Good Morning, Oppo

"ttyymmnn" (ttyymmnn)
06/05/2020 at 09:43 • Filed to: good morning oppo

Happy Friday, everybody. Have an Avro Canada Jetliner, the plane that gave us the word “jetliner.”

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DISCUSSION (14)

user314 > ttyymmnn
06/05/2020 at 09:50

Oh, oh big ol’ jet airliner

Don’t carry me too far awa y

Oh, oh big ol’ jet airliner

‘Cause it’s here that I’ve got to stay

facw > ttyymmnn
06/05/2020 at 09:50

Oh man, I was worried for a minute that I had left this one off of my rankings, but I see it never made it to production (I included some near future planes that haven’t seen commercial service, but I’m pretty sure I made a conscious choice to avoid planes that never made it past the prototype stage and have no chance of doing so)

ttyymmnn > facw
06/05/2020 at 09:53

Rankings?

facw > ttyymmnn
06/05/2020 at 09:55

Basically just an excuse to look at pictures of planes when I should have been working. In any event, it would have gone here somewhere if it qualified: https://oppositelock.kinja.com/non-american-european-jetliners-ranked-1795403971

ttyymmnn > facw
06/05/2020 at 09:58

I remember that series. I didn’t realize I wrote that Jetliner piece a full five years ago. Time flies.

facw > ttyymmnn
06/05/2020 at 09:59

Yeah, I obviously missed it the first time around (or forgot it completely)

RamblinRover Luxury-Yacht > user314
06/05/2020 at 10:55

Exactly what I was thinking of. I would not have thought of “jet airliner” as skirting a trademark for “jetliner” deliberately or accidentally, but now that that’s highlighted, hmmmmm.

Roadkilled > ttyymmnn
06/05/2020 at 11:46

I always thought that having the engines embedded in the wings looked so much better than having them hanging below. I don’t see why aircraft manufacturers stopped doing that. I’m not sure what the downside is.

Well, maybe there is the problem that it reduces the space in the wings for fuel tanks.

Of course, a bird strike or other FOD could unbalance the engine with the resulting vibration damaging the wing structure.

Then there is the problem of a broken turbine blade slicing through a fuel tank.

I guess it would be a problem trying to fit a high bypass turbofan in the wing.

Maybe maintenance would be more challenging and engine replacements might require a bit more work.

I’m not sure if the thrust reverser design would be more challenging to keep the reversed air from blowing against the back of spoilers.

OK, maybe engines in the wings isn’t the greatest idea...

ttyymmnn > Roadkilled
06/05/2020 at 11:56

I think it might also have something to do with the overall construction of the wing. The faster you go, the thinner you want your wing to be. When you have to engineer spars and supports and things to accommodate engines, then you start to make compromises. The B-47 was the plane that gave us the first swept wing, podded engine design, and that pretty much set the tone for all to follow. And yes, having engines in the wings pretty much rules out any sort of high-bypass engine.

user314 > RamblinRover Luxury-Yacht
06/05/2020 at 12:01

Probably just needed the extra syllable.

Roadkilled > ttyymmnn
06/05/2020 at 12:46

I could make an argument that the Me 262 had the first engine in a pod under the engine. I’m also not sure when the jet engines were added to the B-36, but they were in the underwing pods suspended by a pylon. Granted, neither of these were swept-wing designs.

I would also qualify your statement in that the B-47 set the tone for all successful designs to follow. There were still a few divergent designs that didn’t sell well.

Of course, now I’m nit-picking. Your statement on the B-47 is spot-on correct.

ranwhenparked > ttyymmnn
06/05/2020 at 16:51

It also makes it a lot harder to upgrade engines or offer different engine options, since any chang e in dimensions of the power plant would likely require a major redesign/reengineering of the entire wing structure.

ranwhenparked > ttyymmnn
06/05/2020 at 16:57

The sad thing is that there was an obvious commercial potential for the C102, there were several major airlines that were seriously interested. Avro Canada just didn’t have the facilities or resources to develop and build the C102 and the CF-100 simultaneously, and the big government contract was obviously the safer and more profitable route (nearly 700 built, and spare parts and after sales support contracts going on through 1981, it was a solid option).

Hughes Aircraft was interested in licensing the design for production in the United States, if they had gone that route, it would have solved the problem. Hughes would have covered any remaining development expenses and built it in their factory in California, Avro Canada just had to sit back and collect the royalty payments. I assume Howard Hughes being his usual erratic, temperamental self has something to do with that deal not going through.

ttyymmnn > ranwhenparked
06/05/2020 at 16:59

Thanks. It’s such an attractive plane, so iconic of the era, it’s just a shame it was never produced. Sure, it would have been clobbered by the 707, but I bet it still would have had a solid run, and found a niche the Boeing couldn’t fill.