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Boom XB-1 First Supersonic Flight [video]

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Re: Boom XB-1 First Supersonic Flight [video]

#491

Post by Retric »

brookst wrote: post #471
Retric wrote: post #283

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s fine to have multiple aims, but asking for investments without trying to be profitable is fraud.

That’s… not true at all. Cooking books and falsifying projections is fraud. Asking for investments with a clear disclaimer that the goal is a social good that won’t be profitable? If that’s fraud, then every major arts institution everywhere is guilty.

If you want money to provide a social good without the expectation that the money will be paid back, you're asking for a donation. You can also ask for money as a loan, fee for service, etc.

But an actual investment isn’t “investing in our community” it’s asking for money in exchange for to potential to gain more money etc.

Re: Boom XB-1 First Supersonic Flight [video]

#492

Post by CrI0gen »

1970-01-01 wrote: post #484
fryd_w wrote: post #449

Boom’s real challenge isn’t just showing they can go supersonic—it’s designing an engine and airframe combo that can operate at scale, hit reasonable ticket prices, and address stricter environmental policies than Concorde ever faced. The XB-1 proves they’re capable of building a small supersonic jet, but the gap between a funded prototype and a viable passenger fleet is enormous. Unless they can tackle those regulat…

>hit reasonable ticket prices There's much more to this. Their biggest competition may be cheaper Meta headsets paired via Starlink. Why travel as fast as possible when you can simply be there instantly for a fraction of the cost?

I really don't think that will be competition at all. People like to travel and the demand is there for faster international flights. For business travel, people either prefer to go in person or have to be in person. Also with time zone differences, virtual meetings require one party to often have to meet at odd times. The ticket price probably will be higher than what most people want to spend for vacation, but there will still be plenty of people willing to pay.

Re: Boom XB-1 First Supersonic Flight [video]

#494

Post by johncalvinyoung »

echoangle wrote: post #477
metacritic12 wrote: post #465

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would say the critics are already on average proven wrong in the sense that they were betting on something that had a prior of 90% chance of being true. And now those odds might be say 50%. If they were betting people, they would have lost half their money already, while the people betting it would come true have already made 4x. In that competitive sense, they're already wrong. It takes little skill to predict som…

You think there’s now a 50% chance of boom bringing access to supersonic air travel to everyone? I’ll give them 10%.

Probably optimism talking, but I'd put Boom's chances of bringing to market an airliner capable of supersonic travel at equal-to-first-class-ticket-prices at 60%.

Now I'd put their wilder hopes of eventually taking over the subsonic economy market at considerably below 1%.

But I'm hopeful for that $5-10k ticket to London within the next twenty years.

Re: Boom XB-1 First Supersonic Flight [video]

#495

Post by johncalvinyoung »

tiffanyh wrote: post #398

> Boom revealed the final production design of Overture, which is slated to roll out in 2025 and carry its first passengers by 2029. How is Boom tracking to their timelines? https://news.aa.com/news/news-details/2022/American-Airlines...

They haven't updated those predictions publicly in a little while. Definitely a huge setback from Rolls-Royce dropping out, and putting together the coalition that's developing the Symphony engine. Latest I've seen on Twitter is Blake Scholl stating the first full-size engine core should be making thrust by end of 2025.

I'm guessing rollout realistically is more like 2029-2030... but even that is a tall order. Unless, of course, they're a lot farther ahead on Overture development generally than they've revealed.

Re: Boom XB-1 First Supersonic Flight [video]

#496

Post by runako »

1970-01-01 wrote: post #484
fryd_w wrote: post #449

Boom’s real challenge isn’t just showing they can go supersonic—it’s designing an engine and airframe combo that can operate at scale, hit reasonable ticket prices, and address stricter environmental policies than Concorde ever faced. The XB-1 proves they’re capable of building a small supersonic jet, but the gap between a funded prototype and a viable passenger fleet is enormous. Unless they can tackle those regulat…

>hit reasonable ticket prices There's much more to this. Their biggest competition may be cheaper Meta headsets paired via Starlink. Why travel as fast as possible when you can simply be there instantly for a fraction of the cost?

> paired via Starlink

What advantage does Starlink provide here? Isn't it a higher-latency, slower connection than most people have access to at home?

Re: Boom XB-1 First Supersonic Flight [video]

#497

Post by Animats »

mppm wrote: post #430
Animats wrote: post #379

It's nice, but it's basically Scaled Composites, Rutan's old company, building a supersonic fighter plane sized aircraft. That's what Scaled Composites does - build little airplanes as test vehicles. Not always little; they built Stratolaunch. There have been many supersonic bizjet projects.[1] Spike [2] seems to be the only one other than Boom still alive. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supersonic_business_jet [2…

This is fascinating. Do you have more info about the Rutan connection?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burt_Rutan

Re: Boom XB-1 First Supersonic Flight [video]

#498

Post by hnaccount_rng »

michaelt wrote: post #439
throwaway2037 wrote: post #415

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Concorde at least made more money than it cost to operate (and maintain). This overlooks development costs. Wiki says: > Delays and cost overruns increased the programme cost to £1.5–2.1 billion in 1976, (£11–16 billion in 2023). That is an astonishing price for 20 aeroplanes!

£16 billion in inflation-adjusted development costs is peanuts. You should look at the costs of the F-35 :)

But of the F-35 there are >1000 planes to amortise the costs over. Which is two orders of magnitude larger than the concorde

Re: Boom XB-1 First Supersonic Flight [video]

#499

Post by mrguyorama »

michaelt wrote: post #437
throwaway2037 wrote: post #414

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is Boom aiming to be faster than the Concorde? I don't think so. Their website says: > Overture will carry 64-80 passengers at Mach 1.7 Concorde flew NYC LON in 3.5 hours. I guess Boom will fly the route in about 4 hours. Also, regular commercial flights on NYC LON are currently 7 hours. Also, using Google Flights, I priced LHR JFK on first class about T+1month for 7 days (Mon->Mon). It is about 5.3K USD round trip.…

> Are people forgetting about how incredibly loud is a sonic boom? It is unlikely that it will get rights to fly over land, just like the Concorde. Remember a few years back when the Canadian-made Bombardier C-Series was selling well, so Boeing got their allies in the US government to impose a 300% tax on them as an "America First" policy? Well, the rules around sonic booms were similar. Were there sonic booms? Sure.…

>But the real reason for the ban was that they were foreign-made sonic booms.

You are wrong.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oklahoma_City_sonic_boom_tests

This was done to prepare people and gauge the reaction to BOEING sonic booms, for the SST. Everything about a supersonic future was scuttled when it became obvious that people clearly suffered when planes flew supersonic above them.

Keep in mind that the US Air Force still does not go supersonic over populated areas except when absolutely necessary, like during 9/11.

This study mind you was done with SCHEDULED sonic booms. Now imagine, instead of being able to set your clock to a loud, disruptive noise and plan around it, you must deal with completely unpredictable and variable EXPLOSION of sharp noise (130ish decibels is standing 100m from a jumbo jet as it spools up or a trumpet being blasted directly into your ear from a couple feet away)

People already hate the noise of cities when that noise is an occasional quiet siren heard from a mile away a few times a day. Imagine instead if the noise was completely unpredictable explosions. Also imagine you can't move out of the city to get away from it, because the sound blankets an entire flight corridor.

Unless NASA finds a way to magically evaporate all the energy in a sonic boom such that it makes almost no noise at ground level, we would have to literally depopulate mile wide corridors of the US just so a bunch of stupidly rich people can get from NY to LA in an hour? Nah

Re: Boom XB-1 First Supersonic Flight [video]

#500

Post by mrguyorama »

SideburnsOfDoom wrote: post #450
throwaway2037 wrote: post #414

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is Boom aiming to be faster than the Concorde? I don't think so. Their website says: > Overture will carry 64-80 passengers at Mach 1.7 Concorde flew NYC LON in 3.5 hours. I guess Boom will fly the route in about 4 hours. Also, regular commercial flights on NYC LON are currently 7 hours. Also, using Google Flights, I priced LHR JFK on first class about T+1month for 7 days (Mon->Mon). It is about 5.3K USD round trip.…

> Are people forgetting about how incredibly loud is a sonic boom? One of the unique selling points of their proposed aircraft is that it won't be so loud: > Boom says Overture will be a lot quieter than Concorde and the supersonic military aircraft that were flying at the time the FAA ban https://www.freethink.com/energy/boom-supersonic-flight

That's a claim without evidence. A sonic boom is a direct outcome of moving through the air faster than the air can move through itself.

How have they demonstrated that they know how to cause quieter sonic booms?

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