Is the B-21 not a blended wing body?
Air Force funds ‘blended wing body’ design for long-range, fuel-efficient flight
41–50 of 88 posts
Re: Air Force funds ‘blended wing body’ design for long-range, fuel-efficient flight
#42Nice. NASA and Airbus have both flown blended-wing unmanned test aircraft. Not sure what role this serves for the USAF. It's a transport. Wider loads? Stealth? The US has had total air superiority in every conflict since the Korean War. That's over. The Ukraine war makes it clear. Against a competent opponent, most of what flies will die. There are just too many man-portable and truck-mounted systems that can take do…
> Not sure what role this serves for the USAF.
Long range anti-ship missile deployment over the Pacific. A design like this can cover large areas and deploy autonomous weapons from long range.
Weapon development of the US military is almost entirely focused on China and its growing fleet. There are several air launched anti-ship missile platforms under development right now, including swarm attack, stealth and hypersonic missiles. The US is looking for an efficient, long range, high endurance standoff bomber for these systems. It doesn't need stealth; they'll operate from behind air defenses. It needs high efficiency, large fuel capacity and large payload capacity.
And that is exactly what you're looking at here.
Re: Air Force funds ‘blended wing body’ design for long-range, fuel-efficient flight
#43Isn‘t such a design a recipe for lot‘s of ice getting into the engine in the winter if one is not super careful?
Ice usually forms on the leading edges, so if they are kept warm it will greatly reduce this risk.
Re: Air Force funds ‘blended wing body’ design for long-range, fuel-efficient flight
#44Reminds me of the X33, a program I remember my dad was working on during my childhood like 20+ years ago. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lockheed_Martin_X-33
Looking at the cost spent back then vs. what this startup is getting, it doesn't seem like the JetZero guys have even a remote shot at making this happen.
Re: Air Force funds ‘blended wing body’ design for long-range, fuel-efficient flight
#45It used to be said this would fail in passenger markets because windows. The reality of long haul travel these days is that windows are really only "I can lean here" choices which restrict access to the aisle, for any trans-oceanic journey. For domestic flights, I am sure there are window seat aficionado who will continue to pay for window in flight. For everyone else, and by current seating maps there are a LOT more…
It's been many years since the window next to me was open. So, I totally agree. And for the last flight I took, the windows were a real PITA, since too many people had them open and there was wicked glare. A good 30-60 minutes I spent bobbing and weaving to avoid it being in my eyes.
Re: Air Force funds ‘blended wing body’ design for long-range, fuel-efficient flight
#46Earlier quoted context omitted.
Russia would fall like Iraq if we were to attack. Their ground-based anti-air would be hit as soon as even one missile is fired, every radar would be hit within minutes of powering on, their aircraft wiped out as soon as they were within range. With air supremacy we'd be able to fire a precision strike on every piece of active artillery and supply truck. They'd be left with nothing but men starving in trenches and ru…
Ukraine used to be one of the most prolific black market military arms dealers. We should absolutely avoid sending Ukraine any modern equipment. As soon as the war is over, they'll sell it on the black market to countries that will gladly reverse engineer what we've built. And as an aside, I have no interest in funding proxy wars with my tax dollars. Let's not return to a Cold War era. Entering this conflict was abso…
An Ukraine that relies on the West for most of its equipment, is under Russian threat, and wants to join the EU/NATO will go around selling the West's equipment? Makes little sense to me.
The West, and more specifically the US, is doing what they said they would do if Russia invaded Ukraine. This was done publicly and apparently privately too. So if this is a proxy war, then it's different from most proxy wars.
I don't like war, but when you have someone that wants to expand their borders, sometimes you save a lot of money and lives by ending the problem at the start. If Ukraine goes well, why not do the Baltics next? What about all those ethnic Russians in need of "saving" in Kazakhstan? It might even give China some ideas. So be careful: by not doing anything and saving your precious tax dollars, you might end up spending more in the future.
Wars of expansion should be costly and expensive, otherwise everyone would just start wars.
And that cold war era... isn't that what's we're already walking to with China? The sanctions, China's claims in the South China sea, etc? Russia in Ukraine are just a side show.
Re: Air Force funds ‘blended wing body’ design for long-range, fuel-efficient flight
#47The CCP has straight up stolen many billions worth of IP for US military equipment, most notably the C-17 transport plane. The ability of the US military to rapidly deploy people and resources lazily around the globe is one of its biggest strengths and why so many smaller bases is critical - think CDNs.
Now that their main adversary has cloned that advantage, a new generation approach is imperative. Who knows if this is indeed the future of US air logistics or a diversionary press release to mislead the development roadmaps of foes.
Re: Air Force funds ‘blended wing body’ design for long-range, fuel-efficient flight
#48Earlier quoted context omitted.
Russia would fall like Iraq if we were to attack. Their ground-based anti-air would be hit as soon as even one missile is fired, every radar would be hit within minutes of powering on, their aircraft wiped out as soon as they were within range. With air supremacy we'd be able to fire a precision strike on every piece of active artillery and supply truck. They'd be left with nothing but men starving in trenches and ru…
The is the kind of delusional thinking that has NATO forcing Ukraine to use western strategy and then getting slaughtered for it. The US has never defeated a peer army since WW2, in which the USSR did most of the work. Russia has fifth gen fighters, the S400, and very capable EW and artillery. To pretend they would roll over is pure fantasy.
There's no point in discussing this because no one is going to invade Russia. They have nuclear weapons. Even if they didn't, I'm not seeing anyone in the West edging for a war with them.
With this said, all that advanced tech and yet they're shitting their pants in Ukraine against old equipment. Something doesn't fit here.
Regarding training the new forces on western strategy, I'm not sure what else NATO countries could do. That's how they train their own forces. There was a failure to provide the resources (especially air ones) to put our tactics into practice, but NATO can't train Ukraine to fight like Russia/Ukraine/USSR...
Re: Air Force funds ‘blended wing body’ design for long-range, fuel-efficient flight
#49It used to be said this would fail in passenger markets because windows. The reality of long haul travel these days is that windows are really only "I can lean here" choices which restrict access to the aisle, for any trans-oceanic journey. For domestic flights, I am sure there are window seat aficionado who will continue to pay for window in flight. For everyone else, and by current seating maps there are a LOT more…
If this is the only practical solution for hydrogen fuelled aircraft, then it can't fail in passenger markets because there will be no other alternative to compete against once kerosene is too ecologically taxed.
The already-reduced carbon in the US waste stream is more than enough to make synthetic jet fuel to supply the entire current US demand. More generally, biomass (including crop waste) will suffice to power aviation world wide, without large increase in farm area.
Re: Air Force funds ‘blended wing body’ design for long-range, fuel-efficient flight
#50Earlier quoted context omitted.
I wonder if you could tilt everyone's seats forward during takeoff and landing. I've seen very high density seating in the far east where people are virtually standing. Maybe the seats could start off that way, stay that way through takeoff and ascent, then gently lower to a normal posture in level flight.
Like the pendolino trains? Perhaps it could work, but will make the seats more complicated.
You would certainly need space to rotate a seat.
The only seats that do change shape, those lie flat seats, need a fair amount of room around to not bump into something else while changing shape.