161–170 of 545 posts
Congrats to Boom, but also r/killthecameraman
I know nothing about Boom. Why is this impressive? We've achieved supersonic for passengers before. Are we meant to be interested just because someone is taking up the mantle again, or is there some new design that makes it impressive?
Concorde was a large program backed by two governments and designed and built by nationalized aerospace companies. This is a strictly private affair, so no tax dollars behind it, just private funds. The end goal is also to be much more efficient than Concorde, which was a pretty brute forced effort which multiple large afterburning engines. They hope to make the production model capable of supercruise.
$200 million in North Carolina for production:
https://subsidytracker.goodjobsfirst.org/subsidy-tracker/nc-...
$60 million from the US Air Force for development:
https://www.aerospacetestinginternational.com/news/flight-te...
$2 million SBIR grant for development:
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> How do you make this profitable? Selling it for more than it costs to build. Computer-based modelling, advances in our understanding of supersonic flight and sonic booms and a mature civil (and private) aviation industry make the profit case much more compelling than it was for the Concorde. (The real test will be in their engine.)
I assume the question was about the questionable economics of running a super-sonic airplane profitably. The Concorde was notorious for bleeding money. Maybe the premium aspect will be enough, given that we have a bigger and bigger chasm between rich and poor, or maybe the economics of running it won't compete against sub-sonic, lower fuel consumption planes.
NYC to London or Paris? Sure.
But now you still need to find people willing and able to spend $5K+ each way. I'd like to do it but realistically I'm not going to.
“Currently, all civil aircraft flights are prohibited from operating above Mach one speeds over land in the United States.” [1] Mike Bannister’s excellent book Concorde talks at length about how “handsomely profitable” the BA service was (as opposed to the Air France one) from 1984 until the 2000 crash and subsequent grounding put them in to a spiral where keeping enough people certified was too expensive. One part o…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I suspect it'll only ever be a toy for billionaires. For the rest of us, isn't air travel supposed to be something we're giving up/ramping down due to climate change?
What if this ends up being more efficient for long flights over oceans due to the ability to fly in thinner air?
“Currently, all civil aircraft flights are prohibited from operating above Mach one speeds over land in the United States.” [1] Mike Bannister’s excellent book Concorde talks at length about how “handsomely profitable” the BA service was (as opposed to the Air France one) from 1984 until the 2000 crash and subsequent grounding put them in to a spiral where keeping enough people certified was too expensive. One part o…
Concorde experiences one fatal crash in 27 years: entire product line gets cancelled. Meanwhile, Boeing 737 MAX... ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Boom is not currently flying their intended engines, the Symphony, which does not exist yet. (1) The XB-1 is flying with J85's just like a T-38 has, and just like a T-38 it can go supersonic with afterburners. If the Symphony is able to meet its design goals, it will not need afterburners for any part of flight. How much they will be able to deliver on that remains the biggest open technical question for Boom. (2) 1:…
> how much will people pay for civil supersonic? Do we know how much more it's likely to cost? I could easily see people paying 1.5x - 2x. Anything beyond 2x I imagine would start to price out the average person and anything beyond 5x would probably price out the vast majority of potential customers.
The plane looks so small on the runway, I thought how could it possibly hold 64-80 passengers. Hint: it's because the XB-1 is a one-third scale model of their fully fledged Overture.
“Currently, all civil aircraft flights are prohibited from operating above Mach one speeds over land in the United States.” [1] Mike Bannister’s excellent book Concorde talks at length about how “handsomely profitable” the BA service was (as opposed to the Air France one) from 1984 until the 2000 crash and subsequent grounding put them in to a spiral where keeping enough people certified was too expensive. One part o…
Concorde experiences one fatal crash in 27 years: entire product line gets cancelled. Meanwhile, Boeing 737 MAX... ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
“Currently, all civil aircraft flights are prohibited from operating above Mach one speeds over land in the United States.” [1] Mike Bannister’s excellent book Concorde talks at length about how “handsomely profitable” the BA service was (as opposed to the Air France one) from 1984 until the 2000 crash and subsequent grounding put them in to a spiral where keeping enough people certified was too expensive. One part o…