MAX’s Return Delayed by FAA Reevaluation of 737 Safety Procedures

[fizz57]

I must say that's an excellent screen name for a Boeing apologist. The original Icarus pitched up too far then his wings came off...

[Icarus2001]

While the data may not be public, I'm pretty sure the non-MCAS, high-AOA flight profiles have already been done

Exactly and why would they be public?

an excellent screen name for a Boeing apologist

Clearly nuance and subtlety is not your strong point. I am in no way an apologist for anyone but the group think going on in here baying for Boeing blood is way over the top.
Some posters demanding the release of information, for what? Why are WE entitled to it? We aren't.

Regulators have grounded the aircraft. It will get sorted out. If you don't like the result, well you can choose to vote with your feet, either as a pilot on a max or as a passenger.

[spornrad]

Exactly and why would they be public?... the group think going on in here baying for Boeing blood is way over the top...
While I understand your point to some extent, I believe you are grossly underrating the breach of trust resulting from the actions of both Boeing management and the FAA. Take statements from well seasoned jet professionals, e.g. Sully. People are angry, and rightly so. Boeing as well as FAA must re-earn that trust, and what would be better than complete transparency? What would be the argument to not publish essential airframe stability data? It is supposed to become a public transport vehicle, after all. And all will be subject to public court proceedings, anyway... So this is not about whether to publish, but when. ASAP would be my advice, to reduce the baying for Boeing blood...

[Clandestino]

It might sound as a stupid question, but what would change columns forces other than a pitch up tendency?

Far from being stupid, this is exactly the question that points out the silliness of "It's merely stick forces we are dealing with" because with functioning synthetic feel the answer is: nothing.

Aerodynamically, MAX doesn't meet certification stability criteria.

MAX can't be fitted with certified stability augmentation and stall avoidance systems as it would invalidate grandfather rights and as a new design it just would not comply with the current rules even if pitch stability were not an issue.

The only way MAX will ever fly again is by severe reduction of certification requirements so the Boeing management's policy of admitting nothing and waiting for Deus ex machina rescue is quite sound.

[Bend alot]

No I am an airline pilot flying a jet transport aircraft every day.

Your occupation? WE need to know.
There are far better ways to imply being a active commercial pilot on heavy aircraft if that is the case.

A simple check of your log book would prove your "every day" statement incorrect.

I will remind you that there have been many extremely informative posts on this thread, made by persons that certainly are not "Jet Transport /Airline Aircraft Pilots"

Big watches was a 90's thing.

[autoflight]

Exactly and why would they be public?

Clearly nuance and subtlety is not your strong point. I am in no way an apologist for anyone but the group think going on in here baying for Boeing blood is way over the top.
Some posters demanding the release of information, for what? Why are WE entitled to it? We aren't.

Regulators have grounded the aircraft. It will get sorted out. If you don't like the result, well you can choose to vote with your feet, either as a pilot on a max or as a passenger.

US Regulators were forced to ground the aircraft by the leadership of foreign regulators. Hardly inspires confidence in the FAA & Boeing.

[MurphyWasRight]

“It’s too early to determine why all three main parachutes did not deploy, however, having two of three deploy successfully is acceptable for the test parameters and crew safety,” Boeing said in a statement.

Statement after the otherwise successful Starliner spacecraft pad abort test.

[safetypee]

We should be reasonably confident that ‘the data’ exists, but less so in the way it was interpreted and applied in design and certification.

For those who wish to see the data; you are given it - then what. You make your own (non-expert) interpretation, judging safety in whichever way you choose.

The underlying issue is trust, restoring confidence in the regulator and manufacturer which certificated previous (subsequent) types.
Neither the FAA or Boeing have excelled with their attempts to restore confidence, particularly with the lack of information. This may be the greater task in returning the Max to (profitable) service than the technical problems - technicalities can be fixed, issues of trust confidence might only be restored slowly, and never to previous levels. Also technical problems relate to knowledgable people in the industry; with trust, sentiment, the general public, may not be so easy to convince.

What the industry requires are clear technical descriptions of what MCAS was supposed to do, why, and how. Then as appropriate, how the proposals will address the shortfall in operation; the why and how.
Operators need the technical descriptions, piloting and engineering, which were absent in the original Max documentation.

[Takwis]

We simply don't know. We need to know. I think that our best bet for getting this sort of information is if the EASA/ESA does indeed do their own 'bare airframe" testing.

'We', certainly the 737 pilots here, DO need to know the handling characteristics of the aircraft, especially when simple malfunctions (loss of AOA) render the aircraft barely flyable. To say that we don't need to know is akin to saying we don't need to know what happens when an engine quits. We don't need to know how significant the yaw is, compared to other aircraft that we have flown? We don't need to know exactly how to handle it? Ridiculous.

Am I going to analyze the data myself, as someone suggested? No, I have neither the skills, nor the time for that. I have suggested, in the quote above, a body willing, able, and that has signaled a desire to do it. Has the data been gathered and analyzed before, of course it has. But those who did so have decided not to make it public...in fact kept their attempt to correct those flight characteristics secret as well, until people started dying. So, we need to rely on someone who is going to be honest and open.

[safetypee]

A good update; more technical information from EASA @ https://aviationweek.com/commercial-aviation/easa-s-director-expects-boeing-737-max-return-decision-january-0?utm_rid=CPEN1000002344541&utm_campaign=21979&utm_medium=email&elq2=c563ba69f6b341cfa302a94c54606e9b
Worth the hassle of registering if not already open.

Details of bilateral certification agreement. FAA did not highlight MCAS to EASA as a significant change.

Testing complete this month, certification approval in Jan, but more open-ended about training, simulators, overflights, and other regulators.

Third AoA vane sensor unlikely, but a synthetic third input likely with software changes, separating computation and monitoring.

Wise and guarded views on relationships between FAA - EASA and FAA - Boeing, grandfather rights, crew workload, pilot training and experience. (Ref to ‘average’ pilot probably for public, not certification use.)

[OldnGrounded]

"We simply don't know. We need to know." ~Takwis
Do WE really?

No we don't. YOU would like to know but you don't NEED to know.

Umm . . . What Takwis said we need to know is what Loose rivets wondered:

" . . . does the aircraft 'flop' nose-up in the late stages of stall entry?"

I'm pretty sure that the list of those who very definitely need to know is sufficiently long that it's perfectly reasonable to say that WE do.

And I predict that we will know, because there's no way, in view of the present and developing situation, that the information will be kept out of the public record.

[fgrieu]

..technical information from EASA @ https://aviationweek.com/commercial-aviation/easa-s-director-expects-boeing-737-max-return-decision-january-0?utm_rid=CPEN1000002344541&utm_campaign=21979&utm_medium=email&elq2=c563ba69f6b341cfa302a94c54606e9b
Nice article. Too bad the issue of the excessive effort to manually rotate the trim wheel in certain portions of the flight envelope was not raised. That might get in the way of lifting the ban, especially if the ET302 report comes out before the ban is lifted and contains damning material about that issue being a main contributing factor.

[safetypee]

fgrieu, :ok:

The runway trim situation could still be a problem, as you indicate re ET302.

My reading between the lines and from collated opinion, the combined software modifications and monitoring, stick base cutout switch, and a revised (clarified) procedure with refresher crew training, might balance the probability of malfunction - providing no MCAS failures. Even so this depends on human performance to shut the trim off before excessive trim forces would be encountered; perhaps with a big red light identifying trim runaway - but that would be challenging engineering task, dual FGCs at all times …
The training requirement could also apply to the NG, and previous variants.

[PPRuNe Towers]

fgrieu I think is referring to the various reports of a very stiff trim wheel at higher airspeeds. I've plenty of experience of 737NG post maintenance hydraulic flight controls switched off for trim checks but never above 250 knots. I've even repeated the test with the corrections applied in the wrong sense - very unpleasant but trim wheel's still usable.

Rob

[OldnGrounded]

fgrieu I think is referring to the various reports of a very stiff trim wheel at higher airspeeds. I've plenty of experience of 737NG post maintenance hydraulic flight controls switched off for trim checks but never above 250 knots. I've even repeated the test with the corrections applied in the wrong sense - very unpleasant but trims wheel's still usable.

Rob

And probably never with the H-stab at or near the stops.

[568]

There are far better ways to imply being a active commercial pilot on heavy aircraft if that is the case.

A simple check of your log book would prove your "every day" statement incorrect.

I will remind you that there have been many extremely informative posts on this thread, made by persons that certainly are not "Jet Transport /Airline Aircraft Pilots"

Big watches was a 90's thing.Excellent response.

[568]

'We', certainly the 737 pilots here, DO need to know the handling characteristics of the aircraft, especially when simple malfunctions (loss of AOA) render the aircraft barely flyable. To say that we don't need to know is akin to saying we don't need to know what happens when an engine quits. We don't need to know how significant the yaw is, compared to other aircraft that we have flown? We don't need to know exactly how to handle it? Ridiculous.

Am I going to analyze the data myself, as someone suggested? No, I have neither the skills, nor the time for that. I have suggested, in the quote above, a body willing, able, and that has signaled a desire to do it. Has the data been gathered and analyzed before, of course it has. But those who did so have decided not to make it public...in fact kept their attempt to correct those flight characteristics secret as well, until people started dying. So, we need to rely on someone who is going to be honest and open.I would say most of the posters here (including myself) would agree with your comments, great response.

[DaveReidUK]

Testing complete this month, certification approval in Jan, but more open-ended about training, simulators, overflights, and other regulators.

Hard to say whether that's posturing by the FAA, or AvWeek being creative. There is no way that the FAA is going to lift the grounding unilaterally if EASA, etc, are still weeks or even months away from doing so.

[Maninthebar]

Hard to say whether that's posturing by the FAA, or AvWeek being creative. There is no way that the FAA is going to lift the grounding unilaterally if EASA, etc, are still weeks or even months away from doing so.

And, in a statement of the bleeding obvious, dependant on the outcome of testing this month. It would appear that parties have previously committed the fallacy of assuming the conclusion....

[Longtimer]

Position taken by Canadian FAs.Media Advisory - Transport Canada will have to demonstrate that the Boeing 737 Max are safe to fly Français (https://www.newswire.ca/fr/news-releases/avis-aux-medias-transports-canada-devra-demontrer-que-les-boeing-737-max-peuvent-voler-en-toute-securite-883313632.html)

https://mma.prnewswire.com/media/1023551/Canadian_Union_of_Public_Employees__CUPE__Media_Advisory___T rans.jpg?p=publish&w=200NEWS PROVIDED BY

Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) (https://www.newswire.ca/news/canadian-union-of-public-employees-%28cupe%29)Nov 05, 2019, 10:37 ET

SHARE THIS ARTICLE



OTTAWA, Nov. 5, 2019 /CNW/ - The unions representing flight attendants at Air Canada, Sunwing and WestJet stand in solidarity with the American flight attendant unions who expressed safety concerns about the Boeing 737 Max flying again soon. The Air Canada Component of CUPE (Air Canada Mainline and Air Canada Rouge), CUPE local 4055 (Sunwing), and CUPE local 4070 (WestJet, WestJet Encore and Swoop) are calling on Transport Canada to take its responsibility in ensuring the safety of these aircraft.

The safety of passengers and crew must always come first. The federal government's decision to ground the Boeing 737 Max in Canada was the right thing to do. Given the record of Boeing and the Federal Aviation Administration in that file, it will now be up to Transport Canada to provide assurances that these aircraft are fully compliant and safe for our members and the travelling public.

Like the US flight attendant unions, CUPE must be consulted before Transport Canada makes the decision to allow the Boeing 737 Max to fly in our skies again. We need access to all the information required to assess the safety of these aircraft. The highest possible safety standards will be called for to avoid another tragedy. Simply stating these aircraft are safe does not make it so.

Air Canada, Sunwing, and WestJet are the three Canadian airlines operating the Boeing 737 Max. CUPE represents more than 13,000 flight attendants working at those airlines.

SOURCE Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE)

[infrequentflyer789]

Statement after the otherwise successful Starliner spacecraft pad abort test.

And of course the main competitor has one extra chute for more redundancy... (but still had a fail - in the one-chute-failed-by-design test...)

[safetypee]

Another view of the EASA comments:- https://www-rte-ie.cdn.ampproject.org/c/s/www.rte.ie/amp/1088643/
Return to service date not defined.
Focus on new software - Collins avionics.

[Flight Alloy]

One question if anyone could answer, is there a flight regime where the electric trim motors/their gear train would not have had the power to further manipulate the stab? Seeing how great the forces were, and even though the electric trim is electrically driven and aided I imagine by a reduction gear set, it would not seem to me to be multiple magnitudes more powerful than the handle+wheel-cable/pulley driven manual system (which itself is a lever and force reduction aided system (handle+wheel plus cable movement per turn vs pulley size on the jack screw drive side) with certain mechanical advantage). Could it be postulated that at a certain speed and AOA, the electric trim may have stalled out itself, unable to bring the stab nose up even if commanded, seeing that the manual system was practically seized?

[CurtainTwitcher]

A couple of articles on the stock buybacks and the financialization of industry and the effect on investment in Research & Development by investment fund manager Ben Hunt: (https://www.epsilontheory.com/when-was-i-radicalized-boeing-edition/)When Was I Radicalized? (Boeing edition) (https://www.epsilontheory.com/when-was-i-radicalized-boeing-edition/) To get the the full back story, read his previous article on Texas Instruments, Yeah, It's is still water (https://www.epsilontheory.com/yeah-its-still-water/).

[ARealTimTuffy]

One question if anyone could answer, is there a flight regime where the electric trim motors/their gear train would not have had the power to further manipulate the stab? Seeing how great the forces were, and even though the electric trim is electrically driven and aided I imagine by a reduction gear set, it would not seem to me to be multiple magnitudes more powerful than the handle+wheel-cable/pulley driven manual system (which itself is a lever and force reduction aided system (handle+wheel plus cable movement per turn vs pulley size on the jack screw drive side) with certain mechanical advantage). Could it be postulated that at a certain speed and AOA, the electric trim may have stalled out itself, unable to bring the stab nose up even if commanded, seeing that the manual system was practically seized?

Not too likely. The electric motor is at the stab itself and the stab backdrives the trim wheels. The pilots are hand cranking the wheels about 100 feet away via cables. We simply don’t have the torque at that distance when out of trim. An electric motor has boat loads of torque and is connected more directly right at the stab.

edit: but it is of course still possible. Who knows anything at this point.

[CurtainTwitcher]

Thanks Gordon, links fixed.

[Phugoidinator]

Stall at low altitude and airspeed not a good thing. Can this help explain why the second part of MCAS, for lower airspeeds, was added and made stronger than original MCAS? Are there data on this issue from wind tunnel tests or flight tests – does anyone know where I can find them?

[JPJP]

Sound comments.After hearing the response (s) from Muilenburg at the Congressional hearings, one has to wonder if the Board, senior bean counters and upper Management "types" have a grip on actual reality, after drinking the cool aid for all these years.I really believe that they are all in denial relating to the gravity of the current situation and what needs to be done to start the process of fixing many underlining issues (PR, MAX fix, law suits etc.).

I don’t think you’ll be surprised. But you may be disappointed. I was. Here is the boards view, and a ‘measure of their grip on reality’.

From the vantage point of our board, Dennis has done everything right," Calhoun said in an interview on CNBC. "Remember, Dennis didn't create this problem. From the beginning, he knew that MCAS could and should have been done better and he has led a program to rewrite MCAS to alleviate all of those conditions that ultimately beset two unfortunate crews and the families and victims."

https://www.cnbc.com/2019/11/05/boeing-ceo-dennis-muilenburg-wont-take-bonuses-for-2019.html

[Lake1952]

Stall at low altitude and airspeed not a good thing. Can this help explain why the second part of MCAS, for lower airspeeds, was added and made stronger than original MCAS? Are there data on this issue from wind tunnel tests or flight tests – does anyone know where I can find them?

A behind the scenes software program that controls the entire HS and can point the nose down steeply towards the earth unannounced at low altitude is also not a good thing.

[568]

I don’t think you’ll be surprised. But you may be disappointed. I was. Here is the boards view, and a ‘measure of their grip on reality’.



https://www.cnbc.com/2019/11/05/boeing-ceo-dennis-muilenburg-wont-take-bonuses-for-2019.html

Appreciate the link, thanks.
One word, "unbelievable".
Unless they pull their heads out of their "you know what", I shudder to comprehend what lies beyond "Thunder dome" mark deux.

[568]

Stall at low altitude and airspeed not a good thing. Can this help explain why the second part of MCAS, for lower airspeeds, was added and made stronger than original MCAS? Are there data on this issue from wind tunnel tests or flight tests – does anyone know where I can find them?

This will be Boeing proprietary information, which is not available to the public.

[OldnGrounded]

This [low and slow stall characteristics] will be Boeing proprietary information, which is not available to the public.

Not available until revealed in civil litigation, after being dragged out of Boeing's dark corners during discovery.

[megan]

One question if anyone could answer, is there a flight regime where the electric trim motors/their gear train would not have had the power to further manipulate the stab? Seeing how great the forces were, and even though the electric trim is electrically driven and aided I imagine by a reduction gear set, it would not seem to me to be multiple magnitudes more powerful than the handle+wheel-cable/pulley driven manual system (which itself is a lever and force reduction aided system (handle+wheel plus cable movement per turn vs pulley size on the jack screw drive side) with certain mechanical advantage).Could it be postulated that at a certain speed and AOA, the electric trim may have stalled out itself, unable to bring the stab nose up even if commanded, seeing that the manual system was practically seized?"Handling the Big Jets", D. P. Davies.A stalled stabilise drive can occur on some types where it is possible. with a very high elevator hinge moment. to apply a load on the tailplane so high that the drive mechanism is completely defeated and fails to produce any movement. It is unlikely that this will ever occur with the aeroplane in trim since a pilot is most unlikely ever to require a manoeuvre involving such large elevator angles and high stick forces. In an upset of some kind, however, where the stabiliser has achieved a gross out-of-trim condition, this position can arise. In turbulence, for example, a pilot might have run the stabiliser rather a long way away from the trimmed condition, a large and rapid change in speed could produce a very high stick force or the autopilot height lock in a long draught could have run the stabiliser a long way. All these could result in a grossly out-of-trim stabiliser setting with the immediate need of a very high stick force to keep control of the flight path.

While it is obviously disturbing to find that the trim will not run when signalled to relieve a high stick force, very recent tests by the author have shown that recovery from this condition is comparatively simple. Just sitting there and pulling a very high load, while it is the instinctive reaction in order to produce the required flight path, only compounds the difficulty. The stabiliser will not run until the hinge moment is relieved. So, keeping the trim button engaged, slowly ease ofl‘ the stick force. The aeroplane will not react very strongly because you are not doing much trade with all that force anyway. As the force falls through the critical value (actually, about 120 lb. pull on the type tested — although you won't know this, of course) the stabiliser will run and the aeroplane will come back under control.

Some aeroplanes with powered stabilisers and manual elevators have been cleared against a full aircraft nose down runaway stabiliser condition from a simulated jet upset manoeuvre, but only after the maximum nose down stabiliser range has been restricted. Tests in a particular ease showed that. provided the proper drill was followed, the aeroplane could be recovered although not, of course, within its normal speed limitations. The dive having been entered and speed brakes pulled, both pilots had to hold maximum up-elevator forces. The aeroplane stabilised at 0.93 true Mach number in the dive and held this condition for a comparatively long period of time. As the EAS increased at constant Mach number with decreasing altitude the stability of the aeroplane returned very slowly, the elevator began to take effect and very slowly the Mach number started to fall. Once this occurred it could be seen that the recovery would be made. As the Mach number decreased the full elevator effect returned. pitch attitude decreased and the speed began to fall. The recovery rapidly improved in quality thereafter, although very high stick forces had to be maintained until level flight was established at a much lower altitude.

Power was not reduced from the cruise setting during the whole of this manoeuvre because containment of the initial dive angle was so marginal that nothing, but nothing, was allowed to add any nose down pitching moment —which is just what reducing power would have done. It should be pointed out that this manoeuvre was flown on a type where it had been proved that the stabiliser drive could not be stalled in the presence of very high stick forces.

How this rather hairy manoeuvre will be regarded by an airline pilot is not known, but it must be of some comfort to know that there is a drill which will provide a recovery, although at the expense of at large height loss. Remember that this is for a stabiliser stuck at full nose down. a most unlikely event. For the more likely [but still improbable, of course] case of a stalled drive just remember the drill described earlier: keep the trim switch selected and ease off the high load on the stick. When the stabiliser starts running again ease off the stick force progressively and stop trimming when the stick force is down to a low value.

Again. in order to be fair to the designers it must be pointed out that originally there were no requirements relating to stabiliser drive stalling, although, in some cases, an arbitrary figure of about 100 lb. stick force was used. In the light of more recent experience, requirements in this area are being applied. This is always difficult to handle retrospectively: the easiest way out has been simply to limit the maximum amount of aircraft nose down stabiliser range under power.Since the certification dates back to when Jesus was playing full back for Jerusalem it's anyone's guess.

[568]

Not available until revealed in civil litigation, after being dragged out of Boeing's dark corners during discovery.

Yes indeed, all will be revealed at the appropriate time.

[Dave Therhino]

Following this Boeing 720 (a 707 variant) accident in 1963 the investigators determined that the stabilizer trim stalled for exactly that reason. In that case it was the crew who ran the trim well away from the neutral column force position in response to a strong updraft, at least according to what the investigators theorized from the limited data recorder info. My understanding is that the 737 stab control system design was based on the 707 system, but I don't know the system force differences between the models at extreme out of trim conditions.

https://lessonslearned.faa.gov/ll_main.cfm?TabID=1&LLID=66

[Captain Biggles 101]

I would say most of the posters here (including myself) would agree with your comments, great response.

Flight crew must be fully informed of flight characteristics in the event of an MCAS malfunction. The very fact the system was needed in the first place indicates that divergent pitch stability was a problem. Secondly, the fact that the system authority was increased further indicates problems.

Regulators must only allow the aircraft to return to service when system redundancy will allow safe flight throughout the flight envelope. AOA sensors do fail regularly, which i understand will render MCAS unserviceable, and in that event the aircraft needs to still be stable throughout the flight envelope. Crew must be aware of the consequences of AOA and/or MCAS failures, and simulators must reflect true aircraft behaviour in mandatory training for such events. Manual trim authority at all speed and configurations must be discovered and shared with flight crew for all 737 variants following these crashes in addition.

MCAS has turned out to be a powerful deadly system when it goes wrong. After such events, training must fully and accurately reveal in depth true aircraft behaviour and be trained for throughout the extremes of speed and pitch regimes to include electric and manual trim limitations.

It's time for regulators and Boeing to do the absolute maximum and reveal all data to flight crew that need to regain faith in such systems. It is also time for all flight crew to demand nothing short of full disclosure and proper training into all such issues now revealed by these crash investigations.

[Yaw String]

One thing that should have resulted after the first crash,and most certainly has,after the second..everyone now understands what the stab trim cutout switches do...Stated,"there but for the grace of god"

[Lake1952]

https://flightaware.com/live/flight/BOE1

Edited to note : The test flights all show up on flightaware.com as BOE1. There is a new extensive flight test today, Nov 7, although my original post was about the Nov 2 flight. You can see the history of the test flights on this site.

[Maninthebar]

https://flightaware.com/live/flight/BOE1

Interesting traces in the middle hour - is that approach to stall and recovery? Looks like they had particular fun in the last excursion and then called it a day

[fgrieu]

Boeing states that FAA(*) and EASA found documentation of 737 MAX software changes insufficient.
Source: CNBC article (https://www.cnbc.com/2019/11/07/regulators-want-revised-boeing-737-max-software-documentation.html).

Chairman David Calhoun, about CEO Dennis Muilenburg voluntarily waiving his bonus and equity grants for 2019 and
...until the Max in its entirety is back in the air and flying safely. As you know, MAX in its entirety takes us thru all of the next calendar year, and probably until the beginning of 2021
Source: other CNBC article (https://www.cnbc.com/2019/11/05/boeing-ceo-dennis-muilenburg-wont-take-bonuses-for-2019.html) and audio (at 8:00)

(*) updated thanks to airsound

[Water pilot]

Good to see that the spinmeisters are still on the job. At what point does this become securities fraud?

Boeing spokesman Gordon Johndroe said Wednesday the company “provided technical documentation to the regulators as part of the software validation process. The documentation was complete, and it was provided in a format consistent with past submissions. Regulators have requested that the information be conveyed in a different form, and the documentation is being revised accordingly."

One person briefed on the matter characterized the issue differently and said Boeing’s paperwork had gaps, was substandard and meant regulators could not complete the audit, a crucial step before the plane can be certified to return to service.

[airsound]

fgrieu - my reading of the CNBC piece says it wasn't just EASA that objected - the FAA did as well
U.S. and European regulators have asked Boeing (https://www.cnbc.com/quotes/?symbol=BA) to revise documentation on its proposed 737 Max software fix, the planemaker confirmed Wednesday,

airsound

[ktcanuck]

Interesting traces in the middle hour - is that approach to stall and recovery? Looks like they had particular fun in the last excursion and then called it a day
Quite a change in heading on that last one too!

[Takwis]

Lake 1952, I clicked on your link, just as Boeing 1 was taking off, passing through 190 knots. New flight.

[OldnGrounded]

Good to see that the spinmeisters are still on the job. At what point does this become securities fraud?

The market isn't too worried, yet, so the SEC probably isn't either. The spinmeisters' spin seems to be working . . . for now.

[phylosocopter]

Lake 1952, I clicked on your link, just as Boeing 1 was taking off, passing through 190 knots. New flight.

ooooooohhh they are having fun now!

[daved123]

ooooooohhh they are having fun now!
I might just have mistaken the intention of this flight but reckon ElAl 747 got a better silhouette. looks nothing like a 737M to me
DaveD

(not to take away anything from the seriousness of the program)

[Lake1952]

Lake 1952, I clicked on your link, just as Boeing 1 was taking off, passing through 190 knots. New flight.


All test flights are listed below the map as BOE1. My earlier post referred to the Nov 2 flight. There was another busy flight today, looks like a potential vomit comet.

[Grebe]

Looks like more of the go cheap or go home mantra by Boeing to one of its suppliers - Collins- who did the software involved. Extract from NYT


For years, the company had been “a technology leader, an innovator,” Clayton Jones, then the chief executive, told Fortune Magazine “Unfortunately, along the way they forgot to hone their financial skills.”

In 1998, Boeing executives summoned Mr. Jones to Seattle, he later recalled in a speech, and made clear that, to get more of Boeing’s business, Collins would have to cut prices dramatically. In response, Collins introduced what it called “lean electronics,” its take on a belt-tightening philosophy popularized by Toyota.

Collins reorganized business units and retrained managers, with an eye toward efficiency and speed. It pushed its suppliers to do the same, and established partnerships with companies such as HCL Technologies, which provides outsourced, lower-cost engineering services from India.

Along the way, Collins unseated Honeywell as the provider of flight control computers on a predecessor of the Max, the 737 NG, and supplied numerous systems for the Boeing 787, which went into operation in 2011.

When Collins secured the contract for the Max displays in 2012, it credited the belt-tightening. “There were a lot of cost-saving measures — a lot of tough decisions — that had to be made,” one manager said at the time in a company publication The display system is now at issue in both the congressional investigation and the private lawsuits.

[ktcanuck]

All test flights are listed below the map as BOE1. My earlier post referred to the Nov 2 flight. There was another busy flight today, looks like a potential vomit comet.

Watching the return to BFI "live". Fascinating flight profile. If only we knew what cases they were running, especially that last low speed one.

[Zeffy]

https://www.seattletimes.com/business/boeing-aerospace/new-questions-raised-on-safety-of-both-737-max-and-787-dreamliner/


New questions raised on safety of both 737 MAX and 787 Dreamliner
Nov. 7, 2019 at 6:19 pm Updated Nov. 7, 2019 at 6:26 pm

By Dominic Gates
Seattle Times aerospace reporter

Lawmakers are pursuing new safety issues with two Boeing jets — the 737 MAX and the 787 Dreamliner — and questioning how in each case managers at the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) backed Boeing’s contention that there was no cause for concern despite objections from the safety agency’s own technical experts.

The revelations, contained in a letter from the leaders of the U.S. House Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure, come a week after they chaired an intense public hearing when Boeing CEO Dennis Muilenburg was grilled about the 737 MAX crashes in Indonesia and Ethiopia that killed 346 people.

The letter sent Thursday cites “serious, potentially catastrophic safety concerns raised by FAA technical specialists that FAA management ultimately overruled after Boeing objected.”

The issues came to light during the House investigation into the accidents but are unrelated to the two crashes. However, they will add to doubts about the independence of the FAA and its oversight of Boeing.

One issue is how FAA managers agreed during certification of the 737 MAX to give Boeing a pass on complying with a safety rule that requires more separation between duplicate sets of cables that control the jet’s rudder.

This is to avoid the possibility that shrapnel from an uncontained engine blowout could sever all the cables and render the plane uncontrollable.

The requirement was introduced when such a blowout caused the deadly 1989 crash of a United Airlines DC-10 in Sioux City, Iowa. The 737 has never been brought into line with the requirement, and when Boeing updated to the 737 MAX it argued once again that design “changes would be impractical” and expressed concern about the potential impact on “resources and program schedules,” according to documents submitted to the FAA.

At least six FAA specialists refused to concur with an agency paper that allowed Boeing to claim compliance “without implementing a design change,” and an FAA review panel in January 2017 rejected Boeing’s position that design changes were impractical.

Nevertheless, the FAA certified the MAX for passenger service in March that year, and three months later the FAA formally upheld the controversial paper and waved aside the concern among its own technical staff.

Dreamliners and lightning
The letter to FAA Administrator Stephen Dickson was sent by Rep. Peter DeFazio (D-Ore.), Chair of the House transportation committee, and Rick Larsen (D-Everett) Chair of the Subcommittee on Aviation.

The second concern they cite is a design change to the 787 Dreamliner that removed from the leading edge of the jet’s wings a layer of copper foil designed to protect against a lightning strike.

A plane such as the 787 that has a carbon-composite rather than a metal airframe is particularly vulnerable to lightning damage, and a thin layer of copper foil is embedded in areas under the surface of the skin where lightning strikes are common — especially on the wings, which are full of jet fuel — to disperse the energy.

In February this year, the FAA office that oversees and certifies Boeing’s designs rejected the removal of the foil from the wing edge. Boeing appealed.

DeFazio’s letter says that five days later, a company official in a meeting reportedly said that the matter had been discussed with the FAA’s Associate Administrator for Aviation Safety, Ali Bahrami. Bahrami has been criticized for his close ties to the aviation manufacturers that the agency oversees.

Two days after that meeting, FAA management reversed course, and accepted Boeing’s position that the change was acceptable, according to FAA documents.

DeFazio demands to know what the FAA is doing “to ensure that these two issues do not pose a risk to the flying public.”

Boeing issued a statement saying it is “aware of both issues raised in Chairman DeFazio’s letter.”

“We are confident that each was properly considered and addressed by Boeing, thoroughly reviewed with and approved by the FAA,” Boeing states.

An FAA spokesman declined to comment, saying that the agency will respond directly to the two legislators.

Legacy 737 design details
The shortcoming in the rudder cable design was cited in a Seattle Times story in May among a list of MAX design elements that don’t meet the latest FAA requirements.

The story listed a series of legacy design details that have been repeatedly grandfathered into the latest model each time Boeing has updated the 737, which was originally certified more than 50 years ago.

All the issues in the list were flagged by FAA safety engineers as requiring fixes before the MAX could be certified. But each was waved through after managers on the Boeing side of certification insisted that these were non-issues and managers on the FAA side agreed to let it move ahead with the requirement unaddressed.

In the case of the rudder cables, Boeing argued that the CFM-56 engine on the prior 737 model had an “excellent” service history and that it expected the new LEAP engines on the 737 MAX to have a similarly low rate of uncontained engine failures.

DeFazio and Larsen reject this argument as “nonsensical,” since it extrapolates on “the reliability of a then-unproven new engine based on the performance of a completely different older engine.”

DeFazio adds that “my staff has been told that it was virtually unprecedented for six or more FAA specialists to jointly non-concur on a single issue, highlighting the gravity of their concerns regarding the rudder cable issue.”

End runs around safety
Lightning strikes on aircraft are routine. In certain parts of the world, such as Florida and Japan, they are common.

To highlight the seriousness of the issue for the Dreamliner, DeFazio cites the example of a British Airways 787 struck by lightning two years ago shortly after it departed London’s Heathrow airport bound for India.

The plane continued its nine-hour flight but when the aircraft landed in Chennai, maintenance technicians discovered an unusual level of damage: more than 40 holes in the fuselage from the lightning strike.

The major danger from a strike is that if it were to penetrate the wing skin it could ignite the fuel vapor inside the wing, which acts as a fuel tank. When the 787 was designed as a carbon composite airframe, the FAA added a special condition requiring various design details to avoid such an explosion.

In addition to the copper foil that dissipates the energy, metal fasteners on the wing are sealed so that there is no direct metal channel all the way through from the outside to the inside of the wing skin.

That said, later the FAA also loosened a more stringent requirement established after the explosion of TWA 800 to prevent a fuel tank explosion. Bahrami, then head of the FAA’s Seattle office, led that rule change. He argued that manufacturers had found it impractical to comply.

DeFazio’s letter notes that the FAA just last month asked Boeing to perform a “risk assessment of the fuel tank explosion risk from lightning related ignition sources” on the 787 and “to determine if any corrective actions to reduce the risk of a fuel tank explosion should be required.”

However, it laments that this action is so late.

And DeFazio adds that “Boeing reportedly produced approximately 40 airplanes prior to the FAA’s approval of the design change.” He says this “suggests either willful neglect of the Federal aviation regulatory structure or an oversight system in need of desperate repair.”

His letter asks what the safety regulator is doing “ensure that manufacturers do not have an incentive to attempt end-runs around FAA technical specialists by going to senior FAA management.”

Dominic Gates: 206-464-2963 or [email protected]; on Twitter: @dominicgates.

[Water pilot]

And DeFazio adds that “Boeing reportedly produced approximately 40 airplanes prior to the FAA’s approval of the design change.” He says this “suggests either willful neglect of the Federal aviation regulatory structure or an oversight system in need of desperate repair.”
Does this say what I think it does? Boeing produced 40 out-of-spec planes and then got approval for the design change? A manager would have to be either extremely incompetent or extremely sure of the outcome from the regulator to take that sort of risk.

You can google the sad tale of the fishing boat "America's Finest" (in Anacortes) to see the consequences of taking shortcuts like that when you are not an industry that owns the regulators.

[DieselOx]

Wow guys. I'm just done with Boeing. This kind of calloused disregard for compliance with new regulations is beyond fathomable.

"give us a pass, because compliance would be HARD"

That's not acceptable for an effing Barbie doll. It should fly for a freaking aircraft? Seriously?

Step back people, take a look at the view from the peanut gallery. Boeing is beyond the point of no return, in 'good' company with PG&E, with their prioritizing profits and bonuses over safety.

Unbelievable.

[RetiredBA/BY]

Why was it SO difficult for Boeing to design a system which endowed the aircraft with proper handling and stall protection when the Concorde designers created such a system over 50 years ago ?

On Concorde there was a high angle of attack system which retrimmed the elevons and triggered the stick shaker, signalled from the ADCs.
In addition there were TWO anti stall systems where the superstab system applied up to 8 degrees of down elevon and at speeds of 140 k and below the superstab system applied 4 degrees of down elevon.

One might think that with modern electronics and vastly more experience of FBW systems as on the 777 and 787 a better MCAS equivalent would have been a very straightforward task.

This is a basic description of the system as described in Brian Trubshaws excellent book, Concorde, the complete Inside Story, well worth a read by Boeing engineers and regulators, indeed anyone with any interest in the MCAS system and its shortcomings.

[Uplinker]

Quite so.

Also, I don’t understand why the software issue is/was so difficult. In the USA they have all the software expertise of Silicon Valley; e.g, Apple etc. So why - if it is true - did Boeing use cheap freelance software writers, and not tap into the excellent home grown talent they have?

[Speedywheels]

Quite so.

Also, I don’t understand why the software issue is/was so difficult. In the USA they have all the software expertise of Silicon Valley; e.g, Apple etc. So why - if it is true - did Boeing use cheap freelance software writers, and not tap into the excellent home grown talent they have?

$$$$$$$$$$$$$?

[fergusd]

Quite so.

Also, I don’t understand why the software issue is/was so difficult. In the USA they have all the software expertise of Silicon Valley; e.g, Apple etc. So why - if it is true - did Boeing use cheap freelance software writers, and not tap into the excellent home grown talent they have?

Meanwhile, back in the real world . . .

[romiglups]

Also, I don’t understand why the software issue is/was so difficult. In the USA they have all the software expertise of Silicon Valley; e.g, Apple etc. So why - if it is true - did Boeing use cheap freelance software writers, and not tap into the excellent home grown talent they have?

Writing software is hard. Writing software which crashes securely is harder. Writing such software on a 30 year old platform with very limited hardware resources is harder. Writing such software without interfering with other critical software running for 30 years on the same platform is even harder. Writing such software in a very limited time to solve an issue not considered at the start of program is harder. Writing such software with a limited cost was probably too hard.

[GordonR_Cape]

Writing software is hard. Writing software which crashes securely is harder. Writing such software on a 30 year old platform with very limited hardware resources is harder. Writing such software without interfering with other critical software running for 30 years on the same platform is even harder. Writing such software in a very limited time to solve an issue not considered at the start of program is harder. Writing such software with a limited cost was probably too hard.

"Good, cheap, fast. Pick any two." This one is attributed to Red Adair, the famous oil and gas fire suppressing expert.

P.S. I tried to click on the 'like' button, but had to leave a comment instead...

[Flight Alloy]

This is the pinnacle of 'too big to fail' and 'easier to ask for forgiveness than to get permission'. They rush planes to completion that are massively out of specification even withing their already grandfathered guidelines, then tell the FAA, "Well you can't expect us to have to SCRAP all these planes we made, now could you?", as the only way to achieve compliance would be a major structural redesign that is impossible to retrofit. A few shiny beads later to congressmen and FAA administrators and the necessary rubber stamps are dutifully applied and gazes redirected.
It was only by the grace of the residual decent engineering design that these massive short cuts didn't come apparent, but that 'lucky buffer' has run its course, and now the blood and guts are starting to spill. This behavior is so disgraceful it stinks to high heaven, and just goes to show the sickening greed and disregard for any decency of 'peak capitalism' of the US plutocratic type where governmental oversight has become toothless to the most shambolic, theatrical degree...

[jimjim1]

I don’t understand why the software issue is/was so difficult. In the USA they have all the software expertise of Silicon Valley; e.g, Apple etc. So why - if it is true - did Boeing use cheap freelance software writers, and not tap into the excellent home grown talent they have?

Because Shareholders and Senior Management are not paid enough and Workers are paid too much.

That has been the Corporate mantra in the USA and elsewhere for about 40 years now and everyone should know and understand what has been and is going on.

In brief - productivity rises every year due to human ingenuity, in the USA over 40 years ordinary workers have seen NONE of the benefit of that. ALL of the benefit has gone to a tiny proportion of the population.

You may think that is a good thing or otherwise but at least understand it.

Something else occurred in the period from the second world war until about 1980. Productivity rose similarly, however more or less everyone benefited from it.

Edited to add :-

Try Nick Hanauer's two TED talks.
Reviews of - Piketty is the author of the best-selling book Capital in the Twenty-First Century (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capital_in_the_Twenty-First_Century) (2013), or of course read it.

In no special order :-

https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2019/09/02/the-rich-cant-get-richer-forever-can-they

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ADrpo-ycCJ0
David Cay Johnston
The Impact of American Inequality

https://www.nybooks.com/articles/2014/05/08/thoms-piketty-new-gilded-age/

https://www.ted.com/talks/nick_hanauer_the_dirty_secret_of_capitalism_and_a_new_way_fo rward?language=en

https://www.ted.com/talks/nick_hanauer_beware_felow_plutocrats_the_pitchforks_are_comi ng/up-next?language=en

None of these people are crazy.

[OldnGrounded]

New questions raised on safety of both 737 MAX and 787 Dreamliner

https://www.seattletimes.com/business/boeing-aerospace/new-questions-raised-on-safety-of-both-737-max-and-787-dreamliner/

Well, we knew about the rudder cable issue, but I don't remember hearing that multiple FAA folks had to be explicitly overruled or the bizarre argument that the LEAPs would probably be as trouble-free as the predecessor engines. And it's really difficult to understand how the regulator could approve deleting a conductive membrane from the wings of a mostly-composite aircraft.

This whole story, with all of the subplots introduced to date, has gone from very troublesome to just plain scary and creepy.

[HowardB]

I don't think this has been picked up yet:-

Delays in Boeing Max Return Began With Near-Crash in Simulator By Alan Levin (https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-11-08/delays-in-boeing-max-return-began-with-near-crash-in-simulator)

[Flight Alloy]

Well, we knew about the rudder cable issue, but I don't remember hearing that multiple FAA folks had to be explicitly overruled or the bizarre argument that the LEAPs would probably be as trouble-free as the predecessor engines. And it's really difficult to understand how the regulator could approve deleting a conductive membrane from the wings of a mostly-composite aircraft.

This whole story, with all of the subplots introduced to date, has gone from very troublesome to just plain scary and creepy.
It's difficult to understand? How about you are a manager or decision maker at the FAA, earning decent federal employee pay and benefits. The previous FAA commissioner who just 'retired' just joined the board of X aerospace company or became the head of X industry association, with an XX million dollar compensation package. Your old boss you used to work for a few years ago is now a consultant for one of the big aerospace design firms and at the last BBQ he showed up in a new Maserati and his wife wearing a big honking diamond necklace. You are a good employee and on track in the next couple years to rise through the ranks and get your old bosses job. A guy you used to work with who was kind of nerdy but an honest dude filed an official complaint against some safety issue at one of the plane manufacturer's plants some time ago. There was this whole bruhaha in the office for a while but got cleared up. You check what he's up to now on his LinkedIn, and he's now an assistant junior safety adviser at the FAA office in sunny Alert, Alaska working on tire delamination standards and testing for sport ultralight aircraft in cold weather conditions. And on Facebook he's getting all these messages wishing him good luck after his divorce.
A certification application from one of the major manufacturers lands on your desk, your arm reaches for a stamp, will it be the green or the red one? Kathunk! The production line purrs on. Your scroll through the BMW newsletter you have been eyeing for the past month, Sky Blue really is a beautiful color isn't it?

[OldnGrounded]

It's difficult to understand? How about you are a manager or decision maker at the FAA, earning decent federal employee pay and benefits. The previous FAA commissioner who just 'retired' just joined the board of X aerospace company or became the head of X industry association, with an XX million dollar compensation package. Your old boss you used to work for a few years ago is now a consultant for one of the big aerospace design firms and at the last BBQ he showed up in a new Maserati and his wife wearing a big honking diamond necklace. You are a good employee and on track in the next couple years to rise through the ranks and get your old bosses job. A guy you used to work with who was kind of nerdy but an honest dude filed an official complaint against some safety issue at one of the plane manufacturer's plants some time ago. There was this whole bruhaha in the office for a while but got cleared up. You check what he's up to now on his LinkedIn, and he's now an assistant junior safety adviser at the FAA office in sunny Alert, Alaska working on tire delamination standards and testing for sport ultralight aircraft in cold weather conditions. And on Facebook he's getting all these messages wishing him good luck after his divorce.
A certification application from one of the major manufacturers lands on your desk, your arm reaches for a stamp, will it be the green or the red one? Kathunk! The production line purrs on. Your scroll through the BMW newsletter you have been eyeing for the past month, Sky Blue really is a beautiful color isn't it?

I suppose I should have said that, although I understand that many -- perhaps most -- humans behave as you suggest, it's always been difficult for me to accept that they do. Sometimes, our species just doesn't seem very attractive.

[Uplinker]

Quite so.

Also, I don’t understand why the software issue is/was so difficult. In the USA they have all the software expertise of Silicon Valley; e.g, Apple etc. So why - if it is true - did Boeing use cheap freelance software writers, and not tap into the excellent home grown talent they have?

Yeah, I know, it has to do with cost :)

But it is a shame that Boeing still use what is fundamentally a 1950’s design for the 737, which is like a MK 1 Landrover - dependable and does the job, but also very basic - and they never seemed to have the pride or willingness to really upgrade and improve their product? Yes, they added modern instrumentation and crowbarred some computers in here and there. But the cockpit is still like a cupboard, the hydraulics and systems are crude, and they didn’t ever do a properly integrated and sorted redesign, while Airbus overtook them. And Boeing have stitched themselves up now because they cannot fit large, modern fuel efficient engines under such a low wing.

I know some of the reasons were tied in with SouthWest, and pilot retraining costs etc, but as pioneers, it is a shame Boeing never truly modernised the 73.

[OldnGrounded]

I don't think this has been picked up yet:-

Delays in Boeing Max Return Began With Near-Crash in Simulator By Alan Levin (https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-11-08/delays-in-boeing-max-return-began-with-near-crash-in-simulator)

Right. We knew about the proposal to redesign MCAS to use both FCCs, but I don't think the sim "near-crash" has been discussed.

Edit: Re-reading . . . actually, maybe it was, sort of.

From the linked article:

Changing the architecture of the jet’s twin flight computers, which drive autopilots and critical instruments, has proven far more laborious than patching the system directly involved in 737 Max crashes, said these people, who asked not to be named speaking about the issue.

I guess they haven't been reading PPRuNe forums.

[GordonR_Cape]

Right. We knew about the proposal to redesign MCAS to use both FCCs, but I don't think the sim "near-crash" has been discussed.

Edit: Re-reading . . . actually, maybe it was, sort of.

We knew about the change to MCAS to use both AOA sensors, but that was only the tip of the iceberg.

More thorough simulator testing uncovered the potential for runaway trim on the MAX, caused by the inclusion of additional relays to override the yoke cutoff switches, which were only included on the MAX to satisfy the MCAS design criteria.

This fault condition led to the requirement for dual-channel FCC monitoring on the MAX (not the NG), which has turned out more complicated and time-consuming than expected.

This story is almost a textbook example of hubris and nemesis. If MCAS had not been included on the MAX, none of this would be happening. The MAX would never have been grounded, and would be flying today with the same 'relative' level of safety as the NG series.

[20driver]

This story is almost a textbook example of hubris and nemesis. If MCAS had not been included on the MAX, none of this would be happening. The MAX would never have been grounded, and would be flying today with the same 'relative' level of safety as the NG series.
The old saying "If it ain't broke don't f*** with it" In this case the cure was worse than the disease.
Like it or not Boeing is going to have to design an new narrow body.
20driver

[Lake1952]

https://flightaware.com/live/flight/BOE1

Edited to note : The test flights all show up on flightaware.com as BOE1. There is a new extensive flight test today, Nov 7, although my original post was about the Nov 2 flight. You can see the history of the test flights on this site.
If you look at yesterday's flight track log, it looks a bit like an electrocardiogram in atrial flutter! Must have tried to stall a dozen times.

[OldnGrounded]

This story is almost a textbook example of hubris and nemesis. If MCAS had not been included on the MAX, none of this would be happening. The MAX would never have been grounded, and would be flying today with the same 'relative' level of safety as the NG series.

Yes, very likely, assuming, of course, that the pitchup tendency at some attitudes and corners of the envelope isn't worse than we now know.

[OldnGrounded]

If you look at yesterday's flight track log, it looks a bit like an electrocardiogram in atrial flutter! Must have tried to stall a dozen times.

And we don't know exactly what led to or what terminated all those rapid descents. I'm sure there are plenty of reasonable guesses, of course . . .

[nonfrequentflyer_NCL]

If you look at yesterday's flight track log, it looks a bit like an electrocardiogram in atrial flutter! Must have tried to stall a dozen times.

Tbf AF is more predictable than the 737 Max.

[gums]

Salute!

Some interesting thots Gordon and Grounded.

Mods cut off the Tech Log, But I'll post here and save the draft if this thread continues to be political and managment stuff and no serious tech discussion.

There could be more aero characteristics than the AoA vs stick force gradient. Yeah, it's nice to have the same "feel" as other planes ( not just the 737, although many Airbus planes do not have any such "feel"). The beast must be very "slippery", huh? By that I mean little "speed" stability. Checking out in Cessnas, Chipmunks, Champs, etc. , we old farts and many newbies learned the effects of changes in AoA upon control forces, and that speed can make it harder or easier to move the controls.

Somewhere along the line Boeing added STS, and the system doesn't seem to be an aerodynamic feature, but a sfwe feature that also does not seem to be directly AoA dependent, just speed. So why not implement something like MCAS and let the basic plane aero design alone? Hmmm....

Gums ponders....

[LTNman]

Being reported that Southwest have removed the Max from their flight schedule until March 6th.

Also now being reported that American Airlines have removed the Max until March 5th

[silverstrata]

Quite so.

Also, I don’t understand why the software issue is/was so difficult. In the USA they have all the software expertise of Silicon Valley; e.g, Apple etc. So why - if it is true - did Boeing use cheap freelance software writers, and not tap into the excellent home grown talent they have?

The original 737 hardware was the 286 processor, and they were still using it in the NG.
If the same is true for the Max, the number of Silicon Valley techies who understand this antiquated system (both hardware and software) is limited.

Silver

[Water pilot]

By contrast, the 737 Max had two separate computers. One operated the flight systems and another was available if the first one failed, with the roles switching on each flight. But they interacted only minimally.

Boeing decided to make the two systems monitor each other so that each computer can halt an erroneous action by the other. This change is an important modernization that brings the plane more in line with the latest safety technology but raised highly complex software and hardware issues.

What Boeing is trying to do here is really hard, even leaving out the fact that they are using a 286 (which is not ancient, you damn whippersnappers!), a homebrew 'operating system', and have probably zero institutional memory of the baseline code. The estimate “Where before you may have had 10 scenarios to test, I could see that being 100" is off by several orders of magnitude. I know, I did this kind of stuff and it is some of the most frustrating programming you can imagine. (It is a constant war between "data corruption" and "everything locks up"; anyone can understand the theory of critical sections but in practice...) It sounds so simple in the boardroom and looks so neat on the whiteboard but in real life it is a nightmare. I was part of a team that was pretty familiar with this sort of issue and a new major release would take about two years to get properly tested and even after release for the next three months or you could count on getting a call in the middle of the night about data corruption. (I won't go much further but lets just say I have concerns about our financial system as well other data critical enterprises such as elections.)

The plan to have computer #1 inspect computer #2 and halt it if it thinks it is in error is about as asinine as swapping the roles of the computers each flight. As someone who moved onto playing with real world systems with big things that sometimes stop moving, the last thing you want when trying to figure out what went wrong is a system that swaps which processor/sensor is in use based on some unknown criteria. Flight #1 exhibits a critical problem, test Flight #2 shows 'no trouble found', Flight #3 goes back to the bad processor and crashes. What frigging genius came up with that? Oh, the same genius who swapped the 'active' AOA indicator for MCAS.

However, aside from that, what they are talking about is not only really hard, but now you have to test scenarios of erronious computer shutdown at any frigging time during the duration of the flight. This is really the same rancid logic behind MCAS; a solution for an extremely rare event now creates its own problem in much more common situations. How many benign problems are in the processing code that are now going to trigger this 'kill' subroutine? What happens if the two computers get into a war with each other? How robust is the communication line between the computers, which was probably never designed to deal with the amount of data that now has to be transferred?

No wonder they did not want to completely document what they did.

In my opinion, the right solution for their computer failure scenario is to figure out how to enable the pilot to resolve it, not to try to come up with a patched together failsafe computer system that wasn't designed to be failsafe from the beginning. I have no idea whether this involves more indicator lights (I know, I know), or some sort of manual override, or some kind of hardware solution (like physically preventing the computer from misconfiguring the plane) but the right solution is surely not to create an exponentially more complex computer system in a hurry.

[Bend alot]

To add to that Water pilot,

It seems that the FAA and other regulators want not only documentation of the changes, but also supporting evidence of Boeing's optimistic classifications of risks of failures to changes.

Boeing do not seem yet to understand that the old days of Boeing saying we classify the risk as (a rung or two lower than it should be) X, so we comply by doing Y&Z - stamp please!
They seem surprised that the risk must be accurately classified and not "accountantly" classified, as it all ways should have been.

The Boeing management think they made just a few simple errors in the past, but overall they have and still do exceptional work and everyone should just let the couple of errors slide. We know better so just let us do our thing - trust me.

[Loose rivets]

. . . In my opinion, the right solution for their computer failure scenario is to figure out how to enable the pilot to resolve it, . . .

In my suggested, quick cut followed by four stage reintroduction, the last item to be reinstated is MCAS, but wait, can that specific software be divorced from the autopilot and indeed, STS? I assume it can't or there would be no need to ferry the MAX at snail's pace with a notch of flap down.

It seems the only way to inhibit MCAS would be by say, selecting a menu line saying as much, but that in itself is just a few lines of glitch-vulnerable code.

I get the feeling that the only safe design is for MCAS to be a quite separate black box with readily interruptible hard-wiring to the tail.

[Icarus2001]

the right solution for their computer failure scenario is to figure out how to enable the pilot to resolve it, . . . They could make the (manual) electric trim switches on the control column override MCAS trim input. Oh wait...

[FrequentSLF]

They could make the (manual) electric trim switches on the control column override MCAS trim input. Oh wait...

Sorry but i disagree, first of all we need to classify if MCAS is a stall warning or a stall identification system, once we define that we can define what are the actions required. According to certification a pilot should be able to disable a stall id system and such system should not be prone to a single failure. That is not the case of MCAS. To off it pilots loose all electrical controls on the stab, and MCAS is prone to single AoA failure, that is the reason why it was classified as a augmentation system...when in my opinion is a stall ID system... cutting corners to solve major issue

[Zeffy]

https://www.seattletimes.com/business/boeing-aerospace/after-lion-air-crash-boeing-doubled-down-on-faulty-737-max-assumptions/

After Lion Air crash, Boeing doubled down on faulty 737 MAX assumptions
Nov. 8, 2019 at 6:42 pm Updated Nov. 8, 2019 at 7:57 pm

By Dominic Gates
Seattle Times aerospace reporter

Seven weeks after the crash of a Boeing 737 MAX operated by Lion Air killed 189 people in Indonesia, the jetmaker made a detailed presentation to the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) justifying its design of the flight control system that had repeatedly pushed the jet’s nose down.

It concluded, in an exculpatory phrase repeated on multiple slides, that there was “No process violation or non-compliance” in how the jet was certified by the regulators.

But in hindsight, details in the December 2018 slide presentation reveal serious holes in the original evaluation of the Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System (MCAS) flight-control software.

Equally troubling, despite clear indications from the previous month’s Lion Air tragedy that the pilots had not responded as Boeing’s safety analyses assumed, the presentation reiterated the same assumptions and never approached the question of whether the MAX should still be flying.

Flaws in the original safety analysis of MCAS are apparent now after a second crash involving an Ethiopian Airlines MAX in March, and a great deal of reporting on what went wrong on both flights. That December presentation reveals Boeing’s thinking soon after the first crash and indicates both a substantial effort to deflect blame and a missed opportunity to reevaluate before the second crash happened.

The presentation shows that Boeing in its original certification of the MAX:

Presented MCAS to the FAA as not being a “new and novel” technology — and thus not requiring deeper scrutiny. The justification given was a doubtful comparison with the 767 tanker.
Did not consider in its safety assessment the effect of multiple system failures and how this would affect the reactions of the pilots.
Used questionable math to downgrade the system’s risk classification below a level that would have required more redundancy with at least two sensors to activate it.
Made a key safety assessment prior to a major change in the design of MCAS, and did not reevaluate the system again before certification.

Dismissed one scenario in which an MCAS failure was assessed as “catastrophic,” sticking — despite the Lion Air experience — to its prior assumption that “appropriate flight crew action” would save the aircraft.

Boeing’s message to the FAA that December — which formed the basis of multiple public statements by CEO Dennis Muilenburg since — was that MCAS had been certified using the company’s standard processes and was compliant with all FAA regulations.

In a statement Friday, Boeing reiterated: “The FAA considered the final configuration and operating parameters of MCAS during MAX certification, and concluded that it met all certification and regulatory requirements.”

Peter Lemme, a former Boeing flight-controls engineer and avionics expert, describes this as the company’s “stay-the-course, admit-no-fault mentality.”

“Boeing failed to properly reassess the situation, doubling down on their assumptions instead of immediately disabling MCAS to remove any chance of further disaster,” Lemme wrote on his blog devoted to analysis of the MAX crashes.

As a result, Boeing and the FAA maintained their position that the MAX was safe until forced to ground the jet 12 weeks later after another 157 people died in a similar crash in Ethiopia.

A flawed process
The U.S. House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, which displayed one slide from Boeing’s presentation during an appearance by CEO Muilenburg at a hearing last week, provided all 43 slides in the document at the request of the Seattle Times. The presentation is titled “MCAS Development and Certification Overview.”

It notes that MCAS was not evaluated as an individual system that was “new/novel on the MAX.” The significance of this term is that the FAA is required to be closely involved in the testing and certification of any new and novel features on an aircraft.

Though MCAS was new on the MAX version of the 737, Boeing argued that it wasn’t new and novel because a similar system “had been previously implemented on the 767” tanker for the Air Force.

Yet MCAS on the MAX was triggered by just one of the jet’s two angle-of-attack sensors, whereas MCAS on the 767 tanker compared signals from both sensors on the plane. When asked after the second crash to explain why the airliner version lacked this same redundancy, Boeing’s response was that the architecture, implementation, and pilot interface of the KC-46 tanker MCAS were so different that the two systems shared little but the acronym.

Laying out how Boeing originally assessed MCAS internally, the December 2018 presentation tells how first a standard preliminary risk assessment was done — it’s called a Functional Hazard Assessment (FHA) — by pilots in flight simulators.

They did not simulate the real-world scenario that occurred in the crash flights when a single sensor failed and prompted the cascade of warnings in the cockpit. Instead, the pilots simply induced the horizontal tail, also known as the stabilizer, to swivel as MCAS would have moved it to pitch the nose down in a single activation.

The pilots successfully demonstrated that they could then recover the aircraft. They did so simply by pulling back on the control column. They didn’t even have to use what Boeing later described as the final step to stopping MCAS: hitting the cut-off switches that would have killed electrical power to the stabilizer.

“Accumulation or combination of failures leading to unintended MCAS activation were not simulated nor their combined flight deck effects,” Boeing said in the presentation.

Those pilots also did not simulate the crash flight scenario of MCAS misfiring multiple times — in the case of Lion Air, 27 times before the plane nose-dived into the sea.

Boeing notes in the presentation that much later, in June 2016 during flight tests of the MAX, its engineers did discuss this scenario of “repeated unintended MCAS activation” with its test pilots. They concluded that this would be “no worse than single unintended activation.

As proof that discussion occurred, Boeing’s presentation mentions an internal email summary. Yet Boeing concedes that the discussion and its conclusion apparently never made it to the ears of the FAA. Boeing said it was “not documented in formal certification” papers.
The initial FHA classified an erroneous activation of MCAS during the normal phases of flight as a “major” risk.

This is a significant yet relatively low-level risk category, signifying an event that could cause some upset inside the aircraft but would not typically lead to serious injuries or damage. A manufacturer must do detailed calculations to prove that the chance of such a failure happening is less than one in 100,000.

This classification of MCAS proved fateful. It meant that Boeing did not go on to conduct two more detailed analyses of MCAS — a Fault Tree Analysis and a Failure Modes and Effects Analysis — for the system safety assessment it sent to the FAA.

It also meant that MCAS could be designed with just a single sensor.

This is despite the fact that the same FHA established that a similar MCAS malfunction during an extreme, high-speed, banked turn would be a “hazardous” risk. This is a much more serious risk category where some serious injuries and fatalities could be expected. It’s one level short of “catastrophic,” in which the plane is lost with multiple fatalities. The probability of a “hazardous” failure has to be demonstrated as less than 1 in 10 million.

Lemme notes that a “hazardous” classification typically requires that redundancy be designed into the system, with a comparison of at least two sensors being used to activate it.

However, Boeing avoided this for MCAS.

It argued that since the probability of a MAX airliner getting into such an extreme, high-speed, banked turn was just one in 1,000 and that the chance of an MCAS “major” malfunction was less than 1 in 100,000, the combination meant the chance of both together happening was less than 1 in 100 million — which “meets the Hazardous integrity requirements.”

A report on the certification of the MAX released last month by an international panel of air-safety regulators, the Joint Authorities Technical Review (JATR), states that this mathematical discounting of the risk “is not a standard industry approach.”

An FAA safety engineer, who asked for anonymity because he spoke without agency approval, explained why that’s questionable math. He offered the example of how aviation engineers work out the probability of an engine failure complicated by an added factor of ice forming around the engine.

They don’t consider that an aircraft will encounter icing in, say, one of 500 flights and then combine that probability with whatever system failure is in question to produce a lower probability. Instead, they just assume that icing will happen, because sometime it definitely will.

On Friday, Boeing said that it calculated the probability according to an accepted method, adding that “recently there has been discussion of revising this practice but no new standards have been set.”

The presentation also describes how a separate analysis was done of multiple system failures on the 737 MAX, which would have included MCAS.

However, this was “completed prior to the design change to MCAS,” when Boeing decided in March 2016 to extend the system’s operation to low-speed normal flight. The presentation states, “reevaluation of design change not required,” per Boeing’s process.

As a result, Boeing conceded that the version of MCAS included in the system safety assessment sent to the FAA “was not updated to reflect certified design.”

However, it assured the FAA that it had done a new post-Lion Air assessment of the redesigned MCAS, which concluded that a revised analysis “would have included the same crew action that is already considered” and so wouldn’t have changed the outcome.

On Friday, Boeing in a statement said that despite this admitted glitch in the documentation, “Boeing informed the FAA about the expansion of MCAS to low speeds, including by briefing the FAA and international regulators on multiple occasions about MCAS’s final configuration.”

One scenario in the multiple system failure analysis is on the slide the House committee displayed during last week’s hearing.

It shows that when engineers analyzed the case of one angle of attack sensor not working and the second giving an erroneous signal, the combined effect on all systems, not just MCAS, was “deemed potentially catastrophic.”

However, again Boeing concluded this was “acceptable” because of the expectation of “appropriate crew action” to counter the emergency, plus the calculation that such a dual angle-of-attack failure was “extremely remote,” specifically that it would occur in less than one in a billion flights.

However, for MCAS to go haywire required only one angle-of-attack failure, a much higher probability.

Boeing knew that such an event had happened twice on successive Lion Air flights just seven weeks earlier, both on the crashed flight and on the prior flight.

And it knew that the crew action it had expected hadn’t occurred, even on the prior flight when the pilots managed to recover.

Nevertheless, Boeing’s presentation both justified its original analysis and reiterated its position: if MCAS failed, the crew would save the plane and all on board.

The presentation also solves one small mystery. Boeing notes how the FAA agreed with it to remove all mention of MCAS from the pilot manuals and pilot training.

So why was the acronym MCAS listed in the glossary at the back of the pilot manual, though nowhere else?

That was a mistake, Boeing said, “left behind from earlier drafts” before mention of MCAS was excised.

Dominic Gates: 206-464-2963 or [email protected]; on Twitter: @dominicgates.

[Dave Therhino]

I don't know why the other new thread about Congress raising concerns about the Max and 787 was closed, but here is the letter from the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee to the FAA. It's a bit of thread drift, but related. Hopefully I'm not repeating some transgression.

https://transportation.house.gov/imo/media/doc/DeFazio,%20Larsen%20Letter%20to%20FAA%20re%20rudder%20cables ,%20lightning%20covers.pdf

[DaveReidUK]

The original 737 hardware was the 286 processor, and they were still using it in the NG.

Intel 80286: 1982
Boeing 737: 1968

[GordonR_Cape]

Intel 80286: 1982
Boeing 737: 1968

The Boeing 737 Classic (-300 onwards) was introduced in 1984. That is the benchmark for the FCCs, not the -200 model.

[clearedtocross]

I don't know why the other new thread about Congress raising concerns about the Max and 787 was closed, but here is the letter from the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee to the FAA. It's a bit of thread drift, but related. Hopefully I'm not repeating some transgression.

https://transportation.house.gov/imo/media/doc/DeFazio,%20Larsen%20Letter%20to%20FAA%20re%20rudder%20cables ,%20lightning%20covers.pdf

I wonder how much longer the insurance companies will wait to revoke their contracts regarding Max, NG (pickle forks) and Dreamliner so obviously not meeting safety standards.

[Bend alot]

I wonder how much longer the insurance companies will wait to revoke their contracts regarding Max, NG (pickle forks) and Dreamliner so obviously not meeting safety standards.
Insurance for passengers on airlines is very restricted.

So with the clout of Boeing, I doubt much will be said by insurance companies.

Do not forget the FAA "certified" the aircraft not Boeing.

[clearedtocross]

Insurance for passengers on airlines is very restricted.

So with the clout of Boeing, I doubt much will be said by insurance companies.

Do not forget the FAA "certified" the aircraft not Boeing.

This may be true for normal pax insurance for a „normal“ aircraft. But how about product liability? The FAA will not cough up a single dime for a now known design deficiency by B, neither for the hardware or 3rd party damage.

[Bend alot]

This may be true for normal pax insurance for a „normal“ aircraft. But how about product liability? The FAA will not cough up a single dime for a now known design deficiency by B, neither for the hardware or 3rd party damage.
Boeing were adamant the aircraft was correctly certified (it did have the FAA "tick") and the FAA will tick again when the pressure is enough it seems.

Correct the FAA will never cough up a dime.

A VERY staggered release to re certification may by in years not months.

[Takwis]

Zeffy "Though MCAS was new on the MAX version of the 737, Boeing argued that it wasn’t new and novel because a similar system “had been previously implemented on the 767” tanker for the Air Force.

Yet MCAS on the MAX was triggered by just one of the jet’s two angle-of-attack sensors, whereas MCAS on the 767 tanker compared signals from both sensors on the plane. When asked after the second crash to explain why the airliner version lacked this same redundancy, Boeing’s response was that the architecture, implementation, and pilot interface of the KC-46 tanker MCAS were so different that the two systems shared little but the acronym."

It's a dessert topping, AND a floorwax!

[golfyankeesierra]

The Boeing 737 Classic (-300 onwards) was introduced in 1984. That is the benchmark for the FCCs, not the -200 model.
Does the max still have the same FCC’s then? That archaic master/slave stuff and failpassive autoland?

[BDAttitude]

I‘m not sure about the insurance thing as I know too little about this market but that plane is going to be a ticking bomb - at least public relations wise - even when finally cleared to fly some time. Given how many of them were produced and will be delivered in future another one will be going down sooner or later. And whereas all commercial airliners in the last 50 years (maybe except the DC10) had the benefit of doubt that the root cause will most likely have a significant portion of pilot error included, the 737Max will not. So if it’s not CFIT in mountainous area and bad weather or a mid air collision, fingers will be pointed against the aircraft and it’s manufacturer.
And even the last backwoods journo from the Podunk Herald does now know that this plane was deprecated before its first flight, like a hotrod made from a chasis of a 60ies Volkswagen beetle, stretched and reengined with a supercharged direct injection engine, but without anti skid sytem.
So it’s gonna bite someone in future. The question is, will it be Boeing who will not provide a successor in medium term, the airline which is flying this 60ies plane in 2030 or the regulators who will be allowing this continue for indefinite time?
People will not care because they are all hoping to be in a different job position or retired when it is going to happen.

[ktcanuck]

Sounds like the MCAS solution might be all but there but they are now struggling with a much harder one to solve. I was wondering why the trip to Cedar Rapids when Boeing wrote the software. Looks like they are back at the FCC oem trying to show how two computers can self check each other and figure out who's wrong. Good luck with that.

[BDAttitude]

Sounds like the MCAS solution might be all but there but they are now struggling with a much harder one to solve. I was wondering why the trip to Cedar Rapids when Boeing wrote the software. Looks like they are back at the FCC oem trying to show how two computers can self check each other and figure out who's wrong. Good luck with that.
Back then I had been speculating that they must have a solution for this in their code baseline which only needs to be configuerd for the project - otherwise it could never been done with the timeline envisioned. Seems they have to do some post documentation :8.
Still I am more worried by the changes to the task system or function distribution they likely had to do due to the AP disconnect issue. There you have the potential to break anything anywhere and require to do a 100% coverage of functional testing. It’s like rebuilding the supporting walls of a house without moving the furniture. It’s never going to happen without some losses.

[dufc]

From : "After Lion Air crash, Boeing doubled down on faulty 737 MAX assumptions
Nov. 8, 2019 at 6:42 pm Updated Nov. 8, 2019 at 7:57 pm By Dominic Gates" :

A flawed process
The U.S. House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee, which displayed one slide from Boeing’s presentation during an appearance by CEO Muilenburg at a hearing last week, provided all 43 slides in the document at the request of the Seattle Times. The presentation is titled “MCAS Development and Certification Overview.”

It notes that MCAS was not evaluated as an individual system that was “new/novel on the MAX.” The significance of this term is that the FAA is required to be closely involved in the testing and certification of any new and novel features on an aircraft.

Though MCAS was new on the MAX version of the 737, Boeing argued that it wasn’t new and novel because a similar system “had been previously implemented on the 767” tanker for the Air Force.

Yet MCAS on the MAX was triggered by just one of the jet’s two angle-of-attack sensors, whereas MCAS on the 767 tanker compared signals from both sensors on the plane. When asked after the second crash to explain why the airliner version lacked this same redundancy, Boeing’s response was that the architecture, implementation, and pilot interface of the KC-46 tanker MCAS were so different that the two systems shared little but the acronym."

How can Boeing seriously square these contradictory statements? MCAS is similar and dissimilar at the same time?

This is 'Alice in Wonderland' time :

“When I use a word,” Humpty Dumpty said, in rather a scornful tone, “it means just what I choose it to mean—neither more nor less.” “The question is,” said Alice, “whether you can make words mean so many different things.”

[clearedtocross]

How can Boeing seriously square these contradictory statements? MCAS is similar and dissimilar at the same time?

This is 'Alice in Wonderland' time :

“When I use a word,” Humpty Dumpty said, in rather a scornful tone, “it means just what I choose it to mean—neither more nor less.” “The question is,” said Alice, “whether you can make words mean so many different things.”

Easy enough. Alice fell into a land where Humpty Trumpty resides.

[infrequentflyer789]

Easy enough. Alice fell into a land where Humpty Trumpty resides.

Good, except most of Alice's problems and the bulk of Alices certification was done before Trumpty actually moved in...

[Lake1952]

Sorry but i disagree, first of all we need to classify if MCAS is a stall warning or a stall identification system, once we define that we can define what are the actions required. According to certification a pilot should be able to disable a stall id system and such system should not be prone to a single failure. That is not the case of MCAS. To off it pilots loose all electrical controls on the stab, and MCAS is prone to single AoA failure, that is the reason why it was classified as a augmentation system...when in my opinion is a stall ID system... cutting corners to solve major issue

How can MCAS possibly be considered a stall ID system or even a stall warning system? Any system code which autonomously (and secretly) moves a barn door sized HS is a stall prevention system .

So I am sure this has already come up many times, but can the MAX be certified without MCAS even if that required a new type rating G-d forbid? My Lake Amphibian would pitch down with power increases and vice versa. That idiosyncrasy was covered in transition lesson #1.

[dtaylor1984]

However, aside from that, what they are talking about is not only really hard, but now you have to test scenarios of erronious computer shutdown at any frigging time during the duration of the flight. This is really the same rancid logic behind MCAS; a solution for an extremely rare event now creates its own problem in much more common situations. How many benign problems are in the processing code that are now going to trigger this 'kill' subroutine? What happens if the two computers get into a war with each other? How robust is the communication line between the computers, which was probably never designed to deal with the amount of data that now has to be transferred?

No wonder they did not want to completely document what they did.


Retrofitting logic like this sounds to me like an even bigger disaster-in-the-making than MCAS.

Triple modular redundancy has three systems and a majority voting system for a reason: if you can't trust a single module to be sufficiently reliable at performing its own operation, how can you possibly trust it to monitor the dual redundant module sufficiently reliably to trust it to shut it down!? And trying to add this on to a system that was never designed, in a rush to get ungrounded... sounds terrifying.

[jdawg]

Sorry but i disagree, first of all we need to classify if MCAS is a stall warning or a stall identification system, once we define that we can define what are the actions required. According to certification a pilot should be able to disable a stall id system and such system should not be prone to a single failure. That is not the case of MCAS. To off it pilots loose all electrical controls on the stab, and MCAS is prone to single AoA failure, that is the reason why it was classified as a augmentation system...when in my opinion is a stall ID system... cutting corners to solve major issue
Stall warning OR identification? You may want to add avoidance or augmentation device since it applied control input. Now let me help you with the warning or identification part......MCAS neither warned nor identified pilots of a pending stall situation. Hope that clears it up.
The MAX needs to be re certified from scratch !

[Takwis]

Does the max still have the same FCC’s then? That archaic master/slave stuff and failpassive autoland?

Yes. 80286s in the MAX, same master/slave for the flight directors. The master f/d also determines which FCC is being used.

[nevillestyke]

https://www.seattletimes.com/business/boeing-aerospace/after-lion-air-crash-boeing-doubled-down-on-faulty-737-max-assumptions/
It always strikes me that these arbitrary risk factors, which have to be complied with, would be completely different if the majority of people were born with twelve fingers, rather than ten.

[clearedtocross]

Stall identification is a misleading term. It’s task is NOT to identify a stall situation to the pilots - like a stall horn or stick shaker - but to identify an approaching stall condition with its sensors and actively reduce the AoA (like a stick pusher, alpha protect, etc.)

[Fly Aiprt]

Yes. 80286s in the MAX, same master/slave for the flight directors. The master f/d also determines which FCC is being used.

Can we consider the presence of those 286 processors as confirmed ?

[OldnGrounded]

Can we consider the presence of those 286 processors as confirmed ?

It has been "common knowledge" for a long time and I've never seen or heard otherwise from an authoritative source.

FWIW, the mere reliance on the 80286 doesn't really alarm me, but the magnitude of the task of fully reconfiguring the operation of the FCCs is . . . well, it's a very big deal.

[gums]

Salute!

How come we can not talk ancient processors over on Tech Log? Keep the management and political stuff here?

Good grief! The sfwe and object code for the MCAS function could be implemented on a 8088 or a Motorola cpu from the original Apple.

We flew the SLUF and the early Vipers with such, and less than a megabyte of RAM. Our non-volatile memory was maybe a few megs, and the same boxes were used in the lunar landing module. Sheesh.

The problem is not the CPU, nor the dedicated MCAS code. The problem is integrating a new function via the autopilot sfwe boxes, STS function, and who knows what else? No excuse for a complete re-write and still using grandfather cert, huh?

Basic aero still a big problem for this old pilot, so I am with folks that want to see raw MAX flight tests that have MCAS erased and look at the plots. Unless you go "full authority" FBW, the basic aero problems with the new motors and such cannot be mitigated with crude algorithms inserted in autopilot and STS functions such as we are led to see for MCAS.

Gums sends....

[Fly Aiprt]

And it's really difficult to understand how the regulator could approve deleting a conductive membrane from the wings of a mostly-composite aircraft.


It is understandable that Boeing considers changing the rudder cables routing "unpracticable".
But what is this copper foil shielding in a specific part of the wing issue ? Isn't it standard practice everywhere in the plane, and what is so special and so costly about the leading edge ?

[Mike Flynn]

Salute!

How come we can not talk ancient processors over on Tech Log? Keep the management and political stuff here?

Good grief! The sfwe and object code for the MCAS function could be implemented on a 8088 or a Motorola cpu from the original Apple.

We flew the SLUF and the early Vipers with such, and less than a megabyte of RAM. Our non-volatile memory was maybe a few megs, and the same boxes were used in the lunar landing module. Sheesh.

The problem is not the CPU, nor the dedicated MCAS code. The problem is integrating a new function via the autopilot sfwe boxes, STS function, and who knows what else? No excuse for a complete re-write and still using grandfather cert, huh?

Basic aero still a big problem for this old pilot, so I am with folks that want to see raw MAX flight tests that have MCAS erased and look at the plots. Unless you go "full authority" FBW, the basic aero problems with the new motors and such cannot be mitigated with crude algorithms inserted in autopilot and STS functions such as we are led to see for MCAS.

Gums sends....


The problem is keeping up with technology Gums.

The UK navy fleet are still running on Windows XP.

[OldnGrounded]

It is understandable that Boeing considers changing the rudder cables routing "unpracticable".
But what is this copper foil shielding in a specific part of the wing issue ? Isn't it standard practice everywhere in the plane, and what is so special and so costly about the leading edge ?

I think placement of conductive membranes and similar elements varies by location. Some parts of the aircraft, wingtips, radome, empennage, etc. are much more likely to receive lightning strikes than other parts, e.g., the fuselage. So more protection is applied to the more likely target areas. Not sure where, on that "scale," the wing leading edges fall.

Edit: I found this article in B's Aero Magazine: https://www.boeing.com/commercial/aeromagazine/articles/2012_q4/4/

[AviatorDave]

The original 737 hardware was the 286 processor, and they were still using it in the NG.
If the same is true for the Max, the number of Silicon Valley techies who understand this antiquated system (both hardware and software) is limited.

Silver



Really? You think the nine bucks an hour guys in India understand the 286 and the special programming techniques it takes to efficiently program those systems better than a US engineer?
The real reason is obvious: the Silicon valley techie won‘t do the job for $9 an hour.

[OldnGrounded]

Really? You think the nine bucks an hour guys in India understand the 286 and the special programming techniques it takes to efficiently program those systems better than a US engineer?
The real reason is obvious: the Silicon valley techie won‘t do the job for $9 an hour.

Those guys in India are the ones who haven't (yet) established resumes and contacts to get to Silly Valley with H1-B visas to get paid a lot more. The vast majority of them are quite capable coders.

Anyway, we've seen no evidence of problems with coding. MCAS seems to have done just what it was designed to do. That's the problem.

[WillowRun 6-3]

Flight Alloy, if you can draw up (3815) hypotheticals for legally fraught scenarios and situations like that one, not to mention one relating spot-on to a prime example of piling on of failures, don't settle for just a law professor gig. There's not exactly a surplus of good writing in the legal academy that bears tight relationship to the real world - go for something like Deputy Directorial Authority for QC and Monitoring, for Resources and Curricular Materials [(Q)uality (C)ontrol].

[Grebe]

From Boeing presentation to Congressional Hearing page 16 of 45
Enclosure to RA-19-00256

Page 14 of 43

System Level Functional Hazard Assessment (FHA)

Erroneous Inputs to MCAS Control Law

Erroneous inputs to MCAS control law could result in loss of MCAS function or

unintended MCAS activation.

Unintended MCAS activation due to erroneous input would still be subject to

the control law table limits encoded in the MCAS software (2.5 deg maximum

incremental stabilizer movement)

Unintended MCAS activation has previously been shown to be:

. Major in normal flight envelope.

- Failure can be countered by using elevator alone.

. Stabilizer trim available to off load column forces.

. Stabilizer cutouts available but not required to counter failure.

. Hazardous in the operational fight envelope.


. The probability of being outside the normal flight envelope is 10-3 (refAC 25-7C). Therefore, a condition that meets the integrity requirements for a Major within the normal flight envelope also meets the Hazardous integrity requirements for the operational fight envelope.



The above is/are Boeing FACTS as presented to Congress in a public hearing - the next page has interesting graphics re limits

[Takwis]

Anyway, we've seen no evidence of problems with coding. MCAS seems to have done just what it was designed to do. That's the problem.

https://moneymaven.io/mishtalk/economics/boeing-737-max-major-design-flaws-not-a-software-failure-rVjJZBVzZkuZLkDJn3Jy8A/

[WillowRun 6-3]

From the Seattle Times "doubled down" article, this premise for a question, or two....
Boeing stated to FAA MCAS "wasn't new and novel because a similar system had been previously implemented in the 767 tanker for the Air Force..."

Is there a track record in existence for this level of flight control system or system components (meaning, the MCAS) being waved through because it had been part of an Air Force aircraft development program? Of any type of aircraft?; of a program taking an airliner airframe and converting it to a military type? (How about, and specifically a wide-body type decades after a narrow-body had been certified originally?)
If there is such a track record, specifically, how many types of aircraft, and what were they?
Were any of those aircraft (if any) the subject of quite serious procurement scandals, and/or continuing evident QC issues in the production (debris? debris left in a completed aircraft??)?
What data, if any, did the USAF possess, and act upon in deciding to accept MCAS in the KC-46 Pegasus based upon, that is as derived from, the 767 airliner, with respect to pilot reaction times? Are these data (if any) and the assumptions based upon them comparable to those relied upon in the MCAS proces?; if so, how and to what extent?
What is the total set of communications, bureaucratic and/or official information channels of exchange, and all other forms and modalities of comparative and/or collaborative analysis related to airworthiness and ultimately certification, between USAF with an existing aircraft program, and FAA for a pending cerification decision? In other words, seeing that information that MCAS was already riding along on the KC-46, does FAA just nod "okay yes" and draw the conclusion Boeing obviously was seeking - or if not, then what is the sum total of all types of information exchange between FAA and the Air Force? As a process generally, and specifically for MCAS?

This, as discovery will go (or, as this one atty contends it needs to go and should go), is just the start.

[kiwi grey]

https://www.seattletimes.com/business/boeing-aerospace/after-lion-air-crash-boeing-doubled-down-on-faulty-737-max-assumptions/

After Lion Air crash, Boeing doubled down on faulty 737 MAX assumptions
Nov. 8, 2019 at 6:42 pm Updated Nov. 8, 2019 at 7:57 pm

By Dominic Gates
Seattle Times aerospace reporter



Anyone else think Dominic Gates ought to be in line for something like a Pulitzer Prize for this continued attention to this?

[Drc40]

The original 737 hardware was the 286 processor, and they were still using it in the NG.
If the same is true for the Max, the number of Silicon Valley techies who understand this antiquated system (both hardware and software) is limited.

Silver

Limited? How bout non-existent. The vast majority of these techies weren’t even born when that technology was developed and it hasn’t been formally taught in eons. Sadly the best talent might very well be in India as they’re used to playing with our hand-me-downs. Such a sad state of affairs.

IMHO I can no longer see a long term path for sustained MAX production. The sooner they start a clean sheet with modern systems while getting a limping MAX back in the air is their best, and maybe only, option. The MAX can not survive as the malfeasance continues to emerge on an almost daily basis.

[etudiant]

Limited? How bout non-existent. The vast majority of these techies weren’t even born when that technology was developed and it hasn’t been formally taught in eons. Sadly the best talent might very well be in India as they’re used to playing with our hand-me-downs. Such a sad state of affairs.

IMHO I can no longer see a long term path for sustained MAX production. The sooner they start a clean sheet with modern systems while getting a limping MAX back in the air is their best, and maybe only, option. The MAX can not survive as the malfeasance continues to emerge on an almost daily basis.

Press reports indicate Boeing has been discussing a 'Future Small Aircraft' with US airlines. Had not heard that name before, maybe a straw in the wind?

[b1lanc]

From the Seattle Times "doubled down" article, this premise for a question, or two....
Boeing stated to FAA MCAS "wasn't new and novel because a similar system had been previously implemented in the 767 tanker for the Air Force..."



The USAF has already publicly stated that the KC-46 MCAS system is not a concern - it is different then the Max implementation. How Boeing might have presented that to the FAA is another matter. If Boeing had kept the same design for the Max, one has to wonder if two crashes would have been avoided.
Air Force Magazine (http://www.airforcemag.com/Features/Pages/2019/March%202019/USAF-Reviewing-Training-After-MAX-8-Crashes-KC-46-Uses-Similar-MCAS-System.aspx)

The AF has also been public about halting deliveries of the KC-46 due to QC issues though I don't see where this would have any bearing on the Max. QC is not only an issue with new deliveries, it is also a maintenance problem (not necessarily a Boeing problem) on existing platforms.
https://www.airforcetimes.com/news/your-air-force/2019/04/02/air-force-again-halts-kc-46-deliveries-after-more-debris-found/

I'll leave it to your imagination on how much one branch of the gov't keeps another informed. However, I'd suggest that the AF is under little obligation to provide design details to any other gov't organization beyond those that insure the aircraft can safely traverse commercial airspace controlled by the FAA.

[Australopithecus]

It makes you wonder if Boeing have any project managers left who remember a time when they didn’t dictate terms to the FAA. If their documentation is still wanting then it seems like they still don’t get it.

[rattman]

Press reports indicate Boeing has been discussing a 'Future Small Aircraft' with US airlines. Had not heard that name before, maybe a straw in the wind?

I had heard talk about it as competition to the A220, but once boeing aquired embraer and the E-jet range it became a moot point and they went back the NMA

[megan]

Press reports indicate Boeing has been discussing a 'Future Small Aircraft' with US airlines. Had not heard that name before, maybe a straw in the wind Probably referring to this etudiant, plenty of references to peruse.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boeing_New_Midsize_Airplane

[GordonR_Cape]

Anyone else think Dominic Gates ought to be in line for something like a Pulitzer Prize for this continued attention to this?

I did hint a few months ago that Dominic Gates should be nominated for a Pulitzer Prize. His work is certainly merit-worthy, and the clarity of the writing is excellent. It may not be under the same personal and professional risk that some high profile stories attract, though there must be haters amongst the Boeing fan-boys. He likely has the backing of management, for all the extra attention this brings to the newspaper.

Edit: I did not realise there are so many categories. Hard to choose between investigative reporting, national news, explanatory reporting, etc. See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pulitzer_Prize#Categories

[Turb]

The UK navy fleet are still running on Windows XP.Not true. Urban myth.

[Uplinker]

Really? You think the nine bucks an hour guys in India understand the 286 and the special programming techniques it takes to efficiently program those systems better than a US engineer?
The real reason is obvious: the Silicon valley techie won‘t do the job for $9 an hour.

And it is a real shame that a respected and pioneering manufacturer such as Boeing thought it would be OK to go to the cheapest option for modifying the program code, (no disrespect to the coders they did use). One would think Boeing would at least bring in the original programmers as consultants - there must be some of them still alive?

What has happened to Boeing’s pride in their products? It seems to have been replaced by greed for money, and that is a real pity.

What is the issue with using “old” CPUs such as 286s, as long as they can process everything at the required speed? Indeed, there is a lot to be said for keeping to a tried and tested CPU.

How much extra code can be involved in an AoA vane comparison routine? : If x = y then continue. If x ≠ y then goto: (routine to illuminate AoA disagree light, master caution and disable MCAS). Repeat.

(I realise there will have to be limit windows applied to how much of a difference between AoA vanes for how long will trigger the disagree routine, but it’s basic stuff and not nuclear science.)

[AviatorDave]

Anyway, we've seen no evidence of problems with coding. MCAS seems to have done just what it was designed to do. That's the problem.

I know. That was not my point. My point was that Boeing went the cheapest path regardless of where on this planet the most software expertise might have been located.

[WillowRun 6-3]

b1lanc, no material or significant disagreement to comments relating to, existence of MCAS in KC-46 for USAF.
Nevertheless in context of legal manuevers very likely to occur or which already are underway intensely . . . and these include the liability lawsuits for the crashes, the criminal investigations, and the SWAPA lawsuit....getting at basic, underlying factual sets can make a lot of difference (or all of it - "cases are won and lost in discovery").
As these matters stand now, based on publicly reported information, the questions about the interplay between the USAF tanker system and Boeing's discussions with FAA all would be ruled relevant for purposes of discovery (I think there could very well be some of Flight Alloy's "Sky Blue" retirement wheels involved in what gets unearthed, too); and in DOJ investigation on the prosecutorial side as well.
Not looking to drift on this, how these interactions will cycle into, and then out of, the intensifying legislative initiatives to re-do FAA delegation . . . I'll just nod in the general direction of a note OldnGrounded has sounded ( & others); this crisis is a very multi-legged and -footed beast, as the shoes keep...on dropping.

[Realbabilu]

What would you do as folkner when he unknowingly found that the MCAS can activated in low speed in simulator

[Mascot PPL]

Complexity and quantity of software testing and validation B may be required to undertake could still be significant?

Been following this topic since the start and while I'm not a professional pilot I did work a lot on Avionics software in the 80s, none of this was flight critical but I did work a lot in fuel gauging, writing real-time software both in assembler and Coral 66 for 6502, 8031 and early versions of the 286 processors.

The most recent articles seem to suggest that alongside the MCAS SW changes B has moved (or been forced to move) the flight management computer from a simple dual-redundant system with a clear master-slave (active-passive) split between each "side" of the pair. To a semi "active-active" system where both sides are constantly checking each other and exchanging data/taking duplicate data feeds in real-time. If this is the case they will have a "shed load" of retesting to do. We did a similar thing way back when we modified a successful (and quite simple) fuel gauging platform used on a number of civil and military aircraft from active-passive to semi-active-active for a new airframe. We were finding race conditions, putting in semaphores and re-writing working code for nearly a year before the system was fit for purpose. There was little/no change to the functionality of the fuel-gauging S/W just the change of operations with respect to fail-over and real-time checking. Major project.

Typically each hour of software changes require at least 10 hours of testing in rigs before anything was near being suitable for flight testing.

We weren't flight-critical so we could fail hard and reboot it if things got messy. I would guess B don't have that option so god only knows how they are planning to deal with disagreement between each side of the system during normal operations, dual systems can't do majority voting :-). As a result, I would expect a number of new issues to be found in the system for some time after it has come back into service.

With respect to the comments on 286 I would guess these are all mil-spec components and will be around for many, many years (you can still get brand new mil-spec 8051s and I was working on those in 1985!). Flinging more modern CPUs at the problem is not likely to be a sensible approach and would require significantly more work to recertify?

I know the current issue is B specific but I also think that the "grandparent" rules aviation has been using for certifying new versions of older airframes will need some looking at in light of the Max issues?

[Zeffy]

All 43 pages of the Boeing presentation MCAS Development and Certification Overview (https://assets.documentcloud.org/documents/6544179/Boeing-Presentation-to-FAA-Dec-17-2018-MCAS.pdf).

[etudiant]

What would you do as folkner when he unknowingly found that the MCAS can activated in low speed in simulator
Is not the issue that he got the FAA to allow MCAS to remain unmentioned in the pilot documentation on the basis that the system was only used to offset very extreme 'out of envelope' conditions?
Boeing did not notify the FAA subsequently that it was not only deployed all through the envelope, but also was quadrupled in terms of authority.
Folkner did say the he lied to the FAA, unknowingly. Whether he or anyone else ever corrected that is doubtful.

[BDAttitude]

All 43 pages of the Boeing presentation MCAS Development and Certification Overview (https://assets.documentcloud.org/documents/6544179/Boeing-Presentation-to-FAA-Dec-17-2018-MCAS.pdf).
Thank you!
Intresting redactions.

[FullWings]

We weren't flight-critical so we could fail hard and reboot it if things got messy. I would guess B don't have that option so god only knows how they are planning to deal with disagreement between each side of the system during normal operations, dual systems can't do majority voting :-). As a result, I would expect a number of new issues to be found in the system for some time after it has come back into service.
One of the issues I would have thought is that the computing hardware stays the same but they are asking more and more of it in terms of workload. I doubt that this was allowed for in the original specification so forcing something that was primarily designed for navigation and performance to take over critical flight control function *and* monitoring seems like a bit of a step. Do the FMCs run a RTOS?

[PJ2]

. . . .
Basic aero still a big problem for this old pilot, so I am with folks that want to see raw MAX flight tests that have MCAS erased and look at the plots. Unless you go "full authority" FBW, the basic aero problems with the new motors and such cannot be mitigated with crude algorithms inserted in autopilot and STS functions such as we are led to see for MCAS.:ok: , spot-on as always, gums - PJ

[OldnGrounded]

Anyone else think Dominic Gates ought to be in line for something like a Pulitzer Prize for this continued attention to this?

A Pulitzer. Absolutely. And, as I said some time ago, I expect he'll be on this year's short list.

[OldnGrounded]

All 43 pages of the Boeing presentation MCAS Development and Certification Overview (https://assets.documentcloud.org/documents/6544179/Boeing-Presentation-to-FAA-Dec-17-2018-MCAS.pdf).

I second the thanks!

On first read-through, problematic dodging, bobbing and weaving are apparent. Seems like a lot of CYA effort that no informed reviewer taking a hard look would be likely to quietly accept.

Example from page 14 of the document:
https://cimg3.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune.org-vbulletin/1406x595/b_mcas_cert_ex_1_93719c0559265a46ee2ce770ee831a5cc50c4bae.pn g
I'm going to guess that means that countering single unintended MCAS activation by "elevator alone" applies to a single, max. 2.5 unit movement of the stabilizer, not to the combined effects of multiple (presumably pilot-interrupted) movements caused by unintended activation. Unless, of course, Boeing is confident that "elevator alone" recovery is possible after MCAS has run the stab to the stops.

Also, from page 35:

https://cimg7.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune.org-vbulletin/1380x364/b_mcas_cert_ex_2_a8dcc3880ca6469ab38460267f3c0ebfecf6e908.pn g
Discussed but not documented and then . . . not referenced.

There's a lot more in the document. I'm sure others will find and share.

[FrequentSLF]

I know. That was not my point. My point was that Boeing went the cheapest path regardless of where on this planet the most software expertise might have been located.
https://www.microsoft.com/en-in/msidc/
It is well know that most of the software today is developed in India, Microsoft is an example, see the link. I would not see as cheapest path, but probably the most efficient and fastest.
The number of software developers in India is roughly the same of the USA.
It does not seem that MCAS problems are due to the coding, but to the basic concepts.

[silverstrata]

Elevator only is required to counteract MCAS..


I noticed this comment a few times in the Seattle newspaper. But on those FDR traces of the Ethiopian accident, it clearly shows that full back elevator was being applied (at the very end), and the aircraft was not responding.

So were these assertions derived from simulators, or real-world tests? And at what speed did they do the tests? (The Ethiopian was going rather fast....)

Silver

[Takwis]

https://cimg3.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune.org-vbulletin/1406x595/b_mcas_cert_ex_1_93719c0559265a46ee2ce770ee831a5cc50c4bae.pn g
I'm going to guess that means that countering single unintended MCAS activation by "elevator alone" applies to a single, max. 2.5 unit movement of the stabilizer,





As long as we are guessing, I'm going to guess that means that countering single unintended MCAS activation by "elevator alone" applies to a single .6 unit movement of the stabilizer, since 2.4 units is a hell of a lot of trim, and I wouldn't go on flying it "by using elevator alone." Even somewhat less than half a unit of mistrim, I would be trimming it out.

[Grebe]

A Pulitzer. Absolutely. And, as I said some time ago, I expect he'll be on this year's short list.


For those who really think Dominic should get a pulitzer- suggest you take the time to look up the ' requirements' and then make the effort to contact the Committee. even if he does not get the award, your support may well make him eligible for some other related awards.

While its not like voting for the dancing with the stars or popular vote- written support with some detail can make a difference. :ok:

[OldnGrounded]

As long as we are guessing, I'm going to guess that means that countering single unintended MCAS activation by "elevator alone" applies to a single .6 unit movement of the stabilizer, since 2.4 units is a hell of a lot of trim, and I wouldn't go on flying it "by using elevator alone."

OK, but note the "Upon each design iteration of MCAS . . ." statement.

[BDAttitude]

https://www.microsoft.com/en-in/msidc/
It is well know that most of the software today is developed in India, Microsoft is an example, see the link. I would not see as cheapest path, but probably the most efficient and fastest.
The number of software developers in India is roughly the same of the USA.
It does not seem that MCAS problems are due to the coding, but to the basic concepts.
"We are not developing in low cost countries, we are using best cost locations". Been there, done that, don't sort their mess out anymore.


Also, from page 35:
Discussed but not documented and then . . . not referenced.

There's a lot more in the document. I'm sure others will find and share.
Lecture from first day in any business or bureaucracy career:
If it's not in the meeting minutes it's not agreed, if it's not in a mail, it did't happen.

What do they suppose to gain with that whining. Seems pretty desperate.
​

[Takwis]

OldnGrounded OK, but note the "Upon each design iteration of MCAS . . ." statement.
I guess the "stab trim was available..." statement means, in typical Boeing speak, that they DID use the trim, after "using elevator alone."

[OldnGrounded]

[QUOTE OldnGrounded] OK, but note the "Upon each design iteration of MCAS . . ." statement.
I guess the "stab trim was available..." statement means, in typical Boeing speak, that they DID use the trim, after "using elevator alone."

Yeah, they are not exactly covering themselves with glory -- or inspiring confidence in their honest and transparency -- are they?

[DieselOx]

https://cimg9.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune.org-vbulletin/1334x750/e9282d2a_541f_46bd_8eec_519dce08d843_1a7d979d139899767b30662 a8b7694c4b2939281.jpeg
This is the only mention of flight testing of loss of MCAS I've ever seen confirmed here or elsewhere.

Somewhere else in all the pages posted, I got the impression that because MCAS only fires up outside the normal flight envelope, it gets a lower criticality rating, so did not require flight testing, or even sim testing of certain failure modes.

And so if it only fires up outside the normal envelope, why test the loss of it only in the normal envelope?

And what about when failures push you past the normal envelope, and into or beyond the operational envelope?
And all the redactions really are curious, 2 of 4 failure scenarios in particular. What else is hiding in plain sight?

[Drc40]

I can understand redactions of names but the other redactions are clearly CYA in full view. I seriously doubt some top secret Boeing tech was being redacted considering the placement on those docs. The malfeasance continues.

[Peter H]

And so if it [MCAS] only fires up outside the normal envelope, why test the loss of it only in the normal envelope?

I read that as reporting that the MAX's "suboptimal" aerodynamics (which MCAS is designed to tame) only has a "minor"
safety impact within the normal envelope. (Pedantically - for at least one point on the edge of that envelope.) Maybe
somebody doubted the aerodynamics sufficiently to require a test.

I'm only SLF, but "No Safety Effect" would have sounded nicer.

[gums]

Salute!

Good points Diesel

The problem was not failure of MCAS to activate, but activation when not required for the control force requirement. To be honest, 99% of the pilots would not notice MCAS if they were pulling too hard or if it did not kick in.

Gums sends...

[WillowRun 6-3]

WSJ:

https://www.wsj.com/articles/boeing-seeks-blessing-to-deliver-737-max-as-faa-reviews-pilot-training-11573421213?mod=hp_lista_pos2

[Australopithecus]

WSJ:

https://www.wsj.com/articles/boeing-seeks-blessing-to-deliver-737-max-as-faa-reviews-pilot-training-11573421213?mod=hp_lista_pos2

Not paying Murdoch a cent to look past the paywall

[Loose rivets]

In the presentation to the FAA, they show two sets of switches which seem to be the same thing. Items 3 and 5. What are the trim override switches?

Do they simply mean the effective overriding power of the electric trim switches?


https://cimg1.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune.org-vbulletin/640x469/to_faa_1ea89c8c16bf1e544bc6bf5efb974090e17019b1.jpg

[ktcanuck]

I don't think it matters whether FCC(left) and your FCC(right) friend are 8086, 286, 386 or i7 core blah, when you, as one FCC, are called upon to figure out why your data differs from your only other friends data, you cannot tell whether you or they are right and you are screwed. Safely, you can only both shutdown. Now what?

If MCAS was needed for certification in either its initial or later severity of effect, I am at loss to see how airworthiness can be demonstrated without major changes.

But then I am older and not subject to modern economic influences....

[ARealTimTuffy]

In the presentation to the FAA, they show two sets of switches which seem to be the same thing. Items 3 and 5. What are the trim override switches?

Do they simply mean the effective overriding power of the electric trim switches?


https://cimg1.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune.org-vbulletin/640x469/to_faa_1ea89c8c16bf1e544bc6bf5efb974090e17019b1.jpg
They are different things. Point 3 the stabilizer cutout switches right below the flap lever is quite well known. Point 5, as near as I can discern, relates to the stab trim override switch at the back of the pedestal near the door unlock switch. It will override the control column cutout switches, which can be used (without looking it up) in the event of a jammed control column etc. In that case you may need to trim against the direction the column is in.

[Takwis]

Boeing Seeking FAA Delivery Approval - But Approval of Training Would Lag Behind
"Delivery" means payment for the aircraft. Boeing is playing the old trick from the Popeye cartoons, where Wimpy will gladly pay you Tuesday (deliver the training materials) for a hamburger (payment for delivery of aircraft) Today.

https://gmanfortruth.files.wordpress.com/2011/04/1-wimpy.gif

[OldnGrounded]

I don't think it matters whether FCC(left) and your FCC(right) friend are 8086, 286, 386 or i7 core blah, when you, as one FCC, are called upon to figure out why your data differs from your only other friends data, you cannot tell whether you or they are right and you are screwed. Safely, you can only both shutdown. Now what?

If MCAS was needed for certification in either its initial or later severity of effect, I am at loss to see how airworthiness can be demonstrated without major changes.

But then I am older and not subject to modern economic influences....

You've nailed it. Two FCCs can't meaningfully vote on two AoA vanes, no matter how everything is configured. And the task of reconfiguration to get anywhere near an effective solution (maybe toss in a third, synthetic, AoA input) . . . well, how can that not mean an enormous testing and certification burden, followed by significant new training requirements?

[Takwis]

I am worried, though, that we've got it ´figured out´, but the regulators deciding the MAX´s future are forging ahead, anyway:

https://news.yahoo.com/boeings-max-likely-return-european-173136459.html

https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/companies/independent-review-of-boeing-s-max-finds-design-changes-safe/ar-BBWvrG8?ocid=00000000

https://abcnews.go.com/Business/wireStory/american-airlines-ceo-upbeat-return-boeing-max-jets-66795153

and worst of all: https://www.businessinsider.com/boeing-737-max-flight-computer-redesign-delay-simulator-2019-11

"While the 737 Max previously had two computers doing separate things — one operated flight systems, and one stood by in case the first failed — the redesign has both set to monitor each other. The original setup was relatively antiquated, borrowed from older generations of the 737, and the change is more in line with modern flight design.

[kiwi grey]

IMHO I can no longer see a long term path for sustained MAX production. The sooner they start a clean sheet with modern systems while getting a limping MAX back in the air is their best, and maybe only, option. The MAX can not survive as the malfeasance continues to emerge on an almost daily basis.
The clean sheet modern design will be designed and built by the Embraer Boeing Commercial Airplane Company, which will arise from the ashes of the old Boeing after the old company goes into Chapter 11 under the weight of billions of dollars in product liability claims.
By the time this Phoenix-rising happens, the Space, Defense and Services divisions, together with the widebody products and production facilities at Everett & Charleston, will have already been split off and either sold as going concerns or merged into existing industry players.
Under Chapter 11, the old company will shrug and walk away from the B737 and also from all its nasty expensive pension obligations,ensuring that the pain is felt at least as much by its former workforce as by banks and shareholders. A few fairly senior executives will serve as sacrificial goats and may even spend a few years in low-security Federal prisons. The very top guys will of course be thrown theatrically out of 13th-floor windows, and will then float gently down very happily supported by their golden parachutes.
The people who will make a lot of money out of it will be the lawyers, Airbus shareholders, and of course the very top guys from the old Boeing.
Pretty much everyone else will lose their shirts.

Too dystopian you say?
I'm afraid not

[Drc40]

Too dystopian you say?
I'm afraid not

What an uncomfortable chuckle. The absolute injustice you describe is not only possible but highly likely. After lurking on this site for 20 years the first post I made speculated billions would be “vaporized”. When the months wore on and the information trickled out It was painfully obvious this was a monumental industry game changer. The trickle down of this disaster will be felt far and wide. The entire industry will suffer. Hang on people, severe turbulence is around the corner and the ****e heads causing it will largely skate. What a catastrophe.

[formulaben]

The people who will make a lot of money out of it will be the lawyers, Airbus shareholders, and of course the very top guys from the old Boeing.
Pretty much everyone else will lose their shirts.

Too dystopian you say?
I'm afraid not

If you and anyone here reading truly believe this, then you'll buy plenty of shares in Airbus stock.

[fdr]

I must be missing something, but I would have placed a "Golden Parachute" in the same category as a "Lead Balloon". From a Newtonian Fiziks POV, thye don't assit greatly in stopping squishy soft centered human beign affected by gravity on the rock. I digress...

However, the Boeing Presentation is interesting reading still. On or about 17th December 2018, Boeing didn't comprehend what the MCAS was doing, but was quite happy to report it to the FAA. At that moment in time, a simple review of the trim motion of Lion Air would have shown that the information in the presentation was incorrect.
https://cimg7.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune.org-vbulletin/2000x92/screen_shot_2019_11_11_at_3_02_29_pm_a5bb1d7f08a2ba0fcfc611b 96ba167334018131d.png
Except if the crew intervene, which is assumed to occur, and at which point post the reset time of 5 seconds, the MCAS starts off again...


https://cimg2.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune.org-vbulletin/2000x131/screen_shot_2019_11_11_at_3_01_36_pm_176f6f21641415e4a47d9cc 82a0cc1d7a466533b.png

That was the original assumed normal operation of the MCAS if it was triggered, but the MCAS as installed drove the THS exactly the same at flaps up speed or at Warp 7... The dilithium crystals kind of got wonky on that score, and that pretty much guarantees the plane goes off piste into the rough. Now it is entirely possible that there is something else in the code that does something else, but the DFDR readout pretty much suggests that isn't the case.

https://cimg9.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune.org-vbulletin/2000x145/screen_shot_2019_11_11_at_3_08_40_pm_9577799f21665e32c010e52 b59e955195a73822b.png

Really? So why are we still on this topic, "...nothing to see here, move along..."

https://cimg0.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune.org-vbulletin/2000x146/screen_shot_2019_11_11_at_3_08_47_pm_cedb4be64cdd6f448d7edc2 17d4ae4f94b3d5e06.png

Are we so sure about that? Seems it is an assumption that was not aligned with the real world

https://cimg1.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune.org-vbulletin/2000x148/screen_shot_2019_11_11_at_3_08_56_pm_e88928d8b13432a75e4a58c c83d049ff88a48f78.png
Apparently not.

In the noise surrounding this forum, assumptions of what a competent crew should do has routinely been a point of contention. NASA at least bothered to do an evaluation on the assumptions that abound on what a trained crew will do (or won't do) when confronted with an event without notice. The following politely describes the findings, which a read of the source document is pretty confronting if you believe that any particular training program is fundamentally effective. In this study, the crews involved were trained and from what used to be a 1st world country.

Assuming that your training program will ensure that your crews will respond accurately, in a timely manner and effectively is not supported by this little look at the potential slip between assumed crew response and actual.



https://cimg2.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune.org-vbulletin/2000x1176/screen_shot_2019_11_11_at_3_10_11_pm_e19c7d6025722eb32ee0af2 d2647a58b70ad074d.png






https://cimg5.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune.org-vbulletin/2000x730/screen_shot_2019_11_11_at_3_10_25_pm_904ac0f37a710b14ecb6290 4bf824ae79d8849ed.png







https://cimg7.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune.org-vbulletin/2000x1449/screen_shot_2019_11_11_at_3_11_38_pm_bd2c93a222a13e16d5ae8ed da47e5e9f4d8f51dc.png

[Maninthebar]

fdr, thank you, as ever, for your input to this thread.

I'm afraid my contribution is only to say that I VERY much enjoyed the wonky dilythium crystals which forced the plane off piste and into the rough. A metaphor which I shall be using soon

[sky9]

You've nailed it. Two FCCs can't meaningfully vote on two AoA vanes, no matter how everything is configured. And the task of reconfiguration to get anywhere near an effective solution (maybe toss in a third, synthetic, AoA input) . . . well, how can that not mean an enormous testing and certification burden, followed by significant new training requirements?

I wrote in March this year on the Lionair thread:
Add a third AOA with a different software programme for both and you have solved the issue of how to make a poor aircraft design at least flyable.

I can see a lot of companies cancelling their options on this flying pig.

[spornrad]

Interview with Patrick Ky, hear of EASA a week ago: (https://aviationweek.com/commercial-aviation/easa-s-director-expects-boeing-737-max-return-decision-january-0)
...
You indicated that you wanted to have a third sensor.That is one of the possible solutions for the angle-of-attack integrity, if you don’t want [the failure of] one sensor having an impact on the integrity of the flight. With two sensors, the weight on one is 50%. If you have three, a failure of one means you still have two that are good. You can still operate under nominal flight conditions. This is one possibility, but there are others we are looking at with Boeing.
A third sensor would be a major change.Yes a very big change, so they won’t do it.
What are the alternatives?There are a lot of opportunities offered by operational procedures. Angle-of-attack is an important piece of information, but it is not vital for the continuation of the flight. Procedures basically allow the crew to identify the failure, to not use the information anymore and continue the flight. The other possibility is not necessarily a third physical sensor but what we call a synthetic sensor. This is based on a setup of other indicators—speed, location and altitude—and with the help of artificial intelligence you can do much more than in the past. It is an interesting way forward and would need one or two years to be developed.

[Maninthebar]

I can see a lot of companies cancelling their options on this flying pig.

I fear not.

1. The economies offered by the MAX are built into the financial models of airlines
2. Airlines are locked into long term contracts with lease-finance companies, and thence with Boeing, which would take a lot of (expensive) unwinding
3. Airlines are committed to working with Boeing in order to be in the queue for aircraft to replace/refresh existing fleets
4. T.I.N.A.

It's not just Boeing (and their suppliers) who are searching/hoping for a solution. This explains why not even the big ugly brutes of the industry have made noises about looking for alternative supply of airframes. At present EVERYONE is so tied into the model that no-one dare blink. It is POSSIBLE that some audit company, somewhere, will trigger a meltdown by challenging the value of assets on some company's balance sheet but at present the cash MUST keep circulating.

[Giant Bird]

Press reports indicate Boeing has been discussing a 'Future Small Aircraft' with US airlines. Had not heard that name before, maybe a straw in the wind?
Perhaps it is about time for Boeing to seriously consider licencing the MC21 design. It is ready to go, the most modern in the 737 class, and definitely superior to the max . It would keep their factories going and workers employed and give them 4 years to come out with an industry leading game changing replacement to the Max.

[BDAttitude]

I fear not.. It is POSSIBLE that some audit company, somewhere, will trigger a meltdown by challenging the value of assets on some company's balance sheet but at present the cash MUST keep circulating.
I'm wondering for several months now, what the asset value of undelivered non airworthy aircraft is though. Maybe we shall know as this is going to stretch beyond the ending of a fiscal year.

[Icarus2001]

I'm wondering for several months now, what the asset value of undelivered non airworthy aircraft is though. Maybe we shall know as this is going to stretch beyond the ending of a fiscal year. Progress payments during construction render that a moot point.

[Sallyann1234]

Progress payments during construction render that a moot point.
Are airlines making progress payments for undeliverable aircraft?

[AviatorDave]

Perhaps it is about time for Boeing to seriously consider licencing the MC21 design. It is ready to go, the most modern in the 737 class, and definitely superior to the max . It would keep their factories going and workers employed and give them 4 years to come out with an industry leading game changing replacement to the Max.

Admit complete failure, and then on top of the humiliation reach out and license a Russian design? Nah ... never gonna happen.

[BDAttitude]

Are airlines making progress payments for undeliverable aircraft?
I find that hard to imagine and hard to rationalize towards the owners of the airline.
On the other hand, if that means going back to the end of the queue ...
Probably each case individually negotiated, consultants and lawyers making a fortune.

So we have now the situation that making beer cans out of it would be appropriate - but it's not gonna happen.
And further delaying the return will not make it any safer either.

[Zeffy]

Are airlines making progress payments for undeliverable aircraft?

https://www.wsj.com/articles/boeing-seeks-blessing-to-deliver-737-max-as-faa-reviews-pilot-training-11573421213

Boeing Seeks Blessing to Deliver 737 MAX as FAA Reviews Pilot Training
Plane maker discussing whether it can deliver aircraft before pilots have undergone required training


By Andrew Tangel and Andy Pasztor
Nov. 10, 2019 4:26 pm ET

Boeing Co. hopes to deliver 737 MAX aircraft to airlines before the end of the year even if regulators haven’t approved related pilot training, people familiar with the matter said.

As the plane maker prepares for the Federal Aviation Administration to lift a MAX flight ban as soon as December, Boeing is discussing with regulators whether it can deliver the aircraft before airline pilots have undergone required training needed to fly the jet, these people said. The emerging plan comes amid increasing signs there will be lag between an FAA’s lifting of a flight ban and its approval of new training for pilots.

Delivering aircraft before all the regulatory approvals are complete would relieve pressure on the manufacturer as it contemplates further cutting or halting MAX production amid the protracted grounding. It would also help airlines that have lost hundreds of millions of dollars and disrupted passengers’ travel plans. Under the plan, airlines still wouldn’t fly the plane with passengers until the training occurs.

“Subject to strict regulatory approval, we continue to complete key milestones that put us on a path to certification of the MAX in December, with training approved in January, paving the way for the safe return of the MAX to commercial service,” a Boeing spokesman said.

The FAA’s order is expected as soon as mid-December, barring any further engineering and testing delays that have kept the MAX fleet grounded since a second 737 MAX crashed in Ethiopia in March, the people familiar with the matter said. That crash followed another accident in Indonesia less than five months earlier; in all, 346 people died.

Last week, Boeing cleared a key hurdle following a series of certification simulator tests with the FAA, a person familiar with the process said.

But related pilot training isn’t expected to be formally approved until a number of weeks after the FAA certifies the MAX as safe for flight, following a public comment period, the people said. That would effectively prevent airlines from carrying passengers until January at the earliest under the current expected timing.

Airlines have been anxious for Boeing to resume deliveries of the MAX and want to avoid bottlenecks and long waits once the plane is cleared for service.

Southwest Airlines Co. and American Airlines Group Inc. said last week they were taking the MAX out of their schedules through early March, longer than previously signaled. Carriers have a series of steps to prepare their aircraft to carry passengers. Not only do they need to take them out of storage, but they are also planning their own demonstration flights and public-relations campaigns.

Southwest and American want to train all their 737 pilots before adding the MAX back into schedules to avoid scheduling issues that could arise if only some pilots are able to operate the plane.

Since the spring, both FAA and Boeing officials sketched out a process that envisioned MAX deliveries resuming roughly simultaneously with completion of pilot-training efforts. Those earlier scenarios didn’t take into account additional weeks needed for regulators to complete training requirements and for airlines to implement those changes.

As the end of the year approaches, Boeing is running low on parking spots for the 737 MAX as finished planes pile up at locations in the Puget Sound area. Boeing has been producing the 737 at a rate of 42 planes a month at its Renton, Wash., factory since the aircraft’s grounding, down from a previous monthly rate of 52. The manufacturer has stored planes at airfields in the Pacific Northwest and even put some in employee parking spaces.

While Boeing has about two months’ of parking spots available, the plane maker is identifying other storage space if needed, the person familiar with the process said.

Boeing Chairman Dave Calhoun has said the FAA’s ungrounding order would start a longer process to fully return the MAX to service around the world, an effort expected to last into early 2021.

—Alison Sider contributed to this article.

Write to Andrew Tangel at [email protected] and Andy Pasztor at [email protected]

[OldnGrounded]

For those not familiar with the organization, ProPublica is a nonprofit engaged in "investigative reporting in the public interest." The board chair was managing editor at WSJ, they've won several Pulitzers, and so on.

This piece focuses on the lawsuit and lobbying undertaken by the family of the young Ralph Nader relative who died in the ET302 crash:

I Will Never Let Boeing Forget Her (https://www.propublica.org/article/i-will-never-let-boeing-forget-her-737-max)

[gums]

Salute!

Forgive me, but I am having a hard time with requiring hours of "training" for pilots to fly the MAX with the new MCAS, or even the old MCAS.

Seems to this old fart that letting all of we pilots know that 1) MCAS is installed and 2) is supposed to trim nose down when at a few degrees AoA below the stall and 3) it might trigger shortly after takeoff or even in the holding pattern if the AoA sensors go weird, and 4) turn off the trim and trouble shoot while returning to base if you wish.

I would personally like to fly the real plane without MCAS so I could feel the light back force, but I realize that such training might cost $$$$. Hell, I would like to fly the thing up to a stall/stick shaker AoA just to see if there was wing rock, strong buffet, etc. telling me that I was pressing the envelope.

My feeling is that Boeing and FAA thot failure to activate was more important then nuisance and fatal activation when a single sensor went south.

Gums sends...

[Grebe]

Another date-another software only fix - place your bets

Boeing says FAA’s OK for 737 MAX should come next month, but commercial flights will take longer
Nov. 11, 2019 at 11:29 am
Dominic Gates By Dominic Gates
Seattle Times aerospace reporter

Boeing said Monday it expects the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) to clear the grounded 737 MAX as safe to fly again in late December, but the FAA likely won’t finalize a new MAX pilot training regimen until January.

That means Boeing may be able to resume deliveries of the jet to airlines before year end, but that the airplanes won’t be cleared to carry passengers until as much as a month later.

The airlines need at least a further month to get the planes out of mothballs and their pilots trained. This explains why both American and Southwest on Friday took the MAX out of their flight schedules until early March.

Boeing also laid out the specific milestones that must be completed ahead of the MAX’s return to service, and said the first was completed last week. That clear view of the limited steps remaining boosted Boeing stock by more than $17, or nearly 5%, in mid-day trading Monday. nearly $15 in early trading Monday, up to $365 per share.

Once the U.S. airlines have full clearance to fly the MAX, they will need 30 to 40 days to get the planes ready and to put thousands of pilots through the training. They will then introduce the MAX only slowly into their schedules.

While it’s possible that the MAX’s return to service could slip further, omitting the MAX from flight schedules until March will provide certainty for passengers booking now for the early part of the busy spring break period.




Boeing said Monday that within the past week it has completed with the FAA an extensive evaluation of its new MAX software in its flight simulators in Seattle.

The software fix has two parts:

An upgrade to make safe the flight control system — the Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System (MCAS) — that activated erroneously on the two crash flight in Indonesia and Ethiopia.

A change to the overall software architecture of the MAX so that its systems take data from both flight control computers on each flight, instead of only one as previously.

Boeing said the next steps are:

A separate, multiday simulator session with airline pilots to assess human factors and crew workload under various test conditions.

An FAA certification flight test.

Boeing’s final submital of its complete upgrade package to the FAA.
Another multiday simulator session with pilots representing air safety regulators from around the world to validate training requirements.

The FAA’s Flight Standardization Board will then release a report on the training requirements for a public comment period, followed by final approval of the training.

That last step is what’s now anticipated in late January, clearing the way for U.S. airlines to fly passengers on the MAX in early March.

Unlike American and Southwest, United — the third U.S. airline with MAXs grounded and awaiting clearance — has not yet updated its flight schedule.



Foreign regulators are expected to lag somewhat behind the FAA. Patrick Ky, executive director of the European Union Aviation Safety Agency (EASA), told trade magazine Aviation Week last month that his agency is likely to clear the MAX as safe to fly in January, a month after the FAA.

“The FAA and other regulatory authorities will ultimately determine return to service in each relevant jurisdiction,” Boeing said. “This may include a phased approach and timing may vary by jurisdiction.”

In a note to investors, Wall Street analyst Doug Harned of Bernstein Research said Boeing’s MAX deliveries in December “will most likely be on paper and not necessarily the physical transfer of the asset.”

Harned said that once the FAA and EASA clear the MAX to fly, most other foreign regulators, including Turkey, India, and the United Arab Emirates, will follow quickly. “China and Russia, however, may take longer,” he wrote.

[GlobalNav]

Perhaps it is about time for Boeing to seriously consider licencing the MC21 design. It is ready to go, the most modern in the 737 class, and definitely superior to the max . It would keep their factories going and workers employed and give them 4 years to come out with an industry leading game changing replacement to the Max.

Huh? What airline needs another model people won’t want to fly on?

[fdr]

Salute!

Forgive me, but I am having a hard time with requiring hours of "training" for pilots to fly the MAX with the new MCAS, or even the old MCAS.

Seems to this old fart that letting all of we pilots know that 1) MCAS is installed and 2) is supposed to trim nose down when at a few degrees AoA below the stall and 3) it might trigger shortly after takeoff or even in the holding pattern if the AoA sensors go weird, and 4) turn off the trim and trouble shoot while returning to base if you wish.

I would personally like to fly the real plane without MCAS so I could feel the light back force, but I realize that such training might cost $$$$. Hell, I would like to fly the thing up to a stall/stick shaker AoA just to see if there was wing rock, strong buffet, etc. telling me that I was pressing the envelope.

My feeling is that Boeing and FAA thot failure to activate was more important then nuisance and fatal activation when a single sensor went south.

Gums sends...


On the face of it I would agree Gums, but, then the goal posts are being moved here as well. The community understands the system that was at the heart of the two accidents, but now we have a new, improved version, and presumably that removes the risks, however, it also potentially introduces new failure modes that have to be understood. To that end, a sound knowledge on the new system is important. Hopefully, the response is still exactly the same as it should have been, had the problem been recognised on the accident events. Recognition is key to dealing with the issue, as it has been since cavemen first discovered fire.

[fgrieu]

Forgive me, but I am having a hard time with requiring hours of "training" for pilots to fly the MAX with the new MCAS, or even the old MCAS.

Or maybe the issue is that some sizable fraction of pilots need training on manual trimming, and its quirks in some portions of the flight envelope + trim setting, including high speed with heavy nose down mistrim. From where I stand, it looks like the certification assumption is that pilots can handle such situation or avoid that it happens, when in reality
- ET302 has shown that's not always the case,
- it came out that simulators did not (or did not even attempt) to realistically reproduce trim wheel efforts,
- more generally, the regulators have been forced to come to greater realization that ability to pass a simulator test does not accurately predict ability to handle the corresponding real-life situation.

Granted, this could apply to other planes, including the NG. But there is logic in putting an end to the "it worked fine for the NG, it will work well enough for the MAX" attitude. The planes are significantly different, and that attitude failed, badly, and with dire consequences.

[Maninthebar]

It seems to me, and in answer to Gums point, that training MUST be offered to enable pilots to be able to distinguish 'correct' MCAS activation (allow auto trim to run to give stick forces per design) from 'incorrect' activation (diagnose after 3 seconds auto trim, retrim and then disconnect). That's going to be an interesting training package.

[Bend alot]

It seems to me, and in answer to Gums point, that training MUST be offered to enable pilots to be able to distinguish 'correct' MCAS activation (allow auto trim to run to give stick forces per design) from 'incorrect' activation (diagnose after 3 seconds auto trim, retrim and then disconnect). That's going to be an interesting training package.
Very interesting training!

Would require the "feel" MCAS is designed to fix in both high and low speed conditions, before hitting the cut outs FAST when that feel is then"not normal".

That is all edge of the envelope stuff, before things get BAD and what should save you - you need to know if to let it live, or kill it.

It will save you or you will kill the crowd!

Hardly a iPad course I think - even less when all these details are still secret as to when MCAS is "required".

[Outofthefray]

It seems to me, and in answer to Gums point, that training MUST be offered to enable pilots to be able to distinguish 'correct' MCAS activation (allow auto trim to run to give stick forces per design) from 'incorrect' activation (diagnose after 3 seconds auto trim, retrim and then disconnect). That's going to be an interesting training package.
Yes, that will surely be interesting.
But see the Seattle Times report posted by Grebe above (around #3925)....
"next steps are..."........
“A separate, multiday simulator session with airline pilots to assess human factors and crew workload under various test conditions.”

Simulator .sessions are not the place to "assess human factors and crew workload". That needs to be done in a user lab. Simulators are for (no-risk) training. There is nothing to prove they accurately reflect a physical design – or can compensate for a poor one. Nor do they facilitate design failure reporting and analysis.

Is this a design or a training issue? I believe that Gums says that it is design.

[Deepinsider]

Forget hind sight, we are passed that point, the whole world of aviation
pretty well knows all about it.
It's therefore now simple;

For pilots new to the Max...

Folks, Just in case you detect it's a bit nose heavy, remember your
instinctive check back on the column will not work, so use thumb switches as
required and be prepared to activate stab trim cut out switches, and continue
with manual trim if necesary. Ignore other distacting noises if they are
obviously not credible. ( Power plus attitude equals perfomance, rememenber)

The numerous test flights, ferry flights, etc. that are going on almost daily operate
exactly to this scenario, perfectly safely.

Allow the Max back into service right now if Flight/Maintenance crews are so briefed.

Set a time limit for design improvements, but lets just get on with it.

THERE WILL BE TIME AND SPACE LATER FOR BOEING AND IT'S PUPPET FAA
TO BE HELD ACCOUNT

[OldnGrounded]

Forget hind sight, we are passed that point, the whole world of aviation
pretty well knows all about it.
It's therefore now simple;

For pilots new to the Max...

Folks, Just in case you detect it's a bit nose heavy, remember your
instinctive check back on the column will not work . . .

Actually, maybe it will and maybe it won't, depending upon whether MCAS, STS or something else is operating or failing.

. . . so use thumb switches as
required and be prepared to activate stab trim cut out switches, and continue
with manual trim if necesary.

And if you aren't sufficiently out of trim and/or at an airspeed where manual trim is effectively impossible.

Ignore other distacting noises if they are
obviously not credible.

Refer to iPad training: "Identifying validity of flight deck cacophony in three seconds or less."

The numerous test flights, ferry flights, etc. that are going on almost daily operate
exactly to this scenario, perfectly safely.

We know this . . . how?

Allow the Max back into service right now if Flight/Maintenance crews are so briefed.

I wonder why no one thought of this solution in April?

[Takwis]

The numerous test flights, ferry flights, etc. that are going on almost daily operate
exactly to this scenario, perfectly safely. If the system is now perfectly safe, why do they keep test flying it every day?

Refer to iPad training: "Identifying validity of flight deck cacophony in three seconds or less."
Don't you think that ought to be a memory item?

I wonder why no one thought of this solution in April? April? Why not last November? ;-)

[OldnGrounded]

Quote:Refer to iPad training: "Identifying validity of flight deck cacophony in three seconds or less."



Don't you think that ought to be a memory item?


Absolutely. View iPad training and memorize.

[Takwis]

Deepinsider: Allow the Max back into service right now if Flight/Maintenance crews are so briefed.

Set a time limit for design improvements, but lets just get on with it.

THERE WILL BE TIME AND SPACE LATER FOR BOEING AND IT'S PUPPET FAA
TO BE HELD ACCOUNT

And, more to the point; do you have some financial incentive to rush the plane back into service, ready or not, and fix it later?

[Drc40]

And, more to the point; do you have some financial incentive to rush the plane back into service, ready or not, and fix it later?

Sometimes you just shake your head at certain posts, other times you go WTF? I’m feeling the latter

[Takwis]

The more I read it, the more I am convinced that it just might be tongue-in-cheek. In which case, I have been thoroughly trolled :-)

[Longtimer]

Huh? What airline needs another model people won’t want to fly on?
I guess this would help Boeing with their parking problem but will the airlines be willing to accept aircraft that they can not use and also find additional parking areas of their own until the aircraft can be put into service.?

[OldnGrounded]

The more I read it, the more I am convinced that it just might be tongue-in-cheek. In which case, I have been thoroughly trolled :-)

If that's the case, you are not alone.

[OldnGrounded]

(Reuters) - Boeing Co (BA.N (https://www.reuters.com/companies/BA.N)) took 10 new plane orders last month, but saw some customers swapping the U.S. planemaker’s grounded 737 MAX planes in favor of more expensive wide-body planes as doubts lingered about the MAX’s return to service.

Net orders so far this year came to just 45 at the end of October, down from 56 in September, further widening the gap on sales this year with the company’s European rival Airbus SE (AIR.PA (https://www.reuters.com/companies/AIR.PA)) which has now sold nearly 500 more planes.

After an accounting adjustment representing jets ordered in previous years, but now unlikely to be delivered, Boeing’s net total for orders this year sank to a negative 95 airplanes.

More (https://www.reuters.com/article/us-boeing-deliveries/boeing-orders-sink-as-customers-opt-to-swap-max-idUSKBN1XM24M)

[Drc40]

Edit : never mind, article still relevant

https://www.cnbc.com/amp/2019/11/12/faa-chief-vows-to-examine-how-humans-interact-with-aircraft-systems.html

[fizz57]

Boeing’s net total for orders this year sank to a negative 95 airplanes.


Makes one wonder just how deep Boeing's pockets are - and whether any other company without lucrative military sales could do anything like that.

[OldnGrounded]

Makes one wonder just how deep Boeing's pockets are - and whether any other company without lucrative military sales could do anything like that.

At the end of the third quarter of this year, they had almost $11 Billion in cash on hand.

It's probably also worth noting that shareholder equity (the difference between total assets and total liabilities) was approaching negative $4 Billion.

https://www.macrotrends.net/stocks/charts/BA/boeing/total-assets

The stock price hasn't come close to crashing -- at least, not so far -- although it is substantially below the 52-week high. I think there are plenty of investors who believe that Boeing is basically invulnerable.

[Bend alot]

At the end of the third quarter of this year, they had almost $11 Billion in cash on hand.

It's probably also worth noting that shareholder equity (the difference between total assets and total liabilities) was approaching negative $4 Billion.

https://www.macrotrends.net/stocks/charts/BA/boeing/total-assets

The stock price hasn't come close to crashing -- at least, not so far -- although it is substantially below the 52-week high. I think there are plenty of investors who believe that Boeing is basically invulnerable.
Boeing also claimed the MAX will be certified and flying again "early" in the forth quarter - so I expect it is Boeing's top accountants counting the cash with little regulatory oversight and over optimistic assumptions that have it at $11B.

From memory it is also the suppliers that have been forced by Boeing to take financial pain - extended payment terms and requirement of higher stock ready for production increase.

If one or two big suppliers fold, then Boeing will be forced to "create" new "compliant" ones and get fast FAA approval for them to keep the all important line moving - something the Bean Counters never considered a problem before and I still expect they don't.

As for the aircraft, there are about a half a dozen very serious points that Boeing and the FAA seem not to have been transparent on during the re-certification process. These range from the clarification of the aircraft actions in the parts of the envelope that MCAS was required and that's relation to stall, to the manual trim wheel effectiveness. There should have been very clear answers to these main points long ago not lip service and silence.

[ozaub]

Digression Alert. Way back at #3614 and 3615 there's passing reference to Nevil Shute Norway. He co-designed R100 airship and the Airspeed Oxford, an important aircraft of WW2. In his autobiography Slide Rule he admits to keeping Airspeed afloat by dubious valuation of part-built aircraft. "I was acquiring a reputation for reckless and unscrupulous optimism that bordered on dishonesty". Likewise Boeing?

[silverstrata]

You've nailed it. Two FCCs can't meaningfully vote on two AoA vanes, no matter how everything is configured.


No, but if they discovered a discrepancy, they could turn the whole system off for the rest of the flight. Although this is not ideal, and a tri-voting system would be better, turning the system off WOULD have saved these two aircraft and all their passengers and crew.

In fact, all they needed was two vanes feeding information to one computer, to discover if there was a vane fault. But Boeing could not even be bothered to do that..!!

Silver

[OldnGrounded]

No, but if they discovered a discrepancy, they could turn the whole system off for the rest of the flight. Although this is not ideal, and a tri-voting system would be better, turning the system off WOULD have saved these two aircraft and all their passengers and crew.

In fact, all they needed was two vanes feeding information to one computer, to discover if there was a vane fault. But Boeing could not even be bothered to do that..!!

Silver


You're right, of course, and even a single FCC could do that (assuming it could see two vanes). Whether or not that turns out to be a solution that Boeing and the regulators are comfortable with may tell us something about their real views of the stability of the bare airframe.

[ATC Watcher]

A recent set a questions put to me during a dinner party by people having no direct interest or knowledge about aviation , raises the underlying point still waiting below all the technical and regulatory issues.
Will the general public have confidence in using the Max again when it is released ?
.I was surprised of their reactions, as quite a few of the guests in that dinner said they will not fly a Max and some said just booked their forthcoming holidays on a specific airline that they are sure does not has Max . I wonder if this will disappear soon when ticket prices are again going to be the deciding factor.
Not seen much discussion yet on this , although I suspect airlines have some indication via their booking systems .

[Fly Aiprt]

Will the general public have confidence in using the Max again when it is released ?


It is doubtful vague affirmations as to "problem solved", "737 MAX now safe", "no sim time needed" will suffice to restore confidence in Boeing, the FAA and the "flying coffin" image of the aircraft.
It will probably take much transparency to demonstrate that the aircraft is now safe to fly. If it happens to be safe, that is..

[gums]

Salute!
@ Silver and Old......
Back when the Earth was still cooling our "archaic" fully electronic FBW system in the Viper had 4 computers and 4 piezzo doofers to sense our pitch and roll commands. The logic was to keep one computer as a spare and use three computers to blend the two AoA cones and the pneumatic hemisperical probe pressures plus two sideslip/static ports. If we got to only two computers the general rule was to use the most benign value, and this could be implemented easily on the MAX, huh?

Our only problem happened when the fault detection system failed, so we had a few prangs when the system used the dead computer and controls went to neutral ! Wahooo! 22 negative gees, but two outta first three troops made it out. Needless to say, we changed the logic and also improved the power supplies to the computers.

Gums sends...

[Takwis]

Two out of three is not bad.

[PEI_3721]

gums, et al,
We wait for information about the modifications.

A likely scenario is a monitored dual system using the existing FCCs - two required for dispatch. If MCAS shuts down in flight, then providing the stability shortfall is minor, the flight could be continued.
However, more serious stability discrepancies / stall characteristics, would either require a new software architecture using three sensors, or as rumoured a third ‘synthetic’ source of AoA which would enable continued flight or diversion.
Manual flight training would be required to experience the stability differences with MCAS unavailable.

For the trim runaway aspect, stick cutouts, trim alerting, and crew procedure should be sufficient, but this could depend on any differences between the MAX and NG. Training would be essential for quick identification and action, likely stick force, and or ease of trim opertation.

The high workload / distraction problems at or after takeoff due to multiple alerts could be tolerated, but again with training; although the stick shake implications - stall or not stalled, could add a few changes.

[sky9]

Will the MCAS be certified with what the FAA thought they had agreed in tailplane activation, or with what Boeing actually implemented?

[Cafe john]

A recent set a questions put to me during a dinner party by people having no direct interest or knowledge about aviation , raises the underlying point still waiting below all the technical and regulatory issues.
Will the general public have confidence in using the Max again when it is released ?
.I was surprised of their reactions, as quite a few of the guests in that dinner said they will not fly a Max and some said just booked their forthcoming holidays on a specific airline that they are sure does not has Max . I wonder if this will disappear soon when ticket prices are again going to be the deciding factor.
Not seen much discussion yet on this , although I suspect airlines have some indication via their booking systems .
It was touched on briefly several weeks ago - I'm sure when the first revenue flight is scheduled, it will cause a big media circus prior to liftoff. And may have some PAX thinking twice about boarding....

It was also suggested at the time that the passenger roster on that first flight should solely consist of Boeing top rank and their families although this did not sit easy with some posters.

[Thistle42]

Will the MCAS be certified with what the FAA thought they had agreed in tailplane activation, or with what Boeing actually implemented?
I was going to say 'cheeky!', but in essence, this is the exact point. Can anyone trust Boeing to provide the actual algorithm, as it were, after being so devious in the past?

If I were the FAA (or any regulator) I would want to see a full path analysis of the code, not just the 'happy path' it usually takes but all possibilities. Code coverage in all scenarios. We also know of course the 20/80 rule: that is the processor will be running 20% of the code 80% of the time. I did this test analysis for an app that was basically just an inventory of a portfolio of property contents FGS. It takes a lot of effort and I would be very surprised if anything like that has happened in this case in the time available.

[PEI_3721]

sky9, presumably the values of trim rate / tailplane increment, which Boeing implemented; these are what the aircraft required to meet the certification requirements.

[Fly Aiprt]

sky9, presumably the values of trim rate / tailplane increment, which Boeing implemented; these are what the aircraft required to meet the certification requirements.

This is where the test of the bare airplane will come into play. Hopefully the EASA will be there to crosscheck the findings of Boeing and the FAA.
But if nothing is published, how can we trust Boeing and the FAA as to the resolution of the issues ?
How will they convince the flying public ?
"Believe us, this time we did our job, everything's fine, you can trust us" ?

[cavuman1]

I weep for the loss of corporate respect and perceived infallibility of the once-inimitable Boeing Company. Oh, how I thrilled for my first flight aboard a 707. Then a 720, then the lovely, steep approach 727! I marveled at the 747 - how could something so huge fly, and fly so fast? Those were the days!

Now, I must admit, I would think long and hard about boarding a 737 Max. In my mind, I do not believe that Boeing can ever regain its untarnished reputation. They made the mistake of swapping truth for money. As greedy as the capitalistic society of the United States may be, that transaction is still frowned upon.

I think back to the days of the DeHavilland DH 106 Comet and the Lockheed L-188 Electra. Our family flew from New York to Atlanta on an Eastern Airlines Electra in 1961. I recall my father reassuring us that she was a great bird and not to worry. Though but twelve years of age at the time, I remember how quiet the passenger cabin was: many passengers were staring at the wing, waiting for an engine to go into "whirl mode", separating the wing from the fuselage.

I don't have any memory or data of the psychology-driven passenger avoidance of the Comet or Electra once those aircraft first started to come apart, but both types were withdrawn from fare service fairly shortly thereafter, though the Electra continued on for a number of years on routes flown by non-American carriers. I wonder what might become of the 737 Max, or, for that matter, the Boeing Company.

Such a shame!

- Ed

[rattman]

A recent set a questions put to me during a dinner party by people having no direct interest or knowledge about aviation , raises the underlying point still waiting below all the technical and regulatory issues.
Will the general public have confidence in using the Max again when it is released ?
.I was surprised of their reactions, as quite a few of the guests in that dinner said they will not fly a Max and some said just booked their forthcoming holidays on a specific airline that they are sure does not has Max . I wonder if this will disappear soon when ticket prices are again going to be the deciding factor.
Not seen much discussion yet on this , although I suspect airlines have some indication via their booking systems .

They might have to discount them for a while but people will go where the tickets are the cheapest, people still fly garauda even at height of their bad rep. 6 to 12 months people will have not so much forgotten but a cheap airfare will minimise any concern they have over the max

[Australopithecus]

I agree...memories fade. But if any 737 was to crash in the US this year for whatever reason the reputation would be sealed.

[ATC Watcher]

They might have to discount them for a while but people will go where the tickets are the cheapest, people still fly garauda even at height of their bad rep. 6 to 12 months people will have not so much forgotten but a cheap airfare will minimize any concern they have over the max
You mean Garuda Indonesia ? they were nowhere as bad as some other Asian airlines at the time , but this was regional issue with a few months of sporadic coverage. The Max is different since it has worldwide ( rather very bad) continuous coverage since over a year now . And I was surprised to see so many non-aviation people concerned about this. But yes price always is deciding factor in the end, agree, I was just wondering if advance bookings on some Max dependent airlines (e.g. Southwest, TUI, Norwegian etc..) were showing different results for this summer than non Max ones ( e.g Easy jet, Jet Blue, , etc..)

[CurtainTwitcher]

The difference between Boeing/FAA and an airline such as Garuda is the place in the food chain. Boeing & the FAA are the authoritative sources, the wellspring of the safety paradigm for aviation. Until the MAX fiasco, they were regarded as credible (though somewhat tarnished after the B787 program to industry insiders). Now they cannot be trusted by anyone. This is now "common knowledge (https://www.epsilontheory.com/harvey-weinstein-common-knowledge-game/)", everyone believes that everyone else believes it.

They have confirmed what many people have long suspected about the modern economic system, that in fact it is corrupt to the core. It laid bare the "whatever it takes" as the new norm, it is the final signal that nothing can be trusted.

It is this loss of trust at the core of the system that is the issue. If it can happen to Boeing and the FAA, that had been assumed and implicitly trusted to "do the right thing". They failed and put profit before everything else. If it can happen to Boeing/FAA it can happen in every other aspect of their lives.

[krismiler]

A name change worked for ValuJet after the 1996 DC 9 crash, it bought a smaller airline called AirTran Airlines and merged under the new name. Boeing will need to do something similar with the MAX, after all the modification, recertifying and training required it would merit a new designation. Perhaps B737-2020 which would instantly differentiate it from the MAX, imply a clean start in a new year and assure passengers that all modifications had been carried out.

[OldnGrounded]

It is this loss of trust at the core of the system that is the issue. If it can happen to Boeing and the FAA, that had been assumed and implicitly trusted to "do the right thing". They failed and put profit before everything else. If it can happen to Boeing/FAA it can happen in every other aspect of their lives.

This. The trust model may not be irreparably broken forever, but this fiasco has broken it badly and for a long time.

The public may well come to the point of trusting Boeing and the FAA again, but it's a pretty good bet that developments such as SWA pilots and AA FAs raising safety questions in very public ways will reinforce real fear and hesitation, which the disasters and screwups reported over the past year have already strongly motivated.

[CurtainTwitcher]

Non industry people who ask me about the MAX do not differentiate between the NG and MAX, they view all 737's as being suspect. That is an anecdote of one, however, there is a possibility that Boeing/FAA have had a lasting negative branding on all 737's, despite the stellar safety record of NG. The timing of the pickle fork issue couldn't have been worse, and feeds right into that perception.

[OldnGrounded]

A name change worked for ValuJet after the 1996 DC 9 crash, it bought a smaller airline called AirTran Airlines and merged under the new name. Boeing will need to do something similar with the MAX, after all the modification, recertifying and training required it would merit a new designation. Perhaps B737-2020 which would instantly differentiate it from the MAX, imply a clean start in a new year and assure passengers that all modifications had been carried out.

That word, "recertifying," implies a course of events that would change the commercial airplane manufacturing world in fundamental ways for a very long time. If that's the way things play out, all bets are off.

[megan]

They have confirmed what many people have long suspected about the modern economic system, that in fact it is corrupt to the core. It laid bare the "whatever it takes" as the new norm, it is the final signal that nothing can be trusted.We used to have to sign a statement that we had acted ethically every year. How do you take it seriously when the company lecture included the statement "We don't pay bribes, but do make facilitation payments". Difference? The VW scandal is indicative as to how business runs/acts, and Bhopal.

[Ian W]

This. The trust model may not be irreparably broken forever, but this fiasco has broken it badly and for a long time.

The public may well come to the point of trusting Boeing and the FAA again, but it's a pretty good bet that developments such as SWA pilots and AA FAs raising safety questions in very public ways will reinforce real fear and hesitation, which the disasters and screwups reported over the past year have already strongly motivated.

Unfortunately, it is the entire industry that has moved in the shareholders'/beancounters' direction. We have seen in this and other threads reports on the severe reduction in hand flying, the reductions in simulator time and exacerbating that a formulaic approach to simulator training to avoid expensive failures and reruns, very reduced initial training - much of it done only in simulators with very little in live aircraft, and very small hours requirements for the right hand seat etc etc.

Safety is our first priority?

All the holes in the cheese are getting bigger so it is far easier for them to line up.

[esa-aardvark]

Unfortunately, it is the entire industry that has moved in the shareholders'/beancounters' direction.

Unfortunately not just aviation. Pharmaceuticals, Banks, Cars, lots of others.

[Vendee]

Safety is our first priority?



That is the line which is trotted out by so many companies these days, especially following some sort of accident. Of course it is complete nonsense. The first priority of almost all companies is to make money.

[safetypee]

‘… the entire industry that has moved in the shareholders'/beancounters' direction.’
Because we are a very safe industry; complacency, drifting standards, less oversight, … ?

The holes in the cheese are opening and closing as before; the industry continues to manage most, but less skilled at identifying new self-generated ‘holes’.

The Max saga identified many latent ‘holes’; who knew, who saw them, who acted. Could anyone act having identified a problem within the top agencies - the regulator and manufacturer.
Who checks the ‘checkers’.

New holes to come; the aircraft will be safe for service, but the effect of the issues on operators and pilots will generate new opportunities to see ‘holes’, even if none are there.

[b1lanc]

On aviationweek.com yesterday:

“We do not think, at this time, simulator training for the RTS will be required, nor will [737NG] and MAX fleets be split based on the information we have presently,” SWAPA President Jon Weaks wrote in a Nov. 13 update to members. “Since those changes have not been finalized, the simulator training and split fleet requirement issues remain open, however remote.”

"The line-pilot review is one of several key steps that Boeing must accomplish to win regulatory approvals for the MAX’s RTS. Boeing remains hopeful that at least some regulators, led by the FAA, will clear the MAX to fly again by year-end 2019."

[Rated De]

A huge part of the problem is that Boeing's "strategy" invested far more in convincing people that one can pick up a T%rd at one end and have clean fingers

[Drc40]

From business insider today:

”American Airlines flight attendants are "begging" not to have to work on the Boeing 737Max when it returns to service after its grounding, the head of the union representing them said Thursday.

"I will tell you that I hear from flight attendants every day, and they're begging me not to make them go back up in that plane," Lori Bassani, the president of the Association of Professional Flight Attendants, said, according to the Dallas Morning News.“

[Thrust Augmentation]

Unfortunately, it is the entire industry that has moved in the shareholders'/beancounters' direction.

Unfortunately not just aviation. Pharmaceuticals, Banks, Cars, lots of others.

Most any for profit organisation with a disconnected board of directors & investors pressing for unrealistic returns......

The "unrealistic returns" part is why so many apparently health businesses are going down the pan these days & leaving huge debts behind them...

[Zeffy]

FAA Pushes Back

​​​​​​https://theaircurrent.com/aviation-safety/faa-pushes-back-on-pressure-to-return-boeing-737-max-to-service/

https://cimg3.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune.org-vbulletin/1200x1530/november_14_dickson_memo_to_bahrami_9bc7c3b0cceb3a17e8be2153 4f47948a185e689c.jpg

[Bend alot]

"The FAA's return-to-service decision for the MAX will rest solely on the FAA's assessment of weather Boeing's proposed software updates and pilot training address the know issues for the grounding of the aircraft."

Is it a known issue that it appears Ethiopian flight ET 302 could not move the manual trim wheel after MCAS activation?

​​​​​​​Why did the crew reengage the cut out switches? - that's right, this info was only known after the grounding!

[Peter H]

>"The FAA's return-to-service decision for the MAX will rest solely on the FAA's assessment of whether Boeing's proposed software updates and pilot training address the know issues for the grounding of the aircraft."

This seems to imply that Boeing are not intending to make any hardware changes.

[Lake1952]

That is the line which is trotted out by so many companies these days, especially following some sort of accident. Of course it is complete nonsense. The first priority of almost all companies is to make money.
Without fulfilling that goal, the company will cease to exist. Think of the huge corporations of decades ago which no longer exist.

[OldnGrounded]

FAA Pushes Back

​​​​​​https://theaircurrent.com/aviation-safety/faa-pushes-back-on-pressure-to-return-boeing-737-max-to-service/



There are plenty of powerful and conflicting pressures, but the FAA simply must not be seen by the aviation world as a continued captive of Boeing. That memo suggests they know that.

Also today, United joined the list of companies cancelling MAX flights until March at the earliest.

[Zeffy]

https://youtu.be/N71s4_Q3Fe4

Straight from Steve – November 15, 2019
Federal Aviation Administration
Steve shares where he was this week (Aero Club), where he's headed next week (Dubai Air Show), and a special message to FAA employees about the Boeing 737 Max.

[Clandestino]

A name change worked for ValuJet after the 1996 DC 9 crash, it bought a smaller airline called AirTran Airlines and merged under the new name. Boeing will need to do something similar with the MAXBring back Douglas?

[phylosocopter]

Bring back Douglas?

They could call it a DC10.

[Vendee]

Without fulfilling that goal, the company will cease to exist. Think of the huge corporations of decades ago which no longer exist.

I don't disagree with that but they shouldn't try and bull$hit the public with "Safety is our first priority" when it obviously isn't.

[Australopithecus]

How about : Making you think that “Safety is our first priority” is our first priority.

[sky9]

"Straight from Steve" would appear to me to be directed at Boeing as much as the FAA staff. I cannot see the FAA approving the MAX ahead of other Regulators or before Steve has flown the aircraft himself.
The message could be summed up as don't push us.

[HowardB]

They could call it a DC10.

I think that's already taken as is MD11 & MD12 was the proposal for their A380 equivalent so not available either

The next one in the sequence is MD 13 & even though I am not superstitious renaming the 737 to a 13 would scare me! .:ugh:

[Fly Aiprt]

The message could be summed up as don't push us.

Looks like a serious warning adressed to Mr Bahrami, not to concede too much to his partner Boeing...

[BDAttitude]

"Straight from Steve" would appear to me to be directed at Boeing as much as the FAA staff. I cannot see the FAA approving the MAX ahead of other Regulators or before Steve has flown the aircraft himself.
The message could be summed up as don't push us.
Or it could be summed up as a transpicous attempt to regain credibility before communicating a controversial decision.

[BDAttitude]

Looks like a serious warning adressed to Mr Bahrami, not to concede too much to his partner Boeing...
He's had enough to answer for. Enough for being sacked more than once. No need for public warnings.

[Big Pistons Forever]

https://youtu.be/N71s4_Q3Fe4

I know that you will always get carefully calibrated spin from anyone at Steve's level but I have to say I am still impressed with his presentation. It was brief, too the point, clearly stated the message and his expectations and seemed genuinely sincere. It was also delivered by a person with a long and significant career both in the cockpit, and in management roles of increasing complexity as an aviation professional working in operational environments.

Contrast that to the video clips of Boeing Dennis Muilenburg Chief Bean Counter err I mean Executive Officer of Boeing. An individual who's closest exposure to aircraft operations was riding in the back of Boeing Gulfstream, and best efforts in front of the camera are exclusively mumbled platitudes......

[Momoe]

Big pistons forever,

completely agree, Time to wind in the cynicism and let him do his job.

With several airlines shelving Max scheduling until March 2020 I don't think any 'controversial communications' are imminent. Whatever 'special' relationship Boeing and the FAA had, has gone.

[LowObservable]

"Straight from Steve" would appear to me to be directed at Boeing as much as the FAA staff. I cannot see the FAA approving the MAX ahead of other Regulators or before Steve has flown the aircraft himself.
The message could be summed up as don't push us.

Concur. Boeing's Monday release was yet another classic of tin-eared communication.

[CurtainTwitcher]

Simple, the FAA face an existential crisis as the de facto global regulator because of the MAX fiasco. It needs to save Boeing from itself to maintain this global power.

Another single commercial flight controls related MAX accident and the FAA's reputation and global power are toast. It could save the FAA or Boeing, but not save the FAA AND Boeing.

I wonder if there is a larger power play here. If the FAA are not seen to put safety above pure commercial interest, other regulator will not feel bound by it's decisions to knock back a new type certification from say, a Chinese manufacture (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comac_C919#cite_note-44)r without tit-for-tat retaliation. But that is just speculation, divining the tea leaves.

[OldnGrounded]

Concur. Boeing's Monday release was yet another classic of tin-eared communication.

Yes. It continues to appear to me that Boeing simply doesn't understand how deep is the hole it's dug for itself.

[OldnGrounded]

I wonder if there is a larger power play here. If the FAA are not seen to put safety above pure commercial interest, other regulator will not feel bound by it's decisions to knock back a new type certification from say, a Chinese manufacture (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comac_C919#cite_note-44)r without tit-for-tat retaliation. But that is just speculation, divining the tea leaves.

EASA has been working with Comac for a couple of years, already, on validating China's type certificate for the C919. Given that and the developments over the past year, I doubt that it would simply follow suit if the FAA rejected that aircraft, for example.

[LowObservable]

Yes. It continues to appear to me that Boeing simply doesn't understand how deep is the hole it's dug for itself.

Cleopatra ain't the only queen of Denial...

[Mac the Knife]

Unfortunately, it is the entire industry that has moved in the shareholders'/beancounters' direction.

Unfortunately not just aviation. Pharmaceuticals, Banks, Cars, lots of others.

Dead right. And Medicine too, to my great regret

Disillusioned Mac

[Grebe]

Claim MAX software done and well tested 17 NOV in Seattle Times

Title in seattle times
Boeing’s fix tames the ‘tiger’ in the 737 MAX flight controls, say experts and critics

By Dominic Gates
Seattle Times aerospace reporter

After months of intense scrutiny, even some of the harshest critics of the 737 MAX’s flight-control system believe Boeing’s software fix will prevent a recurrence of the scenarios that killed 346 people in the crashes in Indonesia and Ethiopia.

Boeing has redesigned the MAX’s new automated Maneuvering Characteristics Augmentation System (MCAS) that relentlessly pushed down the noses of the two aircraft on both crash flights. Though serious questions linger about the overall safety culture at Boeing that waved through MCAS’s original development and certification, U.S. airline pilots are almost ready to fly the updated jet.

“The hazard is designed out of it,” Capt. John DeLeeuw, chairman of the safety committee of the Allied Pilots Association (APA), the union for American Airlines pilots, declared to colleagues a week after trying the flight-control fix in a Boeing simulator in Miami in late September.
Related
Two tragic flights, 12 problems on the Boeing 737 MAX

Bjorn Fehrm, an aerospace engineer and former fighter pilot in the Swedish Air Force, now a France-based aviation analyst with Leeham.net, has said Boeing’s original MCAS design was “criminally badly done … unforgivable,” and compared the system’s aggressiveness to a tiger. He too believes the redesign now makes the airplane as safe as the previous 737 model.

“There’s no part of any airplane out there that’s been as thoroughly vetted,” said Fehrm. “MCAS is no longer a tiger, but a house cat.”

The final pieces of that vetting are now imminent.

Boeing expects the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) to formally unground the jet next month and to pin down all the pilot training requirements in January.

That’s pending a formal certification flight and a final evaluation of the software fix for the jet’s flight controls. And the FAA insisted Friday that it will take its time and won’t be swayed by pressure from Boeing.

After the FAA clears the plane to fly and issues the pilot training regimen, Boeing and the U.S. airlines will need 30 to 40 days to complete the enormous logistical challenge of getting their airplanes ready to fly after the better part of a year in storage.

Boeing will install the final software fix, refresh all the fluids and lubricants, do ground tests on the engines and flight controls, then conduct a checkout flight. The FAA will inspect every plane.


The worldwide fleet of MAXs previously delivered to airlines was 385, including 72 jets at U.S. airlines. With all the airplanes Boeing has built since, the total of parked MAXs is now just over 700.

American, Southwest and United have all already pushed out the MAX’s return to early March and have said it will rejoin their schedules in a phased approach over several months.

Boeing will also begin delivery of MAXs to carriers like Alaska, whose finished jets the manufacturer has parked and stored pending the ungrounding of the fleet.

Boeing’s fix

On the two crash flights, the pilots struggled to counter MCAS after it was triggered by a single sensor that fed the system an erroneously high value for the jet’s angle of attack — the angle between the wing and the oncoming air flow.

MCAS activated for up to 10 seconds, swiveling the horizontal tail, known as the stabilizer, so as to aggressively pitch the nose of each aircraft down. When countered by the pilots, the system stopped, then kicked in again with a new activation five seconds later. After a vain struggle against these repeated nose-down movements, each short flight — the first 12 minutes, the second just six minutes — ended in a high-speed nose-dive to earth.

Boeing’s fix for MCAS entails three changes to the system design:

It will take input from the jet’s two angle of attack sensors instead of just one.

If they disagree by more than a nominal amount, the system assumes a false signal and will not activate.

If both angle of attack sensors somehow get stuck at the same wrong high value — perhaps if they got frozen in the wrong position — again MCAS won’t activate because the upgrade is designed to do so only when the angle moves suddenly from below the threshold to a new high value.
If both sensors together register a sudden movement to a high angle of attack, the system will activate once only — not repeatedly, as in the accident flights.
The capability of the system to move the horizontal stabilizer so as to pitch the jet nose-down will be limited. The pilot will always be able to counter it by pulling back on the control column.

In addition, Boeing has revised the overall architecture of the MAX’s flight-control computer system, so that on every flight the MAX takes separate inputs from the jet’s two flight-control computers, rather than just one as previously.

These two computers, each processing air data readings from the various sensors on both sides of the airplane, will cross-check and compare values. Again, if they disagree, automated systems including MCAS will be shut down.

This change should catch any computer error as opposed to a sensor fault.

A person briefed on the details said such a shutdown would come in less than one-third of a second, so even if the pilots are distracted and fail to notice the airplane moving as it shouldn’t, the automation won’t be allowed to continue.

This addresses a problem identified in both accident investigations: that pilots took much longer to recognize and react to an MCAS fault than Boeing had assumed. By stopping any erroneous uncommanded movements automatically, the redesign takes the response out of the pilots’ hands altogether.

“We’re not letting the system run while the pilots are inattentive,” said the person, who required anonymity because parties to the ongoing accident investigations are not allowed to speak publicly.

Peter Lemme, a former Boeing flight-controls engineer and avionics expert who has been very critical of the original MCAS design, said Boeing has addressed all his concerns.

Once the FAA approves the fixes, said Lemme, he’ll fly on a MAX with “no misgivings.”

To get the flying public equally comfortable with the MAX, Boeing needs also to counter a recurring theme on social media: the idea that software shouldn’t have been needed in the first place and that the plane’s large engines throw its aerodynamic balance out of whack and make it “inherently unstable.”

Boeing says MCAS is needed not for stability but only to make the MAX feel the same to a pilot as the previous 737 model. The airplane will fly safely with or without MCAS, Boeing insists.

To prove that, Boeing has flown near-stall maneuvers in flight tests this summer with MCAS turned off. Safety regulators plan to do the same during upcoming recertification flights.

Pilot checklists and manuals

Pilots from American and Southwest, as well as Air Canada and some overseas carriers, in late September got hands-on experience with the new MAX flight controls in Boeing’s full-motion, full-flight simulator in Miami.

At a pilot-union conference a week later, Greg Bowen, training and standards committee chairman at the Southwest Airlines Pilots Association union, echoed APA’s DeLeeuw in declaring MCAS no longer a problem.

“In terms of handling characteristics … those anomalies have been designed out of the airplane,” said Bowen.

He said all that remains to be resolved is the training required for pilots, with new attention to how flight crews handle the confusion of a cockpit inundated with multiple alarms. The training and instructions need to be calibrated for pilots with lesser training and experience, he said.

The FAA will issue a report recommending the pilot training regimen, with a period for public comment likely in January. It’s expected that pilots already qualified to fly the older 737 model will be required to take only a two-hour computer course to highlight the differences on the MAX and the changes with the new software.

Bowen said the FAA is also considering significant changes to clarify the procedures in six pilot checklists that cover abnormal flight conditions, including the Runaway Stabilizer checklist that Boeing says the crews on both crash flights could have used to recover the airplanes.

Moving the tail manually

The Runaway Stabilizer checklist is a focus because the Ethiopian flight crew partially followed it: They cut off electric power to the horizontal tail, stopping MCAS from activating.

However, at that point the nose was still pitched downward and when they tried to move it back up manually by turning a wheel connected by cable to the stabilizer, they couldn’t budge it.

The problem was that as they coped with the emergency, the pilots allowed the plane to accelerate to 45 mph beyond the jet’s maximum design speed, causing high opposing forces on the tail that rendered the control surfaces immovable.

Even if the revised MCAS cannot act up again as it did on the crash flights, MAX pilots will still want to be comfortable with manual control of the stabilizer.

A 737 captain on a U.S. airline, who asked for anonymity to speak without permission from his employer, described his own extensive experience as a former test pilot of moving the tail manually.

He said that with the 737 tail at full nose-down position and at maximum design speed, it is “nigh impossible for a normal human to move the manual trim wheel in the nose up direction. The forces are too strong.”

Dennis Tajer, an American Airlines captain and APA spokesman, recently replicated that flight situation in a simulator, deliberately inducing an MCAS-style nose-down pitch at high speed, though still within the normal flight range.

He was able to move the wheel only “a couple of inches, but not enough.”

Tajer said that if the MAX is pitched down toward the ground, it gathers speed all too easily.

“The 737 is a slippery airplane,” said Tajer. “When you put the nose down, it wants to accelerate very quickly.”

He and his co-pilot in the simulator were able to recover control by using an old piloting skill called the roller-coaster technique that’s no longer in the manuals: letting go of the control column to ease the forces, then cranking the wheel, and repeatedly easing and cranking.

“Before we can be fully confident in the MCAS fixes we have to know more about the accompanying pilot training, emergency checklist changes, the extraordinary effort required to recover the aircraft with the manual trim wheel,” Tajer said.

While the FAA is likely to mandate hands-on Runaway Stabilizer training built into every airline pilot’s yearly recurrent training sessions in a simulator, some foreign regulators may make that a requirement for their pilots before they permit the MAX to return to service.

In a recent interview with trade magazine Aviation Week, Patrick Ky, executive director of the European Union Aviation Safety Agency (EASA), indicated that his agency will likely go along with the FAA in not making that a requirement.

Ky said that while some nations may demand simulator training for “purely political or public relations-driven” reasons, it would be “a complete disaster” if the FAA and EASA diverged. “We need to be fully harmonized,” he said.

That suggests the world’s two major aviation regulators are now aligned, though EASA’s schedule lags slightly the FAA’s. Ky said he expects an EASA decision on returning the MAX to the air “sometime in January.”

In the 737’s largest global market, China, the return of the MAX could be delayed by political factors around trade talks and U.S./China tensions.

For U.S. air travelers, though, the MAX could soon be airborne again.

END

[OldnGrounded]

Claim MAX software done and well tested 17 NOV in Seattle Times


From the story:

This addresses a problem identified in both accident investigations: that pilots took much longer to recognize and react to an MCAS fault than Boeing had assumed. By stopping any erroneous uncommanded movements automatically, the redesign takes the response out of the pilots’ hands altogether.

“We’re not letting the system run while the pilots are inattentive,” said the person, who required anonymity because parties to the ongoing accident investigations are not allowed to speak publicly.

Yeah, ya gotta watch out for those inattentive pilots. :ugh:

These efforts to lay off responsibility and blame the folks who fly these airplanes just never end.