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Europe says 737 Max won't fly until it completes it own design review

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Re: Europe says 737 Max won't fly until it completes it own design review

#161

Post by ddalex »

NikolaeVarius wrote: post #121
ddalex wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

LOL what? It's at least 4 orders of magnitude more risky to fly 737 MAX compared to Airbus A320 (counting deaths per 100k takeoffs). 4 orders of magnitude are not irrational.

Terrible comparison. Number of takeoffs of 737 Max is much lower than other planes, so numbers will naturally be skewed

Why would they be skewed? Stats are stats. I'd imagine say we have a sampling bias if there are less than 1000 flights in total, as in the kinks haven't been worked out, but this is a production aircraft, with 1000s of takeoffs each day, maybe more than 1M in total during program lifetime. Sufficient to gather significant stats.

Re: Europe says 737 Max won't fly until it completes it own design review

#162

Post by danharaj »

foldr wrote: post #157
tzs wrote: post #155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are specific regulations on how the stick force must change in response to various flight conditions. Without MCAS the stick force curve of the 737-MAX does not satisfy those regulations. Do an HN search on "MCAS stick force curve" (without the quotes)[1] and you can find some discussion of this with cites to and quotes from specific sections of the regulations. [1] https://hn.algolia.com/?query=MCAS%20stick%20…

There is no source in those comments for the claim that the 737-MAX would not satisfy these regulations without MCAS. Note that the actual regulations are a tad more complex than the incomplete sentence quoted: https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=5tAhOC4KC8MC&pg=PA200&lp...

You're right, I thought I read a post that had a citation, but I cannot find one.

Re: Europe says 737 Max won't fly until it completes it own design review

#163

Post by sgc »

cstross wrote: post #136
village-idiot wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That’s horrifying. I’ve also heard that the 787 was a boondoggle.

The 787 is weird (and possibly unsafe) for at least two significant reasons. Firstly, Boeing totally re-invented their approach to assembling planes. Previously they built most of the aireframe components and assembled them in their own plants. But the 787 was specced out during an ongoing Boeing/Airbus anti-trust dispute over government cross-subsidies that turned nasty (escalated to USA/EU level, mediated via the W…

I find your first point much more relevant than your second. Boeing had been using composites extensively in military aircraft since at least their work on the B-2, and had been using composites in smaller areas from well before then. That was all was before they purchased Northrop Gumman, which brought considerably more expertise in house.

Re: Europe says 737 Max won't fly until it completes it own design review

#164

Post by randolando »

radcon wrote: post #40

Is anyone else extremely reluctant to fly on a Boeing plane after this? A lot of people say "It's no big deal, they just need to update the MCAS software" , but I see this entire situation as a sign of much deeper issues at Boeing, issues that can't be fixed with a simple software update and could affect every plane they make.

Yes, and not just a Boeing plane. The happenings around the MAX make me reluctant to fly on new aircraft in general.

As I understand, parts of the certification process had been outsourced by the FAA to 3rd parties with monetary incentive to accelerate approvals and downplay safety critical issues.

That just seems to be asking for trouble and a step backwards in vetting the safety of new aircraft designs.

Re: Europe says 737 Max won't fly until it completes it own design review

#165

Post by Symbiote »

gambiting wrote: post #21
oldjokes wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is completely wrong, and there is plenty of data that says so. Especially when you start talking about business and frequent travelers, they are notoriously picky and will cancel flights based on a plane class or even when a specific aircraft usually does the route. https://www.businessinsider.com/americans-dont-want-to-fly-b... "If you had a flight on a Boeing 737 Max next week, and the FAA decided to clear the…

I feel like US is a completely different universe when it comes to this. I fly several times per year and there is no such thing as "choice" when it comes to flying. It's a matter of which operator has a connection on that route, having multiple operators fly the same route is completely unheard of(for me). If Ryanair rolls out a fleet of 737 Max tomorrow....I will fly on the 737 Max. I can't go "oh well I'll just fl…

I can choose either Ryanair, EasyJet, Norwegian, BA or SAS to fly direct to London. Just clicking around FlightConnections [1], about half of routes to 1500-2000km-away Europe have more than one airline. For example, two airlines fly to Stuttgart and Zürich, but one each to Basel and Luxembourg.

Of course, if you live near a smaller airport there's less choice -- but you are probably more used to connecting flights in that case.

[1] https://www.flightconnections.com/

Re: Europe says 737 Max won't fly until it completes it own design review

#166

Post by sgc »

piva00 wrote: post #148
NikolaeVarius wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Terrible comparison. Number of takeoffs of 737 Max is much lower than other planes, so numbers will naturally be skewed

And that is exactly the issue, that within the very short period while the 737 MAX has been active it has had major incidents. Naturally it'll be skewed but also naturally it tells something about its risk given the safety record of the aviation industry.

Almost all planes have more crashes in their early years, and many had worse or equally bad early records. It's too early to claim the 737-MAX will be inherently less safe than other planes using a multi-decade long measure.

Re: Europe says 737 Max won't fly until it completes it own design review

#167

Post by huslage »

cstross wrote: post #136
village-idiot wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That’s horrifying. I’ve also heard that the 787 was a boondoggle.

The 787 is weird (and possibly unsafe) for at least two significant reasons. Firstly, Boeing totally re-invented their approach to assembling planes. Previously they built most of the aireframe components and assembled them in their own plants. But the 787 was specced out during an ongoing Boeing/Airbus anti-trust dispute over government cross-subsidies that turned nasty (escalated to USA/EU level, mediated via the W…

The 787 is not weird. It is an evolution of practices and learning from across the industry, academia and governmental organizations (NASA, ESA, etc) that culminated in a new product. The 100% composite structure has been completely flawless for the most part, with the largest issue being how to recycle the plane when it's done. Boeing has long outsourced the production of many components of all of its planes to various vendors, the big difference with the 787 was that they did this on a global scale.

The use of LiIon batteries was a logical next step as well. Manufacturing issues in the first sets of batteries required them to re-engineer the safety system around them, and the vendors that created the batteries now have stricter standards to adhere to.

None of these issues currently compromise the safety of the airframes.

It's easy to pile-on after incidents occur, but these are machines made by people. People make mistakes all of the time. You wouldn't not use a computer because it had bugs. The likelihood of you falling out of the sky in a modern airliner is still vanishingly small and is getting smaller every day.

Re: Europe says 737 Max won't fly until it completes it own design review

#168

Post by rootusrootus »

jussij wrote: post #99
sjg007 wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They've had similar issues before. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boeing_737_rudder_issues

So past history tells us the 737 was marred by multiple fatal crashes cashed by bad rudder design. Recent history tells us the 737-MAX has also been marred with some serious design issues relating to it's MCAS system, which have resulted in multiple fatal crashes. That history suggests passengers should be wary of boarding a 737-MAX any time soon. I for one will give it a few years before taking up that boarding pass…

History also tells us that after the rudder issues, the 737 went on to become the safest airplane in history.

Re: Europe says 737 Max won't fly until it completes it own design review

#169

Post by magduf »

ubermonkey wrote: post #109
radcon wrote: post #40

Is anyone else extremely reluctant to fly on a Boeing plane after this? A lot of people say "It's no big deal, they just need to update the MCAS software" , but I see this entire situation as a sign of much deeper issues at Boeing, issues that can't be fixed with a simple software update and could affect every plane they make.

I think you're absolutely right. The approach on the MAX is horrifying. But airplane tech moves kind of slowly, no? Non-MAX 737s can't really change, and so are as safe today as they were 6 month or 6 years ago. The MAX debacle makes me SUPER SUPER leery of any new airframe, though.

The non-MAX 737s are still shitty planes to fly on. It's an ancient airframe: it's cramped, it's noisy, it just sucks. And it's a fuel hog too (which is why they made the MAX version).

The competing aircraft are all much newer and nicer. The only reason anyone was buying the MAX was 1) because they had already bought into Boeing and the 737 and it's cheaper to just get a 737MAX which doesn't require any pilot retraining (thanks to keeping the MCAS a secret), and 2) because Boeing was selling them really cheap (possibly "dumping") to compete against Airbus.

Re: Europe says 737 Max won't fly until it completes it own design review

#170

Post by huslage »

LoSboccacc wrote: post #138
foldr wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is not the case. The 737 MAX has different handling characteristics to a regular 737, but there is nothing inherently unsafe about those handling characteristics. The purpose of MCAS was just to prevent the need for pilots to recertify by masking the difference.

> there is nothing inherently unsafe about those handling characteristics this is not entirely true. applying throttle to the max causes a pitching momentum, something you don't want during a deep stall when control surfaces are totally unresponsive, because it would make the exit procedure (throttle up, nose naturally pitches down, gain airpseed and regain control) unsafe (throttle up, whops the plane is now pointin…

Applying throttle to any airplane with engines under the wings causes a pitching momentum. The pitching momentum is different in the MAX than other aircraft, but that doesn't make it less safe than anything else as long as a pilot is trained to understand it. The MAX is not naturally more likely to enter a stall regime than its predecessors.
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