Remember how Boeing said that it needed to build 15 C-17s/year to keep the line open?
Well, now that the credit crisis has hit, and a Democrat has been elected president, they are walking away from that demand, saying that they might be able to take production to 8 planes/year.
They realized that lying about required orders might have the whole thing shut down/
Boeing has delayed the first flight of the 787, again.
Not a surprise, considering the strike, but it appears that the work stoppage is only part of it:
Included in the assessment is a costly manufacturing error. Boeing acknowledges a need to reinstall slightly less than 3% of all fasteners throughout its production system.
I’m beginning to think that they should hire a Witch Doctor, and slaughter a pig to get the demons out.
Because the F-111 Aardvark is just so much fun at airshows.
The X-43A was a rather crude demonstrator, relying on a large, heavy copper heat sink and burning hydrogen, but the X-51a is much more advance, and much more viable technologymuch lighter, and being actively cooled by its own hydrocarbon fuel, and the flight ready SJX61-2 scramjet has finished ground test
It will start on ethylene, and than sustain thrust with JP-7, the fuel used by the SR-71, and should have a powered endurance in the 300 second range, following launch at 50,000 feet by a B-52 and a boost to supersonic speed by a booster derived from the ATACMS missile.
I think that if this transitions to anything in the near term, it would be some sort of missile, and if they can get 300s thrust at mach 5 or so, you would be looking at a total range on the order of 600+km.
One of the things that would change is that you would see a lot less metal, and a lot more composite.
Picture Pr0n below:
Titanium nozzle for SJX61-2
The fuel tank is integral to the structure.
I present to you the Aurora Flight Sciences Excalibur VTOL UCAV, a 40% proof of concept version, which seems to be almost as much prop as wing, paid for by DARPA.
The twist in this design is that the lift fans are driven by electric motors:
For VTOL mode, the Excalibur’s turbine engine tilts vertically and provides about 70% of the thrust, says program manager Heather Brendle. Battery-powered lift fans in the nose and wing tips provide pitch and roll control by differential rotational speed, and yaw control via vanes that deflect fan thrust. For cruise, the engine tilts horizontally, the tip fans retract into the wing, a sliding door covers the nose fan and the aircraft rolls onto its back.
The Excalibur is designed as a close-air-support UCAV. The notional 21-ft.-span full-size vehicle is designed around a 500-lb. weapons capacity—enough to carry four Hellfire missiles. This aircraft would have a VTOL takeoff weight of 4,000 lb. and useful load of 1,000 lb., increasing to 4,800 lb. and 1,900 lb., respectively, with short takeoff and vertical landing. Maximum speed would be 300 kt. at sea level, increasing to 460 kt. at 30,000 ft.; loiter speed would be 90 kt.
Aurora’s subscale, 10-ft.-span, proof-of-principle (POP) aircraft weighs in at 720 lb., with a 100-lb. useful load and 280-kt. sea-level speed. The engine is a Williams F415 turbofan from the Tactical Tomahawk cruise missile. Each common lift-fan unit is powered by four lithium polymer batteries packaged with the electric motor. The motor’s fast response allows use of a fixed-pitch fan, says Brendle.
Someone seriously thinking outside of the box here.
So, we now see that Boeing will move more engineering and manufacturing in house after the debacle with its long-delayed 787:
Boeing has expected too much from major outsourcing partners and will take much detailed design work and some major production back in-house to avoid in future the troubles that have plagued its long-delayed 787 programme.
I think that some of the upper management will now say that they had to, because of the labor deal they cut with the IAM, as opposed to admitting that farming that much out to future competitors so as to reduce the initial investment, did not work, and transferred core competencies to the “partners”.
I think that the employment guarantees in the contract were a relief to management, because they had to bring this stuff back in, but admitting failure in an honest way would have meant some high level firings.
Also, toward the bottom, it appears that the SPEEA is feeling its oats with Boeing too, though I don’t expect a strike from them, they are engineers, who tend to be Randroid by nature.
Then again, I did not predict the last time, when they did go on strike, so YMMV.
Well, the French Defense Ministry has suggested that it forgo penalties on delays in the A400M military transport in exchange for a binding schedule. (paid subscription required)
In related news, EADS is slowing production of the A400M in because of delays of the engine advancing through test.
At least, there is symmetry.
If the rumor of China negotiating the purchase of Su-33 fighters of the type used on the Russian STOBAR carrier are true, it would appear to be the case.
Kewl:
I’m not sure if this is real, or some sort of ploy to get money from Paulson, but this is very scary:
General Motors Corp., seeking federal aid to avoid collapse, said it may not have enough cash to keep operating this year and will fall “significantly short” of the amount needed by the end of June unless the auto market improves or it raises more capital.
I’m so glad that I’m not in a position to make a call on this.
Because they did not trust the Republicans to leave as promised:
“Before, the Iraqis were thinking that if they sign the pact, there will be no respect for the schedule of troop withdrawal by Dec. 31, 2011,” said Hadi al-Ameri, a powerful member of the Islamic Supreme Council of Iraq, a major Shiite party. “If Republicans were still there, there would be no respect for this timetable. This is a positive step to have the same theory about the timetable as Mr. Obama.”
The legacy of the Bush administration is the belief that they, and by extension the United States, could not be trusted to uphold agreements.
From, Queen Elizabeth II, of all people.
She visited the London School of Economics (LSE):
Prof Garicano [director of research at the LSE’s management department] said afterwards: “The Queen asked me: ‘If these things were so large, how come everyone missed them? Why did nobody notice it’?”
When Garicano explained that at “every stage, someone was relying on somebody else and everyone thought they were doing the right thing”, she commented: “Awful.”
You see, this is not rocket science.
The only reason that it seems complex is because the people who are trying to fix it, were the ones who caused it in the first place, and they are obfuscating to cover their collective asses.
Honestly, I think that they got the green from Bush and His Evil Minions™, or at least Dick Cheney before cluster bombing cities, but cluster bomb cities they did, and they did it before the Russians moved in.
Even without consideration as to right or wrong, it would be catestrophically stupid to allow Georgia into NATO for one simple reason: It will give the Russian FSB unprecedented access to NATO secrets, because the Russians have completely penetrated the Georgian state security apparatus.
That’s why the Russians were able to launch a devastating counter attack: they knew that it was coming, to the minute and individual battalion level battle plans, and so could respond quickly.
It’s sad, the spirit is willing, but he is too infirm to continue in that post.
The NeandeRepublicans are now saying that their losses are all the fault of the more moderate Republicans.
It’s fascinating. After 1972 and 1984, the Democrats saw electoral disasters as a message to hew to the center, and after 1964, 2006, and 2008, Republicans saw it as an excuse to drive the center from their party.
At some point, they will simply go further right than they can push the Overton window.
Not my headline, it’s the lede from the New York Daily News, but it amuses me.
Just a note on Alaska, the actual balloting appears to be very screwed up, surprising given the fact that they have such a small number of votes to count.
I’m not calling conspiracy, it appears that this is a perennial thing and it happened in 2004 too.
Still, Stevens is clinging to a slim lead.
I’m not sure if I want him to lose, or if I want him to be expelled by the Senate. Which ever hurts him more.
The man has been a cancer on the body politic for decades.
It’s looking worse for Darcy Burner in WA-8. She is down about 5200 votes.
And Coleman/Franken Senate race in Minnesota is still to close to call. What was an 800 vote margin is now a 239 vote margin, and that’s before the recount starts. This is just figuring the official vote count.
Unemployment rose to 6.5% from 6.1%, a 14 year high, and total non farm employment fell by 240 thousand.
Can we call it a recession already?
If not, how about I draw you a picture:
Meanwhile, the Institute for Supply Management’s manufacturing report fell to 38.9%, the worst number since September 1983.
And, just so now, the real estate recovery ain’t coming soon, not with Property & Portfolio Research Inc. the New York City metro commercial property vacancy rate hitting 17.6%.
FWIW, they had predicted a peak of 13% 3 months ago, but it’s already at 12%.
Meanwhile the National Association of Realtors® says that pending home sales fell 4.6% in Septmeber.
At least we are not in the UK, where house prices fell 15% year over year.
That being said, some of the indicators for the finance market appear to be moderating, with spreads edging down, and money flowing back into mutual funds for the first time in 3½ months.
Additionally, it looks like consumers are using their credit cards a bit more.
The bad economic news news has driven the dollar down, and the weak dollar appears to have beaten recession today on the oil markets, where crude is up a smidgen.
Not surprisingly, Gasoline is down at the pump, the 51st day in a row.
This needs to move quickly, because if card check ant other labor provisions don’t go through quickly, they won’t at all.
FWIW, my agenda would be more aggressive than the unions: Repeal Taft-Hartley too.
There is 50 years of anti-union legislation to repeal.
I am quoting Will Bunch of Attytood, and it deserves repreating, because it is so damn funny.