Misleading title. Boeing doesn't make aircraft engines. This is a GE Aviation design.
Which happens to first see service in the Boeing 777X, but there's no reason to assume it couldn't go into other airframes or even other manufacturer's aircraft.
To attribute it to Boeing like that makes no rational sense. More information on GE's site:
The NYT has done reasonably, if not perfectly, on surveillance and cryptography topics I know a great deal about. It's substantially better than The Guardian. Also: the quality of the NYT's reporting is far better than any other news outlet: an NYT story is likely to have better sourcing than any competing story.
As a long-time NYT reader, I can't speak to whether they are better than other new sources, but in areas that I know well, they generally get it wrong, at times leaving vital information out. At other times, they have done well, when they have jouralnsts who are also specialist write articles. For example, some of the articles on nuclear power are co-written by a PhD in physics, but oddly it seems like he is not a contributor on all articles about nuclear power.
Many of the medical articles are not full of complete information or an understanding of healthcare and public health.
Also, many stories on Israel are lacking context and completeness perhaps in some attempts to be "balanced." For example, the NYT does not discuss that the current Fatah Palestinian administration names childrens schools and streets after terrorists. They don't bring up enough that Fatah pays money to the families of terrorists, both dead and those in Israeli jails. That money they use to pay for terrorists comes from American taxpayers.
Well, for example, many claim that Israel is not ready for peace, but the reality is that since Fatah is still naming children's schoolhouses and streets after terrorists (including the mastermind of the Munich Olympics Massacre (see Spielberg's Munich) and that they are using US funds to pay for families of terrorists in prison they clearly back terror instead of being against it. Until the Palestinians demonstrate their steadfastness against terror, there can be no peace. Also American don't want their tax money funding terrorists.
That's a reason why it's important to you that the Palestinians not openly support terrorism. But that's not what I'm asking. I'm asking: can you show us an example of an NYT story about the conflict (or any other aspect of Palestine/Israeli relations) in which those details were needed but absent? It would help to have an idea of what those absent details do to a specific story.
So, the GE9x is a super-high-bypass turbofan that makes unusually heavy use of composites and additive manufacturing techniques, and gains about 10.5 inches in fan diameter (and might shed some pounds) over the GE90 parent design currently used on most 777s. I don't know where Wired is getting the 148in figure - duct or nacelle diameter, maybe. It's right for a 737's fuselage, so maybe the writer took a metaphorical statement as literal. But that's not an unusual size for an engine on a 777, and if you've seen one of these big widebody twins alongside its narrowbody elder cousin - or, better yet, superimposed, as in [1] - you know that it's not really a surprise to hear that the engines of the former are comparable in diameter to the fuselage of the latter.
Wired's really gone down the clickbait hole in the last few years - not that it was ever as substantial as it liked to make itself out, but still disappointing to see.
I flew for about two years before ever seeing a widebody in person. I didn't even see the aircraft first, just an impossibly tall vertical stabilizer standing in solitude over the far side of a terminal that I knew was full of other aircraft. Serious WTF moment.
It's embarrassing that Boeing is still making 737 variants. The first flight of a 737 was over 50 years ago. Yes, most of the systems have been upgraded, but it still has the same small fuselage diameter. Patrick Smith, who's flown both and writes "Ask the Pilot", complains that Boeing discontinued the 757 and continued the 737 instead of developing something better. [1] From his perspective, the 737 is underpowered, has too-high takeoff and landing speeds, and doesn't fly as well as the more modern aircraft. Boeing says they need to make at least 1500 aircraft of a new model to break even, and don't think they can sell that many of something in 737 size.
> From his perspective, the 737 is underpowered, has too-high takeoff and landing speeds, and doesn't fly as well as the more modern aircraft.
"Right sizing" and fuel economy are massive factors in aviation. The 737 clearly fits the niche that airlines are looking for more so than the 757.
It's the same reason Honda Civics sell so we'll compared to more powerful/larger vehicles.
Anecdotally there is a lot of buzz in the airport world over the CS-100 right now due to the potential impact on airport noise due to the stage 5 engines and recent DAL order.
Agreed. The 757-200 isn't much larger than a 737-900ER. The 757 has better payload/range and a higher cruising speed. The downside of the 757 is that it has a heavier empty weight, and uses significantly more fuel.
For routes that have thin margins and relatively low passenger loads, the 737 makes a lot of sense.
For similar reasons, the Embraer 175 is popular with regional airlines. The CS100 [0] would compete for orders with the newer Embraer E2 [1] series.
I think it's fair to say that neither passengers nor the airlines care whether the 737 cockpit is cramped.
I don't love flying in 737s. Although I'm not sure 757s are all that much better. But the link sorta points to the basic issue. Upgraded 737s mostly do the workhorse job at a reasonable level. Building a new airframe for that space would be really expensive and would have to clearly surpass the 737 economics.
It's embarrassing that manufacturers are still making computers with silicon chips in them. The first silicon chip was over 50 years ago. Yes, most of the components and surrounding systems have been upgraded, but it still has the same basic material.
(etc., etc. -- "old" does not mean "bad"; the 757 is a perennial example of people claiming to want something they don't really want; and the 737 is a proven, successful design, so there's absolutely no "embarrassment" in the fact that it's still being manufactured and flown)
> It's embarrassing that manufacturers are still making computers with silicon chips in them.
You might even zoom out a bit more and go with, "It's embarrassing that manufacturers are still making ATX cases". Just as ATX cases have been able to accommodate several generations of computing, modern 737s are effectively different aircraft than early 737s even though they share common properties.
Possibly related: every 737 variant ever made is certified under the same FAA type certification. It's on at least revision 58: http://www.b737.org.uk/a16we.pdf
I have read on forums (but don't know enough to confidently claim personally) that Boeing changes as little as possible between 737 generations to keep everything under that same certificate. And that the 737 MAX would never pass certification as a brand new airplane; instead it's just considered a new variant of a 49 year old plane (and largely grandfathered into those regulations)
When I first flew the 777 about seven years ago I was totally awestruck by the size of the engines.
I flew with Qatar Airways, and in Doha they had a mobile staircase plus a bus, and with business class the entrance was just a few meters ahead of the engine. Or at at least it felt that way.
Seems like the diameter of the 777X engine is just a tiny bit larger than the old 777 engine: 339 cm vs 325 cm.
From my old flying days, I remember everyone talking about how the engine nacelles on the original model 777's were almost exactly the same diameter as the fuselage barrel on a 737.
That one fact really brought home to me what a huge beast the 777 was...
Another standout from my chat with the engineers that day, was the fact that each individual fan blade on the 777 engine was worth far more than my car... I think it was almost the equivalent cost of 24 Porsches spinning around that initial stage of the engine - let alone all the compressor and turbine stage blades behind that!
I watched a documentary on GE not that long ago, it wasn't anything new, probably 10 year old or so.
Anyway, one of the things that really stood out to me was that GE has a command center where they are able to monitor the performance of all their engines in near real time, as they are flying throughout the world. All of their (newer, I assume) engines have build in data links that call home to the control center.
This obviously allows them to see issues really quickly and solve problems nearly before they happen.
It just struck me as one of those things that makes perfect sense, but I never really thought that much about it before seeing it.
I'm surprised I haven't seen more of this in automobiles these days, (maybe Tesla?) but I can't imagine it will be long before it's common place.
There would of course be privacy concerns, but it's something that I could live with in order prevent break downs or things of that nature.
Rolls Royce does this too for their aircraft engines.
The big difference vs automobiles is that most airlines buy their planes but only lease the engines. GE and Rolls Royce monitor the engines at all times because the own them and are responsible for them at all times.
This is a very impressive piece of technology. Coupled with a 777-9, a 2 engine plane can have nearly the same number of passengers as the 4 engine 747.
A GE exec told me that 80% of this technology makes up the electric power generators and that one of these units can power 300,000 homes.
40 comments
[ 2.6 ms ] story [ 66.2 ms ] threadWhich happens to first see service in the Boeing 777X, but there's no reason to assume it couldn't go into other airframes or even other manufacturer's aircraft.
To attribute it to Boeing like that makes no rational sense. More information on GE's site:
https://www.geaviation.com/commercial/engines/ge9x-commercia...
Many of the medical articles are not full of complete information or an understanding of healthcare and public health.
Also, many stories on Israel are lacking context and completeness perhaps in some attempts to be "balanced." For example, the NYT does not discuss that the current Fatah Palestinian administration names childrens schools and streets after terrorists. They don't bring up enough that Fatah pays money to the families of terrorists, both dead and those in Israeli jails. That money they use to pay for terrorists comes from American taxpayers.
Wired's really gone down the clickbait hole in the last few years - not that it was ever as substantial as it liked to make itself out, but still disappointing to see.
[1] http://imgproc.airliners.net/photos/airliners/2/0/5/0881502....
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Electric_GE90#GE9X
http://www.newequipment.com/sites/newequipment.com/files/ge9...
https://www.aviationcv.com/aviation-blog/2016/worlds-biggest...
[1] http://www.askthepilot.com/757-v-737/
"Right sizing" and fuel economy are massive factors in aviation. The 737 clearly fits the niche that airlines are looking for more so than the 757.
It's the same reason Honda Civics sell so we'll compared to more powerful/larger vehicles.
Anecdotally there is a lot of buzz in the airport world over the CS-100 right now due to the potential impact on airport noise due to the stage 5 engines and recent DAL order.
For routes that have thin margins and relatively low passenger loads, the 737 makes a lot of sense.
For similar reasons, the Embraer 175 is popular with regional airlines. The CS100 [0] would compete for orders with the newer Embraer E2 [1] series.
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bombardier_CSeries
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embraer_E-Jet_E2_family
I don't love flying in 737s. Although I'm not sure 757s are all that much better. But the link sorta points to the basic issue. Upgraded 737s mostly do the workhorse job at a reasonable level. Building a new airframe for that space would be really expensive and would have to clearly surpass the 737 economics.
(etc., etc. -- "old" does not mean "bad"; the 757 is a perennial example of people claiming to want something they don't really want; and the 737 is a proven, successful design, so there's absolutely no "embarrassment" in the fact that it's still being manufactured and flown)
You might even zoom out a bit more and go with, "It's embarrassing that manufacturers are still making ATX cases". Just as ATX cases have been able to accommodate several generations of computing, modern 737s are effectively different aircraft than early 737s even though they share common properties.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boeing_757#Specifications https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boeing_737#Specifications
I have read on forums (but don't know enough to confidently claim personally) that Boeing changes as little as possible between 737 generations to keep everything under that same certificate. And that the 737 MAX would never pass certification as a brand new airplane; instead it's just considered a new variant of a 49 year old plane (and largely grandfathered into those regulations)
I flew with Qatar Airways, and in Doha they had a mobile staircase plus a bus, and with business class the entrance was just a few meters ahead of the engine. Or at at least it felt that way.
Seems like the diameter of the 777X engine is just a tiny bit larger than the old 777 engine: 339 cm vs 325 cm.
That one fact really brought home to me what a huge beast the 777 was...
It just struck me as one of those things that makes perfect sense, but I never really thought that much about it before seeing it.
I'm surprised I haven't seen more of this in automobiles these days, (maybe Tesla?) but I can't imagine it will be long before it's common place. There would of course be privacy concerns, but it's something that I could live with in order prevent break downs or things of that nature.
The big difference vs automobiles is that most airlines buy their planes but only lease the engines. GE and Rolls Royce monitor the engines at all times because the own them and are responsible for them at all times.
A GE exec told me that 80% of this technology makes up the electric power generators and that one of these units can power 300,000 homes.
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1361920911...