energy density of batteries has always been low compared with fossil fuels which is why we have never seen electric powered cars or planes to any degree. For the same reason there has never been any real danger from devices such as a lead acid or nicad batteries. Now fuel prices are rising there is more incentive for battery manufacturers to invest in battery technologies so we are seeing the energy densities increase. I suspect it won’t be too far in the future when we see the energy densities of batteries actually get higher than that of fossil fuels. Then we will see electric cars truly competing with their fossil fuel counterparts and we may even see electric powered jet engines, ie the fans are propelled by an electric motor rather than a turbine. I am sure there will be some serious containment issues in those batteries.
The Boeing guys are pushing the boundaries of technology, just like Airbus and many other companies have. The Concorde was sure pushing the boundaries, as was the AB FBW. Boeing have screwed up a little here but I suspect it will be a tempory setback. I am sure they will live another day to release some other new technology in the future and it wouldn’t surprise me if they make the same mistakes again.
Last edited by Cool Guys; 25th Feb 2013 at 13:04.