I guess pilot retraining will always be time consuming, but can anything be done about recertification so that new designs don't face this issue?
737 Max: 1960s Design, 1990s Computing Power and Paper Manuals
21–30 of 133 posts
Re: 737 Max: 1960s Design, 1990s Computing Power and Paper Manuals
#22Earlier quoted context omitted.
That article says that other plans will display the error and the recommended checklist automatically, which certainly seems faster than flipping through a bunch of books trying to find a specific page based off of some lights.
A lecturer of mine once said - knowing what kind of people we teach here for programmers, I am scared of going to the doctor. The less software is in something(and less cloudy/iot) the better. And the more I program the more I prefer stupid and mechanical things when reliability is on the line. A paper manual is always there for you.
> And the more I program the more I prefer stupid and mechanical things when reliability is on the line.
Magic is great. Until it's not.
Re: 737 Max: 1960s Design, 1990s Computing Power and Paper Manuals
#23Earlier quoted context omitted.
That article says that other plans will display the error and the recommended checklist automatically, which certainly seems faster than flipping through a bunch of books trying to find a specific page based off of some lights.
A lecturer of mine once said - knowing what kind of people we teach here for programmers, I am scared of going to the doctor. The less software is in something(and less cloudy/iot) the better. And the more I program the more I prefer stupid and mechanical things when reliability is on the line. A paper manual is always there for you.
The app for my bicycle computer will be obsolete before my bike. On the other hand, my car computer has been running flawlessly for 25 years without any updates.
Re: 737 Max: 1960s Design, 1990s Computing Power and Paper Manuals
#24Kind of unfair. Do they really think that an aircraft should be powered by the same software or hardware that powers a modern computer or smartphone? An aircraft needs incredible reliability. You don’t get that with modern software/hardware architectures.
Yeah, the B-52, adopted in 1952, is planned to be is service through the 2050s. An airframe design expected to last for over 100 years. Keep in mind that flight itself is barely 100 years old. And paper manuals? Are they expecting to use iPads for in flight documents or something? Shall we compare failure states of paper vs tablets?
"And paper manuals? Are they expecting to use iPads for in flight documents or something? Shall we compare failure states of paper vs tablets?"
That cat is already out of the bag. "According to the FAA, Class 1, Class 2 and Class 3 EFB may act as a substitute for the paper manuals that pilots are otherwise required to carry with them. "
Re: 737 Max: 1960s Design, 1990s Computing Power and Paper Manuals
#25Regardless of how bad or good the 737 MAX was conceived, none of that matters because of regulatory capture of the FAA by way of millions of dollars of bribes paid to hundreds in Congress. Ever since the 737 NG, as the 2010 Al Jazeera report shows, Boeing has been installing substandard structural components and covering it up. No one should ever fly on an 737 NG or MAX aircraft because the regulatory environment was…
I'm on the fence on how bad the regulatory system is. Boeing has a massive incentive to make safe aircraft (they're seeing it first-hand right now), and modern commercial aircraft might be too complex for the FAA to effectively certify without input from manufacturers.
Re: 737 Max: 1960s Design, 1990s Computing Power and Paper Manuals
#26I guess pilot retraining will always be time consuming, but can anything be done about recertification so that new designs don't face this issue?
Good grief. No!
Because as we are literally discovering, not knowing the details of how and why the automatic stabilization software is driving your trim wheel can kill you. The biggest single part of the failure chain here was the fact that this should have been an invasive change requiring recertification as a different aircraft and retraining for pilots instead of pretending that it was just like a 737-600.
Re: 737 Max: 1960s Design, 1990s Computing Power and Paper Manuals
#27Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm not sure I agree here. There exist possibilities for far more safety with more compute. For example, when a mechanical failure occurs (for example an engine explodes and partially falls off) the flight characteristics of the plane change dramatically. Current systems fall back to human control, and hope that human will be able to figure out how to control a now very "unique" machine. Future systems could dynamica…
This tech is just now making it into military aircraft in the F-35 (it’s designed to compensate for failures or combat damage while keeping the plane’s handling relatively consistent), so I would guess it’ll be a while before we see a civilian version.
"Figure out a way to fly the thing in the new, crippled configuration" is hard. Figure out a way that's better than what the human pilot came up with may be even harder.
Re: 737 Max: 1960s Design, 1990s Computing Power and Paper Manuals
#28The Windows XP of passenger jets.
Windows XP was actually pretty modern for its time. Maybe you mean Windows ME. ;)
Re: 737 Max: 1960s Design, 1990s Computing Power and Paper Manuals
#29The "1990s Computing Power" comment is ignorantly harsh. The MAX (to the best of my knowledge) uses a similar AMD29050-based architecture as the 777 (where it was pioneered) and the 737-800/900. It's amply fast and very very reliable, hardware and software (setting MCAS aside which is new to MAX). Any sane person would prefer the solid well-proven choice over the bleeding edge. People used to make similar comments ab…
> The "1990s Computing Power" comment is ignorantly harsh.
I don't think so. You build a plane that's expected to run for decades -- if you put a 2010 computer in there now, it'll be 20 years old in 2030.
That 1990's computer was put there in the 90's, does that really make it more reliable?
Re: 737 Max: 1960s Design, 1990s Computing Power and Paper Manuals
#30I guess pilot retraining will always be time consuming, but can anything be done about recertification so that new designs don't face this issue?
Good grief. No! Because as we are literally discovering, not knowing the details of how and why the automatic stabilization software is driving your trim wheel can kill you . The biggest single part of the failure chain here was the fact that this should have been an invasive change requiring recertification as a different aircraft and retraining for pilots instead of pretending that it was just like a 737-600.
You are on my page. Type certification is the process to discover issues like this.
I'm not familiar with pilot training and certification but it seems to me that even if the 737 MAX was type certified certifying a pilot with previous 737 experience would have been just supplemental training. Ultimately a nothing burger.
I've seen a lot of cases where people get bent thinking of all the bad things that will happen because they think customers won't like some change. Always in the end if it's not a show stopper the customers just lump it.