Flapping Madly

I think they probably do. Anybody in public business today is interested in what is being said, right or wrong about what they do or make. Years ago my wife had a TV VCR home taping business where she would get requests to tape news shows on 7 different TV stations we received. In times of crisis (like the 900) a business would send a courier to the house at midnight to pick up the tapes from the 11 PM newscasts so the tapes could be taken to the local biz-jet airport to be flown to the business involved for review. Today, if you "Google" almost anything pertaining to the 900, you will run across a PPRuNE post or two. It's the age of instant "IT".

I would certainly believe British Airways is counting on this being the case with their recent order!

By the way, except for the current flying pilots, first officers and flight attendants, we are all SLF!

The Net allows for instant everything, and choice is the name of the game. It is most important for eliminating the "Puffery" of salesmanship, but also allows nitwits and proctozens to have a say. On the whole, the fact that there is no place to hide any longer for those who would endanger the Public, the venue is a plus. Google has several thousand of arguably the smartest humans on the Planet keeping their engines in Tune. "Imagine That, Fuel that doesn't follow the Rules", etc. "Golly, Friedrich effed up, he needs a stern talking to." The games are over. No longer a quick official guess (Lie), followed by sufficient time to allow the masses to move on. The chip has an eternal memory, and its contents are available in nano seconds. No more Corporate deference to the bottom line, the Bottom is now on the line.

One thing still rings true, and most likely always will. Bury the Dead, Tell the Truth, and Fix the Problem. Those who at one time made a living fooling the Public are now in the soup line. There is a God.

Sorry, I misunderstood your meaning. This latest incident of the T9 reports the Captain and F/O noticing a trend of Oil loss, and spooling down to (Flight) Idle. A Captain's commanded loss of an engine's power due loss of Oil sounds like a Boeing StratoCruiser, or Connie. An Airbus??

What will they think of next.

Without putting too fine a point on QF32, the outcome was to pull the EEC on engine Drop, and immediately change software. Are you understanding me when I say that the Software was not and is not the Problem?? The Engine has a current service life of six months. The software doesn't extend that, it (hopefully) allows for an auto shutdown in time to save an a/c. It is a Patch on a Hemorrhage. (imo).

The most recent incident, now in "Spotters Corner" wasn't my concern.

All I was trying to say was, that on a 3 or 4, with all engines set up to do the same thing, it is most likely that the EEC data from each will respond with similar trends. So as well as the EEC monitoring each engine, a comparison of trends will provide the first indication that any one data point is moving at a faster rate than the average of the same data points from the remaining engines.

Its not the absolute values we should be interested in, but the rate of change and direction of deviation from the mean - that's the first indication of "trouble up at mill".

BEAR....

"I brought this up on the BA038 thread, relative to fluids Stall at TOGA chat. I also injected it early on in this thread, (Actually the original). The FOHE is a candidate for failure both in cooling/heating capabilities due its position on the Fan Case. Here, the unidentified (though known) Harmonic wreaks its damage in a trail of Wear to all parts in the Core."

Thanks for bringing this back into the thread. This aspect is important, explains the high oil temps. Introduces another set of variables we really could do without. :oh:

Time for some R and R. Think you might will like this called the "Nth Degree" and sort of mimics the nature of global aerospace business.
YouTube - Morningwood - Nth Degree

T1000 is bleedless for a start, which is no problem on the 787 it was designed for, but will clearly be an issue plumbing it into a 380 that is expecting bleed air.

Having followed this thread religiously ever since the incident, I sometimes wonder whether the RR engineers involved in the investigation/redesign(?) feel the urge to respond to some of the assumptions and assertions posted on Pprune. Are they bound by a vow of silence, or are some of them PM-ing the more qualified members on the forum, and feeding them titbits of information? The absence of public statements from RR regarding the full extent of the problem, and the progress of its resolution, only results in more speculation regarding the future of the Trent and the Company. They, engineers and management, must know this.

Whatever the outcome of the matter, I have learned and understood a great deal about the finer points of gas turbine engine design from some of the more qualified contributors, but I have also detected an increasing tendency by some, to take delight in flagging up the dire potential consequences to RR of a failure to resolve the issues. There are some posts which add nothing to the debate, but serve only to bolster the self-regarding egos of the conspiracy theorists.

My hope is that our fears are unfounded, for the sake of passengers, operators, employees, and the reputation of one of the last remaining UK world-class engineering companies.

Standby. He'll be along in a minute. :hmm:

Hiya FORGET on the nose..hahaha:\

"My hope is that our fears are unfounded, for the sake of passengers, operators, employees, and the reputation of one of the last remaining UK world-class engineering companies."

Your fears are unfounded. The aircraft and the public is safe. From a commercial view point RR has a bursting order book. This is just a minor technical hitch that was unforseen.

My rant is why it happened. As it turns out the technology we thought we had we actually did not. You can forget the conspiracy stuff. If you want cedibility the only technically qualified contributor here is Turbine D. The rest of us are mainly retired onlookers. So if you read all the posts made by Turbine D and disregard the rest you can be assured of a good understanding.

We were lucky that this event happened as it did with no loss of life. God was with us.

NOTE WELL
I have to add that the logic recorded in the Bayesian paper was more akin to central Europe 1935. This is exactly what happened then. No way will I let that pass.

WETHERKEW
No worries

Nothing is gained by RR responding in any way including feeding info to good or bad shills.

The public generally trusts their regulators and depends on the better press to keep track of major events or rumours in this regard.

Interest pretty much goes with what plays in the press rather than unknown posters on a discussion board. Could be because most of us for good or bad hide our identity :}

For real concerns there is always a phone call or E-mail to be heard or attended to. The industry does have a way of listening to the right people.

Gate Keepers
 

Thats the problem lomapaseo, just who are the "right" people?

Inventing problems and premises just to have something to pontificate about is not particularly helpful.

I suggest cutting down on the sugar.

"I suggest cutting down on the sugar."

No longer can we just sit down and have a cup of tea secure in the knowledge that we will get the business anyway. If anything will loose the UKs best engineers it will be the "old boy" network. That much is clear.

Whatever.

The sugar comment was a reference to you being all over the place like a 6 year old who have eaten too much sugar, posting nonsensical comments on just about any subject.

A friendly advice if credibility and reputation are of any importance to you, if you will.

Thanks for the advice. Got an appointment with the doc in early March:ok:

Extraneosity
 

I think the editorial comments are best left to the moderators. What a bunch of scolds!!

Factless Scolds, at that. Sounding like an amateurish send up of Parliament.

"Hear hear!!" "Harrumph", "Bad Form!!" etc. Those who can, do. those who cannot, criticize.

I do not agree

Moderators, moderate the politeness of interactions and suitability of topics, but not necessarily the content until/unless it violates forum rules or seriously takes the subject off track.

The opinions, accuracy and relativeness of what one posts are free for dispute and/or discussion, just as you may disagree with what I post now.

So we are now completely off thread, and for the pursuance of empty rhetoric accusing one another of Various forms of chemical imbalances, and ignorance of the topic. For one, I see from you 10% of what you can contribute to help further the discussion. You are obviously expert, yet you prefer to withold your knowledge and instead complain about the lack of knowledge evident here. When you yourself are on topic, people read, and learn. When you scold, you waste your talents in pursuit of.....???

None of this should be personal, yet look now at me!! If one's prose offends or annoys, move on!! Why waste the time trying to enforce a personal point of view relative to what presents here, warts and all??

Isaac Newton
 

Isaac Newton will wave his invisible hand in the not too distant future, this thread is not done yet. His hand is every bit as good a Adam Smith's. At the moment I am reading all about the business school at INSEAD. This is where a lot of these RR managers get trained. Certain people in a certain condition as Adam said..Smith.

However, the issues raised in the last few posts about the safety of the public need clarifying. Should the A388 encounter an engine problem... here is the performance capability of the machine at the various weights. It is clear from this information that it is a VERY capable machine running on three engines only. My thanks to Trent 972 over on the Oz site.

Derg,
Basic figures @ ISA conditions
@500 Tonnes - 3 Eng max FL300+
@430 Tonnes - 3 Eng max FL350+
@400 Tonnes - 3 Eng max FL360+
@370 Tonnes - 3 Eng max FL380+

The 380 is always comfortable with terrain clearance on 3 engines, even over the Himalayas, no risk bro. http://images.ibsrv.net/ibsrv/res/sr...ies/thumbs.gif

this was posted on Feb 20 2011.

I read recently that Qantas are hoping to return the plane to service. I seem to remember some discussion in the first part of this thread before it was restarted in the Tech log that this would be impossible.

Can anyone point me to a discussion of how this is going to be accomplished?

Maybe it is in this 2nd part - I haven't had the chance to read the thread yet - I didn't realise that the thread had "moved".

Can rebuild anything as long as someone pays the bills. What you read was B:mad:T

I posted (in the original thread) that based on available photos, the hole in the front spar web left the spar caps intact, and thus a temporary repair appeared feasible. This would permit ferrying the bird back to Toulouse where permanent restoration could be done.

The elephant in the room (;)) is the restoration cost versus the market value of the repaired ship (as well as the QF reputation for never writing off an active ship).

Barit1 I see now YES! hahahah :cool: :ok:

barit1, DERG, and all,

It won't cost Qantas a penny, unless they want to outbid the JunkMan, to 'salvage' their dubious Hull record.

Four New/As New "C" mod T972 on Rolls, a spar, skin, and systems freshen-up, and off we go. Erm.......Off you go.

I do believe Rolls should pay in Cash for the removal of the 468 brown stains on the upholstery. And new knickers for the CC.

Wait, there may be more than one per each. There were after all, TWO BANGS.

Bearfoil

The current CEO, a psychologist graduate, of RR leaves the company at the end of March. He did a hell of a good job. The new guy is an accountant fresh from a job overseeing a retail operation in Belgium. He should be able to add up, but there is no guarantee that the Bayesians will be booted back to the race track where they belong.

He certainly will be busy, creatively hiding the costs within the bounds of company law. It will be his responsibility to regain the once proud name of Rolls Royce.

Some questions, maybe slightly off topic, maybe not:

Why is it that the most prominent UK engineering company goes outside the firm to bring in top leadership and who's education and background has nothing to do with the complex engineering product being designed, produced and sold? Is there not a path to the top for a bright, well rounded engineer to be groomed for the top position within the firm?

Just curious...

Just reminds me of an A/C manufacturer that is consistently poaching the automotive business for its top management positions ....:ugh:

The Board

This is a true story.

Looking for a replacement CEO, the Board recruited via sub contract with a "Head Firm". Interviews went well, and an excellent choice was made, by unanimous and robust approval. Contract was discussed, entered, and the New Man was invited back to the Boardroom for a welcome and Scotch.

When the new CEO was invited to stand up and address the Board, he led with a question:

"What, Exactly, do you folks build, here?"

TURBINE D

Objectively: There are 14 directors on the board of Rolls Royce. Nine of them have a social science background, one is a chemist, one an an academic engineer, two are vocational RR lifelong engineers. One is from management of United Airlines in the U.S. who gained a business degree.

So we have two guys here who could do any job on the shop floor and do it well. The most academically qualified is Colin P Smith.

Board of Directors - Rolls-Royce

So how come Colin P Smith does not have his hands on the reigns?

Now we go into my subjective reasons why after WW2 the engineers were not well regarded by the guys who had the money: the City of London and the Bankers.

1. The allies won WW2. The UK relaxed.

2. The UK education system after the WW2 was tripartheid. There was the private sector, the academic schools for about 10% of public school kids and another school for the other 90% of kids who did not get the scholarship. 5% of the population went on to university. The privately educated kids were the same mix...but they had a lot of input..this is the "oxford accented" and "old boy" network that led the UK after WW2. Of course a lot of them were not particularly gifted individuals but they had the right accents and talked well.

3. The education system has been a "political football" since 1965. The net effect is that we do not have the support structure in engineering.

4. Culture: beliefs and values. Engineering was not valued in many of the public academic schools and the facilities in these schools was poor to promote craft skills. So engineering became unfashionable.

5. The routes upward for talented shop floor workers were through the "technical colleges" and back in the 1960s and 1970s this was a route many sought and won. Colin P Smith is one such example. Entered at age 18 and went through this system. Looks like he hit the very heights of what was possible too..lots of solid balck type after his name.

6. Rewards. The pay for someone like Colin P Smith at age 18 would have been something like £38 per week. The team of 20 or so practical shop floor engineers he led would have been around £300 per week. This would have been for about a 45 hour week.

7. This was in the UK only. If you look at the UK it is on the edge of Europe and an island of some 55 million people. After WW2 the only competitor the UK had to manufactured goods was the USA..and we still have an export/import charge that hangs on today as a remnant.

8. Business culture. As one young commercial manager said to me when I was around 30 years old: "The trick DERG is to sell people fresh air..thats the secret". That memory remains with me.

9. As the post war years rolled on the City of London became a haven for companies from the USA who wanted a foot in the European market and were keen to adopt the methods of the USA in "wealth creation" The UK was an ideal place to make things because the labour was relatively cheap and the new methods were automated. Beacause the UK is an island the economy and labour markets were effectively trapped and the business managers took advantage. The "suit" became the icon. The coverall was altogether frowned upon.

10. Economics Because of the reasons above and the oil price increase the UK was bust by 1972. In Feb 1971 RR went bust but was restarted with tax payers money just as Airbus was founded. The City of London recovered and continued investing in service industries. Engineering was seen as "high risk" as the Japanese and German products became popular.

11. The net effect: the UK became a finance clearing house. If you wanted to be successful in life then engineering was not high on the list. That is why today we have only two or three people on the board of Rolls Royce Aerospace who are true engineers.

This subjective analysis SHOULD cause plenty of you to comment, all replies welcome

Hope this is on topic enough.

Geely Automobile Holdings Limited

It is the board of directors of Geely the Chinese firm that now builds the iconic London Black Cab--and lots of other things.

I've never seen so many Doctors and professors of engineering in one place. Make of it what you will.:O

Just my two cents worth.

Global Shifts
 

Yes indeed Flapping Madly. So if so much manufacturing is going away from us in the "west" why should we be so worried about engineers anyway? Do we need them at all? The blue collar skilled worker is under threat unless he is prepared to be itinerant. Perhaps Rolls Royce has got the right mix on the management board after all...perhaps they think that Rolls Royce is like any other manufacturing company..they could just upsticks and relocate anywhere...who knows?

I remember our previous PM giving a speech from Clydeside saying how proud he was to be giving the speech from a place with such a great engineering past.

This is honestly not a political point - the thought that ran through my head was why are we not as a nation ashamed that ship building / civil aircraft manufacture etc are things of the past in this country? and why is it that only foreign companies can make money manufacturing cars in this country?

I know of graduate engineers who cannot find a job - we should be ashamed that industry and manufacturing have such low esteem.

rant over

New RR Engines
 

My thanks to KEESJE for this post:

RR is working on new Open Rotor Technology for 3 years, with full scale demonstrators in the not to distant future. A third round of windtunnel test will start soon. They say they solved noise issues.

FARNBOROUGH: R-R urges Airbus. Boeing to reconsider narrowbody re-engining plans

Anyway it seems more A320NEO orders in the not to distant future, AirAsia, Jetstar and Lufthansa.
Lufthansa, Airbus Said to Negotiate $2.5 Billion Plane Order - Bloomberg

Jetstar Evaluating Airbus NEO | AVIATION WEEK

Keesje is your man for thus stuff..Thank You!

In 1971 Rolls Royce went into administrative receivership and then was nationalized. At the time the company was being run by engineers but their published accounts were being used as a classic example of a company heading for financial collapse.

The Case of Rolls-Royce plc
 

Some very interesting comments and observations to my original question, thanks!
Here is an interesting read. The pendulum swings from one side to the other over the past 40 year, maybe?

http://www.econ.uniurb.it/siepi/dec0...s/lazonick.pdf

I have made a study of Leadership at the Commercial level for the last two years, among friends and colleagues.

I prefer to start with the straightforward and simple view. If it is correct, no time is lost making things complex or difficult to explain.

The Leader: Tell your People what you want, and how long they have to produce.

The Manager: Tell your people what the Leader said, and explain to your people how to do it.

It is not more complicated than that.

The Man responsible for such a "Naive" view?? Patton.

The civilized world has begun (?) to believe its own nonsense, that work can be done simply by "Asking" and believing the result will be stellar.

The Drift away from Individual excellence into murky collective "Consensus" started with Marx. It has travelled unabated since the mid 1850's, with few sparks of brilliance to thwart its lurch back into the Stone Age.

"One CANNOT strengthen the Weak by Weakening the Strong..." (Lincoln).

The Barometer of Failure is an excess of money.

Bearfoil

If you read DAS KAPITAL by Karl Marx you will see how the CEOs et al operate. All they do is use this theory for their own agenda. They were all trained in this theory if they went to university here in Europe in the 1970s because it was fashionable. This is a "trade secret" I guess.

The result is always the same: a very small bunch of people live very well off a very insecure big bunch of people. Adam Smith in his THE WEALTH OF NATIONS describes this small greedy bunch as "certain men in a certain condition". A contemporary example is Michael O'Leary of EasyJet.

Adam Smith is the "good guy" and won out in 1989 when communism collapsed.

Make no mistake though, the other stuff is still used. Very successfully too until someone like Isaac Newton comes along and scares 'em. Ahem!

TURBINE D

"The pendulum swings from one side to the other over the past 40 year, maybe?"

http://www.econ.uniurb.it/siepi/dec0...s/lazonick.pdf

That paper was fascinating. I see INSEAD was involved, the MBA finishing school for the muppets who are sitting on the RR board of directors.

There is no question...they have lost control of the company. Isaac Newton is messing with their pendulum. It will cost them many times the £56m they have set aside as a fund to repay Qantas.

Just how much this will cost?

Nice Headline...........
 

I wonder if RR still has any corporate memory of their hyfill disaster