737 Max is a generation too much

"El Relámpago(LZone) - Humanity First!" (lightningzone)
03/12/2019 at 14:11 • Filed to: None

Boeing would’ve been better off by doing a proper development exercise with a mini 787, new narrow body to replace the 737, instead of the Max.

Sure, it would’ve been a longer, more expensive effort, but they would’ve had a fresh new platform that would’ve been safe and efficient for decades to come. Instead we have a a 50 year old chicken ostrich, a synergy of old and new tech, with little studied implications. Because it’s “only an upgrade”.

DISCUSSION (32)

Spanfeller is a twat > El Relámpago(LZone) - Humanity First!
03/12/2019 at 14:31

I mean, the 787 also had a rocky start, but yes... the 737 should’ve been dropped.

Maybe they should’ve shortened the 757 instead

Aremmes > El Relámpago(LZone) - Humanity First!
03/12/2019 at 14:40

Their only mistake in all of this lies firmly on them changing the interface behavior by not allowing the pilot to override MCAS through the yoke, and then not telling anyone that they changed that. If they had not changed that behavior, at least the Lion Air flight would’ve survived.

Eric @ opposite-lock.com > El Relámpago(LZone) - Humanity First!
03/12/2019 at 14:40

If it’s the same problem as the Lion A ir, there’s clearly a bug and the question of why they needed to add this functionality. Did we have planes falling from the sky due to stalls? Why should something that doesn’t know the altitude of the plane be able to decide to override the pilots and push the nose down?

So many questions.

HammerheadFistpunch > El Relámpago(LZone) - Humanity First!
03/12/2019 at 14:42

Iterative development isn’t a bad thing at all, but this version does feel a little kludgy compared to the effort that would normally be needed to do it properly.

Mercedes Streeter > Spanfeller is a twat
03/12/2019 at 14:43

You could even say that the 787 launch was so hot it was fire..

Cash Rewards > Eric @ opposite-lock.com
03/12/2019 at 14:44

Yes, it was actually needed for stalls. T he newer, bigger, more efficient engines had to be mounted higher and farther in front of the wing, and changer the center of gravity.

Mercedes Streeter > Eric @ opposite-lock.com
03/12/2019 at 14:53

The system was introduced because the balance of the aircraft was changed. It seems Boeing’s idea was to have the plane make corrections in the background so that to the pilots, the aircraft will fly like a previous generation 737.

The potential problems being investigated are how the system reacts to bad readings from one or more AOA sensors and exactly how many pilots are even aware about how to deactivate it and take manual control.

ttyymmnn > El Relámpago(LZone) - Humanity First!
03/12/2019 at 14:55

I would hate to be the one reading the tea leaves at Boeing. They seem to be so risk averse about creating the NMA that they have instead pushed the 737 far beyond what it was ever meant to be. And now they are working on the MAX 10 which is meant to compete with the A321, which should have been the competitor for a 757 replacement, not a ludicrously stretched 737.

I do not believe that the MAX 8 is an inherently unsafe airplane in the hands of skilled pilots . But that was not the case in Lion Air, and the pilot of the Ethiopian airliner was only 29 years old. What I see at work here is that you have far more experienced pilots in the US coming to this aircraft after military careers or coming up from smaller jets. We have a culture of flying in this country that is not seen in the rapidly developing markets, where pilots are put in charge of airliners with minimal stick time of any sort. That said, any system that is put in place to make flying easier should not be so opaque that pilots of any skill level find it hard to manage.

ttyymmnn > Cash Rewards
03/12/2019 at 14:58

As I came to learn from some of our pilot Oppos, it’s not so much an issue of COG but one of a change in the relationship between the COG and the center of lift when compared to older 737s. The placement of the engines doesn’t help, but the shape of the nacelles themselves impart a certain amount of lift, and that was causing lateral instability. Boeing couldn’t get the MAX certified under older certifications unless they installed MCAS. That system alone isn’t causing the planes to crash, but it’s not helping, especially when the system does not know how to handle bad data, and pilots don’t know how to turn it off or have the skills to hand fly the aircraft.

ttyymmnn > Spanfeller is a twat
03/12/2019 at 15:00

The 787 was grounded over the battery issue, after zero deaths. More than 300 have died, and the FAA is playing a wait and see game. In fact, they never really solved the battery issue on the 78. They merely made a stronger box to contain any fire that might have happened.

IMO, they have badly missed their chance to replace the 757 with a new design. Not a smaller 787, not a shorter 757, but a whole new aircraft built around the engines they want to use and the demands of the airlines. You just can’t keep stretching a 50-year-old design.

ttyymmnn > Aremmes
03/12/2019 at 15:01

Might have survived. We’re assuming that the Lion Air pilots were skilled enough to hand fly the plane. I hope they were.

Spanfeller is a twat > ttyymmnn
03/12/2019 at 15:17

Lets remember that designing a new jet from the ground up takes a lot of time nowadays, the 787 took eight years from zero to first commercial flight.

I think Boeing (more so Airbus) was caught off guard by how quickly the market started transitioning out of hub and spoke, which is why pulling the plug on the 757, which has a lot more ground clearance than the 737, was a mistake IMHO.

Working the LEAP engines into a shortened 757 would’ve acomplished a lot of what the MAX program did, and also avoid changing the centre of gravity so drastically, and having an airframe which is already decades more advanced.

I mean, for fucks sake, the 737 still has navigational windows.

Also, working the LEAP engines into the 757 would be amazing for skinny routes!

Distraxi's idea of perfection is a Jagroen > ttyymmnn
03/12/2019 at 15:20

After the Lion Air crash it’s hard to believe that Max pilots haven’t all brushed up on how to turn the system off. They’ll be first at the scene of the accident...

El Relámpago(LZone) - Humanity First! > ttyymmnn
03/12/2019 at 15:23

Right now. It doesn’t matter. A good part of the world doesn’t trust the plane. And isn’t only about emerging markets.

Kinja'd!!!

This only puts further pressure on the FAA to do so too. Unless Boeing manages to convince the world that the plane is fundamentally safe, the Max is heading to an abrupt end.

ttyymmnn > Spanfeller is a twat
03/12/2019 at 15:29

Pretty sure the eyebrow windows went away after the -500 or -600.

I would rather see a mid-sized twin-aisle. One of the knocks on the 757 was that it was so long and skinny that it took a long time to load the passengers. And, at the time, airlines were more interested in smaller, more efficient jets. Right now, the answer lies in the A321. If Boeing were to make a brand new, direct competitor to that, they might have something. The MAX 10 is not it.

ttyymmnn > Distraxi's idea of perfection is a Jagroen
03/12/2019 at 15:32

I’m sure that all US pilots have. They’ve probably gotten sim time to deal with it as well. I can’t speak for the Ethiopian pilots. But the right seat in that cockpit had only 2oo hours of stick time, and the captain was only 29 years old. I don’t know how many hours he had in the MAX, but they gave him that route because he begged for it so he could visit his family in Nairobi. Not exactly how you want to be ass igning routes.

ttyymmnn > El Relámpago(LZone) - Humanity First!
03/12/2019 at 15:33

I disagree. Boeing will get it figured out. They have far too much invested in the MAX not to get it right. I think they are guilty of moving too fast, though, and without enough redundancy. We shall see. But at the end of the day, the world needs pilots who can fly. Remember Asiana 214 ?

Spanfeller is a twat > ttyymmnn
03/12/2019 at 15:36

So, something like an Airbus A310?

Bman76 (hates WS6 hoods, is on his phone and has 4 burners now) > HammerheadFistpunch
03/12/2019 at 15:37

Found the right take.

ttyymmnn > Spanfeller is a twat
03/12/2019 at 15:40

Perhaps. Honestly, I’m not versed enough in airline demand to know what they are really looking for. f86sabre told me that Delta has been leaning on Boeing for some time to field a replacement. It would be neat if they took the risk on something truly revolutionary, like a blended wing, but that is unlikely. Hell, they could make something exactly like the A321, with the latest and greatest engines, and they’d probably have buyers. But who knows how long that aircraft will stay relevant? That’s why I wouldn’t want to be the one making billion-dollar projections.

gmporschenut also a fan of hondas > El Relámpago(LZone) - Humanity First!
03/12/2019 at 15:42

There isn’t enough carbon fiber in the world to make a mini 787, and would push the price to be uncompetitive.

Spanfeller is a twat > ttyymmnn
03/12/2019 at 15:46

I wouldn’t know either, maybe Boeing had such a bad aftertaste from the B787 design that they didn’t want to go through that process again, you also need to consider type ratings (I wouldn’t be able to imagine there’s a single comercial aviation pilot that doesn’t know how to fly a 737); the less work individual pilots have to make in order to be able to fly means more airlines would keep flying with boeing rather than doing the outright switch to the A320; which is more spacious and has better engines.

ttyymmnn > Spanfeller is a twat
03/12/2019 at 15:51

I wouldn’t be able to imagine there’s a single comercial aviation pilot that doesn’t know how to fly a 737

Correct. They can get more planes in the air faster with pilots who already know the 737. Which is why, when they built the 767, they gave it the same cockpit at the 757, and pilots on the 75 were automatically rated to fly the 76. But the 767 is quickly going away, too.

Seems to me that Boeing should have started on the NMA the minute the 787 was set in stone and under production. They have lost many years waiting and waiting and stretching and stretching. They’ve really boxed themselves in, especially with the two recent crashes and doubts about the viability of the MAX. Sucks to be them right now.

Oh, and they also totally mishandled the CSeries thing, and basically handed Airbus a fantastic little airliner that will soon be taking the world by storm.

Spanfeller is a twat > ttyymmnn
03/12/2019 at 16:07

They should’ve seen the problems with the 737 very early on, in the early 2000s the writing was already on the wall... We all knew super-high bypass engines would be the future and that the 737's low ground clearance would become a massive problem.

But Boeing execs probably wouldn’t want two very expensive proyects being carried out at the same time... specially right after the 9/11 attacks; where pretty much every airline was bleeding cash.

ttyymmnn > Spanfeller is a twat
03/12/2019 at 16:35

Yeah, but that was 18 years ago. They should have started on the NMA 10 years ago. It would be here by now. Now they’re screwed.

Spanfeller is a twat > ttyymmnn
03/12/2019 at 16:43

Yeah, right now they’re going to have a very big problem... specially since the Airbus A320 is now made in America too.

I wonder when Aeromexico will switch over; it’s kind of unsustainable for the most expensive airline to use the worst jet (Interjet and Volaris use A320s), I'd rather fly economy in Interjet than first in Aeromexico.... that's how much better the A320 is.

ranwhenparked > El Relámpago(LZone) - Humanity First!
03/12/2019 at 18:14

I’ve always wondered about the lack of dedication to developing a clean sheet aircraft. I mean, this is a company that introduced 4 essentially all-new airliner s in a little over a decade from the late 1950s-late 1960s, and has managed only two new designs in the past 25 years. At some point, you do inevitably reach the limit of where you can realistically develop an existing model. I don't know that the 737 is there yet, but it most certainly will be sooner rather than later, given it is over half a century old.

WilliamsSW > El Relámpago(LZone) - Humanity First!
03/12/2019 at 21:25

There are many aircraft that had some problems which caused the public to lose confidence in them - Dehavilland Comet, Lockheed L188 Electra, DC10, Dreamliner- and this isn’t even the first time it’s happened to the 737. All of those eventually returned to the air and became safe aircraft - though the first 3 certainly suffered some market share loss.

The same will happen with the MAX - hopefully quickly for Boeing’s sake.

Biggus Dickus (RevsBro) > HammerheadFistpunch
03/12/2019 at 21:42

Exactly. The biggest selling point of the MAX is the iterative development. A whole new airframe is prohibitively expensive to develop for Boeing and to maintain for an airline.

Biggus Dickus (RevsBro) > ttyymmnn
03/12/2019 at 21:48

Ethiopian is to early to tell but from the Aviation circle i chat with it sounds like Lion Air isnt really a Boeing failure as much as it was bad maintenance protocols (deliberately choosing to let the plane fly with a noted faulty AoA sensor) and lack of pilot skill (either not knowing how to override MCAS/fly without it).

Biggus Dickus (RevsBro) > ranwhenparked
03/12/2019 at 21:52

The airline and aerospace was growing at a MUCH faster pace then. Additionally, safety and regulatory were relatively non existent compared to today.

ttyymmnn > Biggus Dickus (RevsBro)
03/12/2019 at 22:01

Agreed. Lion Air never should have taken off, as their two AoA sensors disagreed by 20 degrees. It never should have taken off after the reports by the pilots who flew it last before the crash. But even with the faulty sensor, and Boeing’s software, they still should have been able to turn it off and fly the plane, which they weren’t able to do. There is no smoking gun here, and people are obsessing about MCAS, but it’s really a combination of factors, as most crashes are. MCAS is just a piece of the puzzle.