I agree that I can't help but think the original post was a fishing expedition - not least because the poster concerned commits the cardinal sin of lumping FBW and automation in together, when they are very much two separate entities.
Originally Posted by
rudderrudderrat
Because you then know how much control surface deflection is being applied.
Well, in the Airbus FBW system you're commanding rate rather than deflection (I know you know that though!
).
This Lufthansa crew had no idea how much aileron was being applied by the FBW computers.
You're leaving out the other half of the story there - the Captain in that case made some judgement calls that were alarmingly poor. Namely allowing the F/O to continue an approach that had gusts approaching the regulation limit for F/O approaches, followed by grabbing the stick to correct when the correct action would have been to call a go-around as soon as things looked uncertain.
Now I can't argue against the notion that the Airbus control approach doesn't lend itself to last-minute correction of that nature, but that's what the SOPs are for, and why they should be followed - is it not?
Have you ever wondered why B777 & B787 FBW give control surface position feed back via the yoke?
I don't wonder, I know
- it's because offered the choice between sidesticks and yokes, the T7 launch customer (United IIRC) chose the latter. Boeing then used that as a sales differentiator against Airbus. What should be noted however is that the feedback is simulated via software, and that makes the software far more complex than the Airbus equivalent.
Additionally, even older designs with yokes don't necessarily behave in a logical manner when given conflicting inputs. One thing that came out of the EgyptAir 990 investigation is that when the yokes are pushed and pulled in opposite directions on the 767 - with sufficient force you get a split elevator condition (i.e. one elevator deflects up, the other down). Boeing had to spend a lot of money correcting that.
Originally Posted by
main_dog
During my airboos years I could never escape the feeling that the airplane had been created by over-confident engineers who were trying to design the pilot out of the machine...
On this occasion your gut instinct was incorrect - pilots were very much involved in the design and development, including pilots who worked for the ARB (home of "Handling The Big Jets" author D.P. Davies) and who worked on Concorde.
so it's horses for courses (ą chacun son gołt).
On this you're absolutely correct, and I agree totally. It saddens me that with two successful approaches there's this tendency for aficionados of one to try to denigrate the other.