747-100/200 Brake Overheating
I have a friend who used to fly a 747-100/200F into Kabul on a fairly regular basis. I was amazed when he told me about the problems they used to have with brakes overheating and tire fuse plugs thermaling.
He said they almost always landed at their maximum landing weight (tankering fuel), which usually required a medium setting on the autobrakes at Kabul. But, he said if they didn't reach up and go to minimum on the autobrakes once they touched down and got into reverse, they would likely thermal the tires due to the brake temperatures exceeding 800 to 1,000 degrees F once they taxied in and parked on the ramp.
In other words, their runway analysis stated that they could land on a particular runway with medium autobrakes at a certain weight and atmospheric condition, but using medium autobrakes all the way down to a stop would result in thermaling most of the tires.
I thought the landing performance was predicated on getting it completely stopped within 60% of the runway with maximum braking. Wouldn't this imply that there is something wrong here if doing so would cause the tires to thermal? Shouldn't maximum braking to a full stop mean that they should even have been able to do it with the autobrakes on max. Thoughts? Thanks.