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Thanks so much
Wow!!! What a wonderfully interesting, gripping, riveting thread. It took me about one week to read it entirely and that was quite fantastic; so thanks a lot to all the main contributors (I'm sure everybody knows who I'm talking about):Dhttp://images.ibsrv.net/ibsrv/res/sr...ies/thumbs.gif:D.
Unfortunately, I never had the opportunity to take a ride on the beauty but I really felt in awe of her as soon I as I sarted to look at her more closely. This plane is a lot more than just a plane; to my eyes, it is simply one of (if not THE) the biggest achievment of mankind so far and something that inspires wonderment and sadness at the same time, a huge step forward in aviation history that sadly ended up in a huge step backward. I had a look at the video of the final concorde going out of Filton in 1979 posted earlier in this thread (BBC - Bristol - The story of the final Concorde) and keep in mind the faces of the 2 guys looking at the production line starting to be demolished... Heartbreaking! Of course, I have many questions to ask to the experts here so let's just start with a serie of questions regarding the birth of the beast: The 1962 treaty talks about an equal share of work and expenditure between Fr and UK... That sounds very political and not very realistic! A more pragmatic way would have been to take the best each country had to offer. But, in the end, was the share really fair for everybody? Did this treaty lead to some redundancies in terms of R&D or manpower and to an increase of the total cost of the project? Also, was there really a technical need to build 6 a/c before the entry in service? I ould really appreciate if one the living concorde bible in this thread give me an answer and, BTW, keep this thread alive. |
NHerby
The 1962 treaty talks about an equal share of work and expenditure between Fr and UK... That sounds very political and not very realistic! A more pragmatic way would have been to take the best each country had to offer. But, in the end, was the share really fair for everybody? It would take a book to answer your questions properly. Luckily someone has already written it - try to get hold of Ken Owen's "Concorde New Shape in the Sky" ISBN 0 7106 0268 5. It is an excellent account of the genesis and development of the machine that drove my life for 25 years. You are right - it was a political agreement, but politics after all the art of agreeing what is possible, and we are talking of the UK and France of the 1950s. No way that either of those two proud countries was going to let the other have the lion's share of the kudos and fun of developing and flying the world's first supersonic airliner. Fun? yes, exciting, challenging, exhausting but definitely fun.:) and no way it was going to be other than an equal split. But one can easily argue that it was arranged so that each country contributed the best it had to offer. The actual split was 50/50 on total costs, but arranged so that the UK had 60% of powerplant and 40% airframe. At the time, France had nothing to compare with the Olympus as an engine suitable for supersonic cruise, so that was logical. Out of our 40% on airframe we had responsibility for the intake and for powerplant/airframe integration. But when it came down to brass tacks Onera had a more flexible intake design than anything we Brits had to offer, and later in the project the "TRA" nozzle also came from France. We can take a lot of credit for melding these into a very successful powerplant, but I think it fair to say that each country did, in fact, contribute the best it had to offer. As for fair shares for all, well all I can say is that there was more than enough work to go around ;) |
No point asking Clive .. he's an aerodynamicist and, hence, only talks in slugs/cubic foot.
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No point asking Clive .. he's an aerodynamicist and, hence, only talks in slugs/cubic foot. :ouch: That's because of my age not my profession - real aerodynamicists get around all that by using non-dimensional quantities like CL and Cd.:D IIRC, the drawings were dimensioned in both units, but all threads etc were metric. Dude would know that better than I though. There was never any real difficulty with it. |
CliveL
Thanks a lot for this answer.
try to get hold of Ken Owen's "Concorde New Shape in the Sky" ISBN 0 7106 0268 5. It is an excellent account of the genesis and development of the machine that drove my life for 25 years. we are talking of the UK and France of the 1950s. No way that either of those two proud countries was going to let the other have the lion's share of the kudos and fun of developing and flying the world's first supersonic airliner. |
And I assume also that the reason to build 2 identical prototypes was mainly to respect this principle of fair and equal share between the 2 countries; am I right? Partly out of equal shares, but there was also more flight test development work than could be handled by just one aircraft in a reasonable timescale, and each partner had their own sphere of responsibility to cover so if you have to have two airframes it made some sense to have one each. |
Concorde.
Ummm....... Dunno! Just wanted to keep the thread on the front page, I guess?
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Originally Posted by galaxy flyer
(Post 5868196)
Four engine flameout is a very unlikely event, unless one runs into a volcanic cloud.
GF I'm pretty sure my memory isn't betraying me too far when I say I seem to remember a case, in the dim and distant past, of a management pilot (no less) taking a Concorde sector and... mismanaging things... badly. In fact they came so close to a four engine flameout (with no volcanic cloud in sight) that the thing was unable to be disembarked after landing for... CoG reasons... if you take my meaning! Someone confirm? R1 |
The 2 prototypes weren't prototypes in today's meaning of the word, they were essentially experimental supersonic passenger aircraft, in mid 1960s when their design was frozen a lot of work needed to be done before you had a mature SST.
The next 2 per-production were nearer today what we would call prototypes for a design, much much closer to the final spec of systems and design. The 2 first production aircraft, after re work and re certification could have been sold on to operators should the market have been there. The pre production set could have been dropped in many peoples view, but due to the way the design was maturing the EIS would have been delayed a few years, and there was simply a requirement to allow the next stage of testing to move on. Very much like the NASA moon programme, they could have taken a delay and flown more apollo missions and completely dropped Gemni, but at that point in time they needed to be flying to get the data. |
Ranger one, the fuel incident has been discussed on here
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I have a query about the thrust of Concorde's engines. The quoted static thrust of the Olympus 593 is 32,000lb, but it has been frequently stated that in supercruise, the majority of the thrust was provided by the intakes. That being so, how much thrust was actually produced overall at Mach 2, and how was this measured (if indeed it ever was)?
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Already discussed on this thread Shane.
Try a search.....;) |
Just received my copy of "Concorde New Shape in the Sky".
Ex library copy. Big stamp on Contents page saying "Smithsonian Libraries"! :ok: Score! Looking forward to a nice, long read! Thanks for stoking the addiction everyone here. -Gary |
@CliveL
Partly out of equal shares, but there was also more flight test development work than could be handled by just one aircraft in a reasonable timescale, and each partner had their own sphere of responsibility to cover so if you have to have two airframes it made some sense to have one each. A few pages earlier on this thread some of you have posted some of their favourite photos of Concorde. Here are very sad, chocking and rare photos: http://maripa.free.fr/photos/ccd/ccd-3.jpghttp://maripa.free.fr/photos/ccd/ccd-2.jpg This is 211 (F-BVFD) after "Air France's special treatment" (shame on them). The photos were taken in 1994. More photos of this can be seen here: Maripa : Documentation photographique. To compensate, here's one of my favourite: http://le.pointu.free.fr/historique/...rique_1_41.jpg Most of those photos were taken at Toulouse (we saw a lot from Filton in this thread but very few from France). The caption of the top left picture says it is 102 (F-WTSA) and 201 (F-WTSB) in the background. The image comes from a french website (Concorde dans la presse de 1965 à 2003) gathering hundreds of articles about Concorde. Very interesting but in French only. I particulary like this last serie of photos because it shows the process of a dream turning into reality, the beginning of such a beautiful adventure and the symbol of a time where national pride and technical achievment had more importance and value than the basic investment/profitability ratio that rules the world today! And now, more than 40 years later, not only we are not able to build a SST but we are also not able to make a SST flying again. And this leads to a new question (maybe another 64000$ one): As we can see in those photos and as I have seen in photos from Filton, several pre-production and production airframes were built at the same time. Did the fabrication of pre-production or production a/c had to be stopped at some point to wait for in flight test results? Similar question: did the early flights revealed unforseen problems that needed to be sorted out before the program can move on? |
Did the fabrication of pre-production or production a/c had to be stopped at some point to wait for in flight test results? Similar question: did the early flights revealed unforseen problems that needed to be sorted out before the program can move on? All flight tests reveal unforeseen problems! This could result in a pause in the prototype/pre-production flight test programme whilst the test aircraft was being modified, but this didn't delay build of later vesrions. |
Engine rating modes
This is a repost, but I'm not sure if the question was missed by people with knowledge, or ignored, so I put it up again.
Welcome everyone. I am new to this forum and thread but must confess that I have read all the pages of this amazing topic. I am an aviation enthusiast flying on different planes in FS9. One of them is SSTSIM Concorde. My question concerns engine rating modes in general with Concorde in mind. AFAIK (and this is a perfect time and place to fix my knowledge) engine rating modes on ordinary turbofan engine are: - TO- dictated by safety - full power in order to get obstacle clearence/ GA - CLB - cut down in power for engine prolonged life, but still high to get to fuel efficient altitude ASAP - CRS - for economic and long, stable flight Concorde is not an airplane, so things look quite different, huh? We have a pair of switches, one is take off - flight, second climb- cruise, so we have: 1. Take off with TO and CLB 2. Climb with FLT and CLB 3. Cruise with FLT and CRS 4. Descent with FLT and CLB 5. Approach with TO and CLB Can somebody explain, what really engine rating modes change in the work of the engine, why we have CLB again for descent (when they work close to idle) and why there are two systems overlapping? I don't need strict numbers, just general idea confronted with ordinary planes. Thank you in advance. Dan |
the best thread ever on the net and so polite.
all those technicals and in deep infos. i never flown myself the Concorde but my dad made one CDG DKR RIO and one CDG JFK and as others mention he was smiling back from those flights even the flights were for work. i had the chance to see the Concorde at night in the AF maintenance at CDG it was called Airbus-Concorde division and despite i was more on the other side : the 747 division i loved to stay around and just watching that wonderful Bird waiting to fly the next morning. alas when moving to Canada we lost all the pictures and souvenirs of those days but they re back with you. thank you Lady and Gentlemen. and Bravo, merci. |
Wow, what an amazing thread which I have only recently found.
Congratulations to all for a fascinating read :D Although I never got the opportunity to fly on Concorde, I will never forget seeing her fly some charters from Filton in the late 1990's. On one occasion I was stood at the wire fence at the end of runway 27 and watched Concorde taxi directly towards me, do a 360 degree turn and line up for takeoff. Concorde was only around 100ft-150ft away from me when the throttles were opened. Luckily I was holding tightly onto the fence and got a face full of dust as the reheats kicked in! :eek: The noise, power and heat I felt from those Olympus engines was phenomenal. She looked stunning as she rotated amongst the heat haze and the slender delta climbed steeply away towards the Bristol Channel. What an aircraft! My grandfather worked on the Olympus 593 engines at Rolls Royce in Filton, so I will always hold Concorde close to my heart. I have been onboard Foxy at Filton when she was open to the public and I have visited 002 at Yeovilton and 101 at Duxford. I live quite close to Delta Golf at Brooklands and have been onboard her about 4 times now (including a sit in the cockpit) and recently flew the fantastic Concorde simulator with Captain John Eames and First Officer Ian Smith which is a day I will treasure. Opening up the throttles for take-off on 31L at JFK and tackling the checkerboard landing at Kai Tak were experiences I will never forget. Keep up the great postings everyone! :ok: |
Words almost fail me...
I am on page 49 of this amazing thread about an incredible aircraft. I have spent many "unproductive" hours at my desk – when I should be defending the free world – reading here.
I must say, this is an incredibly brilliant (in the US sense of "intellect" rather than the British "cool/great") people. The history; the technology; and, most importantly, the people here make this a thread beyond compare – more alive than any book on the topic could hope to be. Sometime, roughly ~1987?, I was driving from Norfolk, Virginia, to Washington, DC. As I drove by the Wilmington, Delaware, airport I saw an unusual looking tail rising above a building. I thought, "That looks like Concorde, but she wouldn't be here. Several seconds later the building no longer blocked my view, and it was indeed Concorde! I had previously seen the a/c on display at the Musee de l'air in Paris and have since seen the one in Sinsheim, Germany. Wilmington, though, was the only time I actually saw one in service. Long into, now to my question: A few pages back I read about "left rudder" on takeoff because "engine number four was at 88% thrust." I understand the need for rudder based on asymmetric thrust, but why was the thrust asymmetric in the first place? I need to push on through the next 40 pages to get the answer to my question! :) |
LTCTerry
...but why was the thrust asymmetric in the first place?... Allow me to direct you to my colleague M2dude's answer here. |
Just a slight correction to Dude's explanation - the vortices came off the intake sidewall not the wing LE. Otherwise spot on.
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Brian,
I don't think there is any published explanation, but maybe this will help. Basically the problem with #4 intake was that it was on the RHS of the airplane. We are talking about low speed right? and especially zero forward speed when the engine is trying to suck as much air as it can get from wherever it can get it. That means that the induced angle of attack on all the intake leading edges is going to be high. The best drawing I can find that shows the flow into the right hand pair is this http://i1080.photobucket.com/albums/...-intakewkg.jpg The intake leading edges were all sharp, so the flow would separate if subjected to a high AoA. The upper lip was protected a little by the wing leading edge, and we were obliged to modify the prototype LE ahead of the intakes to prevent underwing vortices developing at low AoA in cruise which also helped a bit. The lower lip had a substantial separated flow 'bubble' at low forward speed as shown in red, but this cleared up quite quickly as the aircraft gathered speed. It was'cured' by the blow-in doors. The inner sidewalls were shielded by the landing gear doors, so the AoAs on the sidewall on that side were quite modest. The splitter was of course subject to equal flow demands on either side so the flow over that was pretty well symmetric. That leaves the two outer sidewalls which, look for all the world like highly swept delta wings with sharp LEs mounted vertically. Like all such wings when operated at high AoA they develop powerful vortices on the 'leeward' side. Looking back towards the engine the vortex on #4 engine was anticlockwise and that on #1 was clockwise. [Hope I got that one the right way round ;)] The OL593 rotates clockwise looking aft so the induced incremental AoA on the compressor blades was different on #1 and #4. The difference was enough to trigger some mild blade vibration - hence the rpm restriction until the intake capture was good enough to reduce the vortex strength. |
Just finished the Haynes 'Concorde workshop manual'
This is a collaboration between a retired Concorde Captain and Flight Engineer. The one excerpt that really caught my eye was the reference to the method of construction and differences between the British and French built Aircraft. 'The French fuselage was designed to safe life principles while the British was designed to fail safe. From window line to window line across the top of the fuselage Bristol used three skin panels overlapping at 10 o'clock and 2 o'clock while Toulouse used two, overlapping at 12 o'clock' This revelation was a big surprise to me, for a production run of 14 airframes two different construction methods were employed apparently, amazing. I had always thought the airframes were virtually identical. Anyone have any further insight on this ? |
Concorde and TU-144 at Sinsheim
Earlier this week I had the great pleasure of a late afternoon followed by a full day at the Sinsheim technical museum near Heidelberg. Highly recommended and much more than just a museum; just ask my children what they thought of the helter-skelter from elevated Ilyushin IL-18 back down to the ground, or the twisting and turning stainless steel tubular slide from museum roof mounted DC3, through a hole in the roof, and back to the ground level entrance! The staff I encountered were all friendly and informed and I now look forwards to a day at the sister museum in Speyer - replete with 747-200 on the roof on which visitors can walk the wing.
Anyway, of relevance to this thread I thought I'd shared some of my photos of Concorde F-BVFB and Tupolev TU-144 77112. It was tremendous to be able to walk backwards and forwards between the two, directly comparing design features and relative elegance of execution. Both are achievements for mankind but I have to say that to me not being an aeronautical engineer, Concorde won every time - dreary Air France cabin notwithstanding - with the larger Tupolev coming over as somewhat clumsy; let alone knowing engine technologies to be a world apart, just compare the wheel bogies as one example, and then the cleanliness of wing design as another. Yes, the Tupolev canards were a novel feature, but I understand they were only necessary in the first place because of lower speed control issues as a result of more basic aerodynamics. Like any aircraft on static display exposed to the elements both airframes could do with some TLC, but here are the photos: http://i1062.photobucket.com/albums/...0827151313.jpg http://i1062.photobucket.com/albums/...0827154149.jpg http://i1062.photobucket.com/albums/...0827155237.jpg http://i1062.photobucket.com/albums/...0827155141.jpg http://i1062.photobucket.com/albums/...0828085327.jpg Concorde aft cabin door http://i1062.photobucket.com/albums/...0828081934.jpg TU-144 aft cabin door http://i1062.photobucket.com/albums/...0828084402.jpg http://i1062.photobucket.com/albums/...0827154334.jpg http://i1062.photobucket.com/albums/...0828084341.jpg http://i1062.photobucket.com/albums/...0827155028.jpg http://i1062.photobucket.com/albums/...0827155819.jpg TU-144 No 4 engine location viewed from exhaust towards inlet (and directly in to the sun!) http://i1062.photobucket.com/albums/...0828084257.jpg http://i1062.photobucket.com/albums/...0828085833.jpg http://i1062.photobucket.com/albums/...0828085718.jpg To be continued in separate post as I have hit the photo count ceiling in this one. |
...and the second post to conclude the photos and ask a question:
Concorde cockpit (through hazy perspex screen) http://i1062.photobucket.com/albums/...0827154610.jpg TU-144 cockpit (also through hazy perspex screen) http://i1062.photobucket.com/albums/...0827155448.jpg A sign that made me chuckle http://i1062.photobucket.com/albums/...0828084546.jpg http://i1062.photobucket.com/albums/...0828094144.jpg http://i1062.photobucket.com/albums/...0828094336.jpg http://i1062.photobucket.com/albums/...0828094423.jpg I hope that these pictures were of interest and can spark some further discussion in this amazing thread. If I can have the temerity to start the ball rolling with a TU-144 question, I was intrigued to notice the following tiny vane situated on the fuselage base between engines 2 and 3. Closer inspection revealed an adjacent hole, perhaps indicating pressure measurement? Anyway, ideas or proven fact welcome! As observed http://i1062.photobucket.com/albums/...0828085601.jpg Cropped http://i1062.photobucket.com/albums/...0828085604.jpg |
Look at that wx radar..funny all this new computing technology nowadays just to go slower and slower...happy this thread has been revived...:ok:
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I think the TU144 needs an entirely new thread. Oooh questions questions....:D
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Best book ever:-
:ok: PS - Other web based retailers are available.... |
@ Stilton
I had always thought the airframes were virtually identical. @ The Late XV105 Pure speculation - a drain hole with some sort of guide to deflect the fluid away from some other part? |
The late XV105
Yes, the Tupolev canards were a novel feature, but I understand they were only necessary in the first place because of lower speed control issues as a result of more basic aerodynamics. With a plain slender delta on the approach the trailing edge control surfaces will be slightly up and as speed is reduced this angle will increase slightly. If you want to raise the nose in the flare then even more stick back will be needed. This gives - if you like - a wing with a negative flap angle and so rather less lift needing a higher speed than you miught wish. If you add some canards to give a big nose up force then to trim the aircraft the trailing edge surfaces will all be down a bit - giving a flapped delta with considerable benefit in terms of reduced approach speed. The Tu144 with canards was able to land on the display runway at Le Bourget and take the second turn off right to the aircraft park - a quite remarkable demonstration of its modest speed on finals. |
I entirely agree with John Farley's comments. We were planning to fit canards on the second generation SST for exactly those reasons - they also gave a slightly better L/D in take-off climb which was useful for noise abatement, but they only just earned their keep in terms of economics!
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Thank you, Mr Farley! Nicely explained, and although at odds with an article I read a very long time ago, your words make perfect and easily-understood sense. :ok:
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Clive,
While not disputing what you are saying about the construction why was the French method described as 'safe life' and the British 'fail safe ? ' It sounds significantly different. |
@stilton
I can't give you much detail I'm afraid - as JT said a few posts ago: No point asking Clive .. he's an aerodynamicist and, hence, only talks in slugs/cubic foot. Safe-life refers to the philosophy that the component or system is designed to not fail within a certain, defined period. It is assumed that testing and analysis can provide an adequate estimate for the expected lifetime of the component or system. At the end of this expected life, the part is removed from service. Fail-safe designs are designs that incorporate various techniques to mitigate losses due to system or component failures. The design assumption is that failure will eventually occur but when it does the device, system or process will fail in a safe manner. |
as JT said a few posts ago
.. I really shouldn't be as cheeky as I tend to be at times ... |
I realize it's all academic now Clive but the two philosophies do sound significantly different.
Just for the sake of argument if the two fleets were still operating surely BA's would be approved for a longer life with the fail safe method of construction ? |
The Late XV105
I am not in any position to offer an answer to your question XV105, but may I offer a 'speculation'? I would hazard that the projection you highlight might be a Radio Altimeter aperture? It looks like a casting or even a forging and far too fancy for a drain. It seems to me the surface in which the aperture is 'machined', would be pretty much horizontal in the landing configuration and thus offer accurate height of the centre of gravity perhaps? Given that the cockpit would be many feet above that, it makes sense.
Errr..... I'll get me coat. :O |
.. I really shouldn't be as cheeky as I tend to be at times ... |
Just for the sake of argument if the two fleets were still operating surely BA's would be approved for a longer life with the fail safe method of construction ? |
Don't know much about radio altimeters. First thoughts were that it was some sort of vortex generator, but seems a funny place to have one. Second thoughts were that the 'vane' standing off the surface was there to generate some sort of suction (the 'hole' seems to be on the leeward side) to make sure that the inside did drain in all conditions.
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