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Boom takes the wraps off its supersonic Symphony engine design

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Re: Boom takes the wraps off its supersonic Symphony engine design

#61

Post by hef19898 »

whinvik wrote: post #51
rgmerk wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The point is that there isn’t progress on the most critical part of a viable aircraft - the engine. Some of us who weren’t born yesterday have seen this rodeo before, and when a startup aircraft manufacturer switches engines it tends to indicate their concept isn’t viable. The fact that Boom are proposing to build their own engine, rather than partnering with an established engine manufacturer, tends to suggest that…

Ok I will bite. Commercial engine manufacturers are also an oligopoly so they also have very little incentive to innovate like aircraft manufacturers. The only way to incentivize them is to bring a big pot of gold. I remember Boom tried but one of the engine manufacturers initially signed on then withdrew.

Both, aircrafy OEMs and engine OEMs, do innovate all the time. Their innovation is of the evolutionary instead of disruptive nature so.

And hey, Airbus and Boeing are flying their existings jets with SAF for quite a while now, Airbus did so with the A400M and the A330.

No idea why Boom thinks they can be an aircraft and an engine OEM at the same time when already one of things tends on the impossible side of things to begin with.

Re: Boom takes the wraps off its supersonic Symphony engine design

#62

Post by hef19898 »

mmustapic wrote: post #58
Adrig wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Innovation doesn't stop once you manage to make something fly. Aerodynamics simulations, science of materials, engine design or manufacturing innovation like metal 3D printing are some of the areas that can completely revolutionize how we look at previous problems.

Are they doing something like that? If true, how will this solve the main problems of supersonic commercial flights, that being cost, noise and pollution?

Magic start-up disruption, of course.

Re: Boom takes the wraps off its supersonic Symphony engine design

#63

Post by lajosbacs »

julienfr112 wrote: post #28
whinvik wrote: post #24

It's very disappointing to see how skeptical HN has become about new technology. Making aircrafts is hard, making supersonic aircraft even harder and making a new supersonic aircraft company hardest of all. That there's progress by Boom should be encouraged. Otherwise we are just saying that aircrafts will continue to be the domain of Airbus and Boeing only who don't have much incentive to innovate.

HN was very sceptical about blockchain/web3, and recent events show that HN was quite rightly so ...

Counterexample where HN was wrong: the famous Dropbox comment.

Re: Boom takes the wraps off its supersonic Symphony engine design

#64

Post by cm277 »

whinvik wrote: post #24

It's very disappointing to see how skeptical HN has become about new technology. Making aircrafts is hard, making supersonic aircraft even harder and making a new supersonic aircraft company hardest of all. That there's progress by Boom should be encouraged. Otherwise we are just saying that aircrafts will continue to be the domain of Airbus and Boeing only who don't have much incentive to innovate.

Hmm, all of these things are hard; they are also fairly easy compared to building your own jet engine. There are a handful of jet engine makers in the world, 2 or 3 that can build passenger-grade engines and 2-3 (small overlap) that can build supersonic jet engines.

The physics within a jet engine are basically unknowable. The material science is the hardest we have. The tolerances and margins for error are insane. I wanted Boom to succeed and even believed some of their hype, but this basically means they are dead.

Re: Boom takes the wraps off its supersonic Symphony engine design

#65

Post by jabl »

perihelions wrote: post #38

- "And it is built specifically for use with Sustainable Aviation Fuel, a cleaner alternative to ordinary jet fuel — albeit one that costs several times more right now." I've been thinking about this for a while, in the context of multiple different startups. There's this (anti)pattern I see repeatedly: a startup says they're doing something that's an obviously an overwhelmingly bad idea from a business sense, but th…

Sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) is a type of fuel that is ostensibly sustainable (however you define it), but fulfills all the requirements in the Jet A-1 specification. The idea being that they are completely interchangeable.

So it's just a marketing trick. They could just as well market it as "runs on standard jet fuel available at any airport worldwide". Ultimately it's up to the customer to decide what fuel they use.

Perhaps they are trying to attract investment from people who put wishful thinking (sustainable AND supersonic) ahead of common engineering sense.

Re: Boom takes the wraps off its supersonic Symphony engine design

#66

Post by kitd »

masklinn wrote: post #59
kitd wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not so. He is the one who made the original statement. The onus of proof is on him to show what is "completely made up". It's a fairly extreme statement after all.

No, the original statement is that there is “new technology” which HN is “skeptical of”. The evidentiary requirements for a dismissal are no higher than what they dismiss. Which in this case is a PR bit completely devoid of evidence, so 0. But if you’ re interested in evidence I actually scratched a bit at one of the names mentioned, and I can’t say I’m impressed: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33983419#3399687…

Sorry, but that wasn't his statement. It's quite clear that he states that what is presented as new technology is completely made up nonsense. He may be right, but he needs to show what in the article is completely made up nonsense so that we know if he is.

Re: Boom takes the wraps off its supersonic Symphony engine design

#67

Post by ulfw »

tmitchel2 wrote: post #43
4ndrewl wrote: post #17

Quoted post unavailable.

Interesting you say that, I look at a company like Arrival and think fantasy company, they don't show any of their manufacturing processes, instead doing robot dances. However, boom looks to be taking a modern but practical approach to their manufacturing and have a test plane almost ready to fly. Timelines are aggressive but if contend that wouldn't put it in fantasy land.

Test plan will fly with what engine?

Re: Boom takes the wraps off its supersonic Symphony engine design

#68

Post by constantcrying »

perihelions wrote: post #38

- "And it is built specifically for use with Sustainable Aviation Fuel, a cleaner alternative to ordinary jet fuel — albeit one that costs several times more right now." I've been thinking about this for a while, in the context of multiple different startups. There's this (anti)pattern I see repeatedly: a startup says they're doing something that's an obviously an overwhelmingly bad idea from a business sense, but th…

>I'm overlooking something obvious and reasonable

You are missing the point entirely. Boom builds planes, they don't operate them and they do not build the engines (Kratos does). Their capacity to make the plane use "clean" jet fuel is almost zero. The people who manufacture the engines and operate the planes are the ones who need to put in the effort and pay the costs, it is not Boom who has to care.

This is a pure PR move. They get some nice comments, but their effort to make this true is almost zero. They aren't saying the plane will not work with regular fuels, it definitely will. This is not a bad idea, simply because it basically isn't an idea at all.

Re: Boom takes the wraps off its supersonic Symphony engine design

#69

Post by cycomanic »

mmustapic wrote: post #56
whinvik wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes parts of it were solved decades ago but Boom is not doing exactly the same thing. Concorde for example had an afterburner.

Concorde used afterburners for take-off and while transitioning to supersonic, then it cruised at Mach 2 without afterburners. The thing with Boom is that they are saying "we are doing this new great thing", and it's not new, Concorde did it. How are they specifically going to be better than Concorde? Just not using afterburners during taking off? Are they going to be cheaper? How? Just by saying they will? That's wh…

On top of that nobody needs it. The issue is that supersonic jets are really anachronistic, it's the most wasteful way of flying and it doesn't even buy you much time for most distances because you have to fly subsonic over land.

Re: Boom takes the wraps off its supersonic Symphony engine design

#70

Post by jabl »

whinvik wrote: post #51
rgmerk wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The point is that there isn’t progress on the most critical part of a viable aircraft - the engine. Some of us who weren’t born yesterday have seen this rodeo before, and when a startup aircraft manufacturer switches engines it tends to indicate their concept isn’t viable. The fact that Boom are proposing to build their own engine, rather than partnering with an established engine manufacturer, tends to suggest that…

Ok I will bite. Commercial engine manufacturers are also an oligopoly so they also have very little incentive to innovate like aircraft manufacturers. The only way to incentivize them is to bring a big pot of gold. I remember Boom tried but one of the engine manufacturers initially signed on then withdrew.

Sure they have an incentive to innovate, namely taking market share from their competitors.

The reason why they want a big pot of gold is that developing a new competitive jet engine is frighteningly expensive. The established vendors, with decades of in-house knowhow, will spend a decade and billions of dollars on a new from scratch engine. It's just not a game where a VC-funded startup with a very limited runway can expect to be successful.

But sure, I'd be happy to be proven wrong. Not holding my breath waiting though.

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