I wonder if there isn't an easy way to automate the parabolic flight - the autopilot should be clever enough to do it by itself without needing human intervention.
The “vomit comet” (American equivalent of this) has autopilot for yaw and roll only.
Weightless: Parabolic flight on an A310
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Re: Weightless: Parabolic flight on an A310
#42There's some scary videos from the cockpit in an A300 and (I think an) A310 doing parabolas: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ty5B-7CinB8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f-pMLZP6HL8
Maybe the pilots should wear helmets.
Re: Weightless: Parabolic flight on an A310
#43One of my preferred video clip ever was filmed entirely during a parabolic flight: OK Go, Upside Down & Inside Out https://youtu.be/LWGJA9i18Co
The weightless chain reminds me of the latter half of Seveneves.
Re: Weightless: Parabolic flight on an A310
#44Earlier quoted context omitted.
Wow that last one was pretty crazy to see. I guess they had some camera rig that would keep the camera level with the horizon.
Amazing video. I’d guess not mechanical? Look at the dashboard top, lower left over the first minute or so: There’s a screw head that keeps popping in and out of existence which suggests some kind of heavy software correction to me.
Yeah that looks like the kind of artifacting you might get from a 360° camera that's trying to hide itself from the footage.
Re: Weightless: Parabolic flight on an A310
#45I did one of these with https://www.gozerog.com/ a few years back. Not cheap, but memories that'll last a life-time. Started with lunar and mars gravity, before going full zero g. Like the article says, just make sure you have your ass pointed at the ground before they bottom out!
Re: Weightless: Parabolic flight on an A310
#46Earlier quoted context omitted.
I could imagine the autopilot could do a much better job. In the ideal 'zero-g' flight, you can release a ball at the start, and it should stay stationary (relative to the cabin) for the whole flight. That means the plane body must be to within a few inches of the exact perfect location in the sky 30 seconds later. I haven't flown planes, but I imagine that making sure they follow precisely a path with an accuracy of…
All the autopilots in the world aren't keeping a plane to within an inch in all three dimensions. It'd be nice, but turbulence is a thing :) More importantly, actual position isn't that important - you care about relative acceleration being as close to 0g as you can. And with the 3-pilot setup the A310 zero g flights have, they maintain +/- 0.02g. Now you add to that the fact that developing an autopilot you can trus…
The “easy” way to do it is to mandate autopilots to have the capability for precise ballistic trajectories. This would need better positioning, accelerometers, and meteorological radars and would also enable fully autonomous landings (if the plane can be aware of air densities and speeds around it, it can nail the landing even with wind gusts).
Re: Weightless: Parabolic flight on an A310
#47Re: Weightless: Parabolic flight on an A310
#48I wonder if there isn't an easy way to automate the parabolic flight - the autopilot should be clever enough to do it by itself without needing human intervention.
"Wow, this is hard. Therefore, AI must be the cheaper solution!"
This doesn’t need AI. The physics are very well understood. All that’s needed is a better autopilot with better awareness of surrounding conditions and more precise control of the aircraft.
Re: Weightless: Parabolic flight on an A310
#49Earlier quoted context omitted.
All the autopilots in the world aren't keeping a plane to within an inch in all three dimensions. It'd be nice, but turbulence is a thing :) More importantly, actual position isn't that important - you care about relative acceleration being as close to 0g as you can. And with the 3-pilot setup the A310 zero g flights have, they maintain +/- 0.02g. Now you add to that the fact that developing an autopilot you can trus…
The “easy” way to do it is to mandate autopilots to have the capability for precise ballistic trajectories. This would need better positioning, accelerometers, and meteorological radars and would also enable fully autonomous landings (if the plane can be aware of air densities and speeds around it, it can nail the landing even with wind gusts).
Wait what? If your landings are a ballistic trajectory, kindly step away from that stick ;)
And that's kind of the point - nobody except the few planes that fly parabolic trajectories needs this. So good luck mandating something affecting all of aviation with no practical use except for a handful of flights.
Autoland already exists. And can handle crosswinds up to 25kts. It's just that using them is an incredibly intense task - your reaction time to fix mistakes is a bit short.
That's why most landings are still manual, unless visibility is so bad that you have no choice.
(Also, the idea that meteorological radar could give you enough info about air density to preemptively handle air gusts is... a bold future)