First Boeing 787, in the flesh

[Ma Deuce]

Linky

Long story short, an aviation enthusiast, camped outside the Boeing assembly plant in Everett, managed to capture the first 787 on camera as it emerged from the factory, more than a week ahead of it's official July 8th rollout. Overall it looks good, despite having a far more conventional appearance than the radical designs seen early in the program. One thing I find particularly noteworthy about this aircraft is how huge the windows (especially on the cockpit) are, which makes it look smaller than it really is.

[Howedar]

Fucking fantastic. This makes my morning.

[DPDarkPrimus]

They're made of flesh?!

[size=0]To anyone stupid enough to quote this and try to correct me: I WAS MAKING A JOKE YOU IDIOT.[/size]

[Spanky The Dolphin]

Huh, I was expecting something bigger.

That's what your mother said!

[Ma Deuce]

They're made of flesh?!

Well, much of it's structure is made of carbon, the element upon which all life is based. Which reminds me, I wonder what colour American Airlines will paint theirs if they decide to order any: They can't simply leave it unpainted like they do with their current aluminum-bodied jets, for both aesthetic and practical reasons (the epoxy used to bond the carbon-fiber can't be exposed to UV, which means the aircraft must be painted over)

[Alerik the Fortunate]

It looks like the offspring of a 757 and 767 mating.

[Broomstick]

the epoxy used to bond the carbon-fiber can't be exposed to UV, which means the aircraft must be painted over

Yeah, I was going to mention "needs paint".

It's not just UV, though - you want to protect composite materials from any sort of corrosion or abrasion as much as possible.

[Aaron]

How much thrust do those engines put out? They certainly are large.

[Ma Deuce]

How much thrust do those engines put out? They certainly are large.

If those are the GEnx engines (and I assume they are, but the Trent 1000's numbers are probably very similar), then their design limit is about 75,000 lbf of thrust. During ground testing however GE pushed the engine past 80,000 lbf. By comparison, the largest, most powerful turbofan engine in the world, the GE90-115B (used on the Boeing 777), can generate up to 115,000 lbf of thrust.

[phongn]

I wonder what American Airlines' color scheme will be if they decide to buy the 787.

[Alan Bolte]

phongn, was that supposed to be ironic?

[phongn]

phongn, was that supposed to be ironic?

AA traditionally has been to have a lot of bare metal. You can't do that with composites.

[Stark]

What he means is -

Well, much of it's structure is made of carbon, the element upon which all life is based. Which reminds me, I wonder what colour American Airlines will paint theirs if they decide to order any: They can't simply leave it unpainted like they do with their current aluminum-bodied jets, for both aesthetic and practical reasons (the epoxy used to bond the carbon-fiber can't be exposed to UV, which means the aircraft must be painted over)

It's been done.

PS giant plane. :S

[Ma Deuce]

Come to think of it, AA did paint their A300s (among their oldest aircraft) light gray. However this time I'd bet on them going for silver-metallic to best match the rest of their fleet.

[Broomstick]

Unless silver-metallic weighs significantly more - because paint does have weight. Quite significant weight when you're talking about enough for an airliner which, by the way, is one reason AA doesn't paint much of their metal birds - to save weight.

[Dark Flame]

Coincidentally there is also a Lego version out as well.

And damn that thing is huge!

[Kenny_10_Bellys]

Dammit, it just looks like any other wide-bodied jet. The original design was well swoopy and very svelte looking, whereas this is just more of the same old same old. So it gets better mileage because it weighs less, they could have made it pretty too.

[Broomstick]

As someone who has to pay bills for aviation related matters, all I can say to that is any airplane that costs less to run than comparable airplanes IS beautiful!

I realize that the bog-standard tube-with-wings design isn't as sexy as some artist's conceptions, but really, the design does work reliably which is important when transporting large numbers of people.

[Zixinus]

This is interesting. What are the most mayor design advances compared to the previous Boeing?

[Broomstick]

Not sure which model you're referring to, but recent tech advances include use of composites in key structural/critical areas (there were a couple of decades of them being used in things like fairings before they were used in more important areas) and the introduction of GPS navigation. Neither of these are particularly obvious to the naked eye, particularly from the perspective of passengers. There have also been some significant improvements in engine technology, such that they are much more fuel efficient, quieter (although "quiet" is very much relative to other jets, they're still damn noisy), and more reliable. In the 1960's 4 engines were considered necessary for safety when crossing major oceans. Now, twin engines do it rountinely.

Of course, you can argue those are all incremental advances. If so, there have been a lot of increments over the past couple decades.

The thing is, the shape of aircraft is heavily constrained by aerodynamic requirements. Only certain shapes fly well.

[Ma Deuce]

There's more: Not only are the fuselage and wings all-composite, but the fuselage sections are actually fabricated as single-piece composite barrels, rather than frames with skin sections riveted on. This adds structural strength and reduces airframe maintenance. Since the aircraft's major prefabricated pieces are now larger, it also decreases assembly time to only three days, a quarter that of the 737.

-The high use of composites also allows increased passenger cabin pressure and humidity, increasing passenger comfort. Another benefit of the composite fuselage is the allowance of much bigger windows, which will be the industry's largest (bigger than the competing A350XWB), as well as a wider cabin relative to the outside fuselage diameter

-The engines are now "bleedless". Where as most airliners "bleed" air from the compression stage of their engines for such systems as the electrical system, cabin pressurization, wing de-icers etc, on the 787 the components previously reliant of bleed-air are replaced by independent electrically operated systems. The elimination of bleed air from the cabin pressurization system is particularly significant, as it eliminates the need for a bulky heat exchanger system to cool the superheated air to habitable temperatures, and improves cabin air quality as well, since the air breathed by passengers was not originally sucked through the engines.

A few advances are visible in the cabin as well: first, the interior lighting is now provided entirely by LEDs, and these can produce 128 colour combinations, allowing the aircraft's internal lighting to mimic the colour of the outside sky, which should help reduce jet lag. Additionally, the windows now dispense with the traditional sliding shades, instead making use of electrochromatic glass.

One other new system that would improve passenger comfort is what Boeing calls the "active gust alleviation system", which can automatically adjust the aircraft's control surfaces thousands of times a second to cancel out the effects of turbulence on the aircraft.

When all this is put together, I would say that despite it's conventional appearance, the 787 is a truly revolutionary aircraft.

[Broomstick]

-The high use of composites also allows increased passenger cabin pressure and humidity, increasing passenger comfort.

Actually, we've always been able to do this, it's just that beefier structure required to hold the pressure would have added prohibitive weight.

-The engines are now "bleedless". Where as most airliners "bleed" air from the compression stage of their engines for such systems as the electrical system, cabin pressurization, wing de-icers etc, on the 787 the components previously reliant of bleed-air are replaced by independent electrically operated systems.

Which makes me wonder about the back-up system if the electrical one goes out.

(There are alternatives - most, if not all, big airliners have small wind-driven turbines that drop in the event of engine failure to provide power in emergencies. It's just that those systems are somewhat limited.)

[Alerik the Fortunate]

Well, it sounds like an awfully comfy plane to fly in, at any rate. Too bad it seems that security requirements for flights tend to be going in the direction of passengers being stripped, sedated, and strapped down for flight duration (some exaggeration, of course)

[Howedar]

Dammit, it just looks like any other wide-bodied jet. The original design was well swoopy and very svelte looking, whereas this is just more of the same old same old. So it gets better mileage because it weighs less, they could have made it pretty too.

That's not true, actually; stick it next to a 777 and you are going to see significant differences.

[Broomstick]

The passenger-comfort features are nothing to sneeze at.

The low humidity of the typical pressurized passenger plane dries out the mucus membranes of the mouth and throat, making you more vulnerable to infection. The necessity of recirculating the cabin air means whatever germs people bring aboard not only stay aboard, but they are shared amongst everyone riding along. (In recent years HEPA filters and other devices have been added to on-board systems where possible, which helps somewhat).

The dry, thinner air on board also contributes to dehydration, which contributes to deep vein thrombosis. Which is not to say humid air at higher pressure will eliminate DVT, just make it less likely.

Although the current standard is 8000 foot MSL pressure equivalent (in the US - I presume others use a metric standard of roughly the same pressure), which should be fine for the standard healthy human, not everyone flying as a passenger is as healthy as the people the standard was based on. In certain vulnerable populations this can cause barometric-caused symptoms that are a close counsin to the bends, including joint pain. Not to mention that every year a certain number of tourists take that one last scuba dive just a little too close to take off time, resulting in honest-to-god episodes of the bends. Over the Pacific en route between Hawaii and California (as an example) is a really bad place to come down with this sort of thing, as there aren't really any options. You're just going to have to live in pain and hope you don't get too badly affected until they can land the airplane and get you to proper treatment. A standard pressurization equivalent to 5000 foot MSL would cut down on the instances of both these phenomena.

Anyone who has had to deal with full-blown jet lag will also appreciate it if the lighting system on board the airplane mitigates some of that unpleasentness, too.

Of course, this all pales in comparison to the one comfort improvement everyone would like to have but will likely never see -> more leg room!