Short article says that some prototypes may be revealed at a London air show next month.

[mynorthwest.com]

I hope that's true, but I rather doubt it... At least not flying prototypes... Wooden mockups, maybe.

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Paul F.
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A sword never kills anybody; it is a tool in the killer's hand. - Lucius Annaeus Seneca c. 5 BC - 65 AD
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Good is the enemy of Excellent. Talent is not necessary for Excellence.
Persistence is necessary for Excellence. And Persistence is a Decision.
--
Eureka, CA

As I've said before, any progress is good progress (Though, I'd prefer a plane sooner rather than later). It's been known that there have been some teams in Boeing working on a Supersonic plane...

There's apparently a wing design from the 70s that cancels out the boom, but at the cost of generating lift (which, isn't much of an issue in supersonic flight, but it is a consideration), so I figure work would be done to make it a variable wing design so it can generate lift at subsonic speeds.

Furthermore, there's a company called "SBJ" which is probably Vaporware, but they claim to have a wing design that would allow for over-land Mach 1.2 travel. Business jet though.


Anyway, super excited. I hate time and geography getting in the way of where I want to be.

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Shamelessly pitching my driving blog: [prndloser.com] (Now actually up and running again too!)

That would be great but in the meantime, the Concorde was a terrific airplane.

Yes, it had a very catastrophic crash to end its career but that could be fixed by reinforcing the bottom panels of the fuel tanks (or not leaving pieces of metal on the runway ).

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At one time not too many decades ago, a ramjet- and/or rocket-powered spaceplane seemed a distinct possibility. At the time of the Concorde, both the US and the Soviets had supersonic (turbojet) passenger planes in development. The Soviet entry actually flew, and crashed, at a Paris air show. The US plane was cancelled for lack of funding. The market for Concorde travel, given the high cost of tickets, was tiny; AFAIK, it always flew at a loss.

The trend instead, beginning with the 747, was for giant ocean-liners of the air. With the Airbus 380, that seems to have peaked, so maybe it is time to start looking at super- or even hyper-sonic passenger service. After all, I don't expect that a spaceplane reaching suborbital altitude will bother anyone on land with sonic booms.

/Mr Lynn

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"Hillbilly at Harvard"
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On the river in Saxonville.

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Paul F.
I hope that's true, but I rather doubt it... At least not flying prototypes... Wooden mockups, maybe.

Oh, come on. Just drag out some B1-B Bones and pressurize the bomb bay areas, and put little Japanese tube hotel beds in the rotary bomb racks.

I thought airlines were desperately trying to reduce fuel consumption of their fleets?

I'm sure they could make these planes, but I doubt any airline would buy them at the moment.

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Why is that that all sorts of other fluids are available for way less than gasoline nowadays? Lets make a supersonic passenger plane that runs on ketchup, or vinegar, or corn syrup and bring OPEC to its knees.

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^^^
and cause a shortage in condiments!!!

How utterly short sighted of you - we need to embrace renewable energy and this is the perfect opportunity.

Just put windmill generators on the fuselage and once you get up to speed the air rushing by at 750+ mph will power the generators and it will fly for free!












(and yes, I'm being facetious)

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You can tell a lot about a woman by her hands...
- For example, if they are wrapped around your throat she's probably slightly upset.

I don't care if I fly on a supersonic jet. I just wish coach had more leg room for those of us taller than 6'. Is that too much to ask?

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the_poochies
I don't care if I fly on a supersonic jet. I just wish coach had more leg room for those of us taller than 6'. Is that too much to ask?

One of the reasons I take trains, whenever possible—and I'm nowhere near 6', either.

/Mr Lynn



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 06/26/2012 09:04AM by mrlynn.