Random Aviation Post

Here's one I hadn't seen before: the "Tip Tow" project.

The problem: how to provide fighter coverage for long-range bombers when your fighters have nothing near the range of the bombers.
The solution: hook your fighters onto the wingtips of the bombers, shut down their engines, and let them have a free ride until they're needed.


The bomber, a B-29 Superfortress variant, was fitted with wingtip receptacles that allowed for the fighters, two modified F-84s, to hook up their own wingtip brackets in flight. Once connected and latched into place the fighters were locked in step with the bomber about their pitch and yaw axes, but free on their roll axis.

The fighters' elevators were used to assist as extended control surfaces for the bomber. In testing they accomplished this manually via control inputs from the fighter pilots, but the goal was to incorporate control of the fighters' control surfaces with the bomber's control surfaces automatically from the cockpit of the bomber. Upon first activation of the automatic system, however, the fighter immediately rolled over into the bomber, taking both to the ground and killing all on board.

The final solution: in-flight refueling.

Moller M400

As much as I would love to think otherwise, the flying car is a bad idea. General aviation has an overall excellent safety record, and that would be sure to change if the flying car were to become a commonplace reality.

Set all that aside, however, and I sure do like to drool over ideas like the Moller M400. On a sunny day like today a commute doesn't sound like such a bad idea after all...

Geeks only need apply

Ok, last one for the night -- I promise. Wings of War looks like an incredible way to spend some geektime. It's a warbird dogfight card game that involves very careful physical placement of airplane and maneuver cards which are then checked with a ruler to see who is in a position to shoot who out of the sky.

Check out the rulebook to get a feel for it. Only problem is there's no stinking way I'm getting my wife into this and Ezra's still too young. Hutch, where are you when I need you??

This is so totally worth your time

Behold, my first-ever Scratch project. It's dedicated to my wife; depending on who you are, I may or may not actually 'heart u'.

Update: Ryan's not the only one who's getting tired of having to hear my airplane sound every time I load this blog. Plus the applet is crashing Firefox on our laptop. Hope you enjoyed it while it lasted.

Oregon Airshow

We coughed up the $20 a piece yesterday and went to the Oregon Airshow. Wow. I had never been to an airshow before so the chance to go and see the Blue Angels (annoying audio on their site) was quite the treat.

I have watched plenty of their stuff on TV, so it wasn't that I was unfamiliar with what they do... but seeing it live really was incredible. There was an element of playfulness that I really hadn't expected -- as they transition between maneuvers you see them circling around, one or two planes racing to catch up with the others -- it looked like a giant game of plane tag at times.

The crummy cell phone pictures make it look as though they were miles away but in person they really feel as though you could just reach out and touch them when they fly overhead. The first time one banked over the crowd literally got my heart pumping (and my ears ringing) -- the F/A-18 is quite the flying machine.

There's a feeling I'm starting to get used to, though, as my relatively new views on peace slowly infiltrate the corners of my life, and I experienced it while watching both the Angels and (more so) the A-10 Warthog they had there: Very, very cool to watch the pilots perform? Yep. Totally amazing to see such capable aircraft pushed to its limits? Absolutely. But the maneuvers we saw yesterday aren't the purpose of those birds. Plain and simple, they were designed and constructed to kill. And that's just not ok. And I don't yet know how to reconcile the enjoyment and the repulsion I experience at the same sight.

Random Aviation Post -- Boeing BWB

Boeing has long been an innovative company. If you click through to their site, be sure to refresh the splash page a couple of times -- they've got some sweet shots of several of their aircraft, including the Chinook, the Apache, and the B-1B Lancer (really cool pic!) as well as their more mundane commercial stuff.

One of their latest projects is something called the Blended Wing Body, or BWB. Last Friday they gave their scaled unmanned prototype a test flight, apparently to good effect. Essentially this is a cross between a traditional fuselage/wing configuration and a flying wing configuration. The idea is to give the most lift possible while producing the least drag and leaving lots of space inside for people and stuff.

The prototype they are flying was manufactured for them by a British company called Cranfield Aerospace and, at 21 ft wingspan, is only an 8.5% mockup of what they envision producing someday. Even so its three 50 lb-thrust micro-jet engines can get this little guy up to 10,000 ft -- not bad for an R/C bird!

Among the cool things about the BWB:
* 20 separate control surfaces on the trailing edge! And yes, those would count as 'elevons' -- and all of them are independently actuated. Wow, complex. Sounds like A&P job security...
* Mounting the engines above the tail (or lack thereof) should greatly reduce the amount of noise transmitted downward, making for a much quieter plane.
* The prototype includes a parachute to bring the plane down gently if something goes awry during testing.

More info here, here, here and here.

Back to School

Aircraft Rigging and Assembly begins this morning -- we'll be taking the wings off of a Cessna 150 at some point this mod; beyond that I don't know too well what to expect. Should be a bit more hands-on than the electricity series though so that will be a pleasant change of pace. Feels good to be starting up again, the week off was much needed but I'm ready to get back in the saddle again.

meta

* Really cool video of a guy doing a Pike's Peak climb in a Peugot. If you like rally-style driving, this one's for you. I watched it with the sound off so as not to wake the baby, so I have no idea if it's music or a voiceover -- but the driving is great and so are the camera angles, especially for as old as it is. Via Dark Roasted Blend.

* Also from DRB, a very cool photo set of airplanes and their contrails. The first two pictures in particular are great, something you see on a daily basis but never ever up close.


* TSK has a very interesting and well worded bunch of thoughts about offensive language. He argues (among other things) that pre-modern offensive words were excommunicatory in nature, modern offensive words were largely centered around bodily function, and post-modern offensive language is exclusionary or derogative in nature. Lots more thoughts on this issue, maybe I'll devote a post to it.

* Geekdad recently linked to a comic book store in Toronto that has an incredibly cool front window display of the battle of Helm's Deep recreated with Muppet characters. What's not to love?


* Heard on NPR the other day about an ambidextrous pitcher currently playing college ball. Yes, both of those pictures are of the same guy. He has a custom-made two-thumbed glove that allows him to switch hands from batter to batter. Wow.


* Didn't really expect this, but apparently I'm a Wesleyan. (Via Wess, who isn't.)

You scored as Evangelical Holiness/Wesleyan, You are an evangelical in the Wesleyan tradition. You believe that God's grace enables you to choose to believe in him, even though you yourself are totally depraved. The gift of the Holy Spirit gives you assurance of your salvation, and he also enables you to live the life of obedience to which God has called us. You are influenced heavly by John Wesley and the Methodists. Evangelical Holiness/Wesleyan 89% Reformed Evangelical 86% Emergent/Postmodern 75% Neo orthodox 57% Fundamentalist 50% Charismatic/Pentecostal 29% Classical Liberal 29% Modern Liberal 18% Roman Catholic 18% What's your theological worldview? created with QuizFarm.com

Radial engines redux

A while ago I posted about radial engines, including their use in motorcycles. Here's another use we're not studying in A&P school, courtesy of Dark Roasted Blend.

The radial engine coffee table:

This one goes out to the geeks I love...

I recently ran across Geekdad and it immediately started causing problems in my Reader account as I find myself hanging onto almost everything they post, wanting to try every idea out myself. It is definitely must-read material for parents with a geeky bent toward gadgetry and hands-on learning. And how can you resist a site that points you toward products like this?

One down, seven to go

This week is spring break -- and that means I have officially survived one quarter of A&P school. Don't get me wrong -- I am really enjoying being there. But it feels wonderful to get a little bit of a break. The mod we just finished (read: class) was a challenge in terms of coping with the instructional style... I'll leave it at that. Looking forward to moving on in a different direction.

Next quarter's mods are a bit repetitive: Aircraft Electricity I, Aircraft Electricity II, and Aircraft Electricity III. The electricity aspect is a bit daunting to me as I know *nothing* about it at all... but it'll be great to be able to say I grasp the basics at least of electrical theory.

A&P School pix

PCC AMT Program

I've been taking cellphone pictures at school to have something to show the kids of "what daddy did at school today." Figured I may as well go ahead and post them here too -- they're nothing special but they give a chance to see what the PCC hangars I'm spending 25 hours a week look like. I tried to caption them at least rudimentarily, mostly just for my own future reference.

Random stuff

One word: Why?

(Thanks to Thrilling Wonder)


Jet-Man

Talk about cool. If I'm doing the math right, that's about 190 mph.



Theo Jansen, kinetic sculptor

This guy's stuff is absolutely brilliant. Search for his name if you want to see more, he has some *crazy* stuff.



Beatboxing flautist

Ummmm...

We've been studying legalese all week

Ever wonder how the FAA's 14CFR Parts 91 & 65 relate to each other? Got any questions about their scope or who they apply to?

Me neither.

But if you ever did, this chart we're studying would answer them for you.

Random aviation post

Radial engines are really cool. Haven't studied them yet but we've got a sweet real-life cutaway of one at school that runs on an electric motor so you can watch it work. Very cool to see. And if they're cool on planes, why not on bikes too?





As usual, HowStuffWorks has a nice clear piece on radial engines and the basics of how they function. Basically they are a series of cylinders laid out in a spoke-like pattern rather than in the more familiar V or inline patterns you see in cars. Their popularity was at its height around the time of WWII. How do you add more cylinders in a radial configuration? Stack "wheels" in front of each other. Enter the Pratt & Whitney R-4360 Wasp Major, an absolute beast of a machine. Not the first to add row upon row, but probably the standout example. Four rows of 7 cylinders each for a whopping 28 cylinder, 4360 cu in, nearly two-ton, 4300 HP animal. Throw four of those bad boys onto an airframe and you've got the B-50 Superfortress.

How not to do this job

The guy actually didn't go all the way through, and, incredibly, he lived -- his helmet jammed the engine and held him there just long enough for the pilot to shut things down, then he crawled back out the front end. Full video (with those details) here. According to my classmates, the Navy shows that clip to all the new recruits who are going to be working on their jets.