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Boeing is making a long-term play for hypersonic travel
- sunstone 8y agoIt had better not be too long term because SpaceX has committed (the CEO, not Musk) to having 1.5 hour, door to door, travel between any two points on earth (with on of their space ports) within 10 years. All for the price of a first class ticket.
- avmich 8y agoIt would be interesting to learn how they are going to solve the problems of relatively high apogee orbits. For example, what's going to be done with space junk? If they are going to seriously compete with current airline industry, there are many flights and there are many objects to cross orbits with. Or what about levels of radiation in the middle of ballistic trajectory? Another question is of reliability at landing - Zarya spacecraft design was shelved in ~1985 because powered landing alone was deemed to risky - and that's for relatively infrequent government flights, not for passenger industry.
- greglindahl 8y agoThe CEO of SpaceX is Musk. Gwynne Shotwell is the COO and President.
- mabbo 8y agoCan anyone tell me what is more expensive about hypersonic jet travel? Fuel costs, I would imagine, are higher- wind resistance is a function of speed squared after all. But where else does the higher price come from? Are the jets just that much more expensive to build? If so, why?
- Something1234 8y agoIf you remember 1/2 mv^2 = KE from high school physics, then you'll realize just how bad it is. It an N^2 relationship, and that's really expensive. Faster you go the more it costs.
- nfg 8y agoI’m no expert by any means but one major factor is that the airframe is subjected to a lot of heat due to friction which can require exotic or expensive construction materials.
- rayiner 8y agoFuel costs are a lot higher. Concorde used four times as much fuel per passanger as a 747. Plane costs are higher—you need exotic materials and building techniques in the aircraft and engines to deal with the high temperatures. But what really gets you is the economics of building niche products. Even if the long run incremental cost diffefence isn’t that much (say double), only a tiny fraction of people will be willing to pay the premium. That means you might amortize your fixed development costs, which will be much higher of that of a conventional jet, over 1/100 as many planes. 1,500 747s were ever built, but just 20 concordes. The 787 cost $32 billion to develop. Amortizing that over just dozens instead of hundreds or thousands causes per-unit costs to explode.
- dx034 8y agoTo add to this, many of the most popular airports with business travellers (LHR, JFK, HKG) have restricted capacity. They'd have to use the same number of slots for a small supersonic plane as for a widebody flying that route otherwise. That can significantly increase cost per seat.
- 7952 8y agoThe engines are likely to be more elaborate than the turbofan you find on a jet liner. To get to Mach 5 you need to accelerate through different speeds and need an engine that works and is efficient enough at each speed. A turbojet works well at lower speeds but cannot go much above Mach 3 in its traditional form. A ramjet is efficient at high mach numbers but does not work at low speeds. One solution is to reconfigure the engine at different speeds, such as a variable cycle engine. Alternatively, some designs include precooling of intake air (sabre), or even a hybrid rocket/jet engine. But all these options are more complex and expensive.
- simonh 8y agoSo if this pans out, along with the supersonic passenger jet being developed by Boom, and maybe even SpaceX plans to use the BFR for super-fast long haul flights, what are the implications for the economics of conventional passenger jets? Right now they make a large fraction of their money from business class, but these new vehicles will take a fair chunk of that away. Doesn't this inevitably mean significantly higher economy class fares to keep the conventional planes viable?
- njarboe 8y agoSouthwest has no first class. All seats are the same. They do just fine and prices are low. They are probably the most profitable airline of all time in the US. That most airlines focus on first class/business class as their money maker means they really don't care much about the rest of the plane. Splitting business from economy might make both better? Who knows until it happens.
- simonh 8y agoNeither do a lot of other low cost regional carriers, but supersonics are mainly aimed at long haul international business.
- dx034 8y agoThe capacity of those jets will be tiny, even compared to current business class offerings. And they're likely to be more expensive so not everyone who can fly business can fly supersonic. What will be affected is First Class (which most airlines are already scaling back) but most importantly, private jets. Esp private jet sharing services (e.g. NetJets) will suffer if they can't offer supersonic flights.
- notahacker 8y agoThe trouble with scheduled services aiming to competing with private jets is that the private jets are much, much more flexible. If the next three hour flight to the relevant area of US is six hours away to a different city, any rich person in a rush is better off taking an nine hour bizjet flight to their preferred airport instead.
- amelius 8y agoI hope they will run on renewable energy ...
- melling 8y agoThe plane flies at 3800 mph. Assuming they eventually get approval to fly supersonic over land, NYC to Tokyo or Shanghai should also be doable in about 3 hours?
- growlist 8y agoI wonder if this is a defensive strategy as much as anything, what with the suborbital leisure/transport market apparently heating up. 20-30 years away is far enough that Boeing could use this venture to investigate broad concepts/supporting technologies thereby building up a war chest of promising capabilities, whilst still remanining sufficiently uncommitted to pivot rapidly should a potential competitor race ahead. One example might be Boeing's investment in Reaction Engines SABRE tech, which whilst speculative could prove to be a critically strategic piece of IP. https://www.reactionengines.co.uk/reaction-engines-secures-26-5m-investment-from-new-industrial-and-financial-investors/ https://www.reactionengines.co.uk/reaction-engines-secures-2...
- pfdietz 8y agoBoeing will never pay for this by themselves. It's an attempt to get $$$ from Uncle Sugar, just like the SST ferment back in the 1970s.
- akhatri_aus 8y agoWhat's wrong with that? Most new technologies come about in that way anyway. You wouldn't be on the internet today otherwise.
- pfdietz 8y agoI dispute that most new technologies come about in that way. More often, government jumps on bandwagons that have already started in the private sector, if the government gets involved at all. And often, when the government goes first, there's a damned good reason the private sector avoided it. The SST example is a good one. Back then, aircraft makers would only go ahead if it was a government program, because they knew the commercial case was deeply flawed. There was all sort of gnashing of teeth about money grubbing luddites in congress when funding was cut, but it turned out to have been the right thing to do.
- woodandsteel 8y agoRadical new technologies are generally based on scientific understanding that is the product of many decades of government-funded research. Also many new technologies were first developed by the military, such as the internet, the jet engine, sonar, nuclear power, the computer, and space rockets. Alas, the Republicans, who have an economic philosophy similar to yours, have been slashing government support of science, and so we can expect to fall behind the Chinese in it in the coming decades.
- pfdietz 8y agoThere's actually not good evidence that public funding of research has a positive economic impact (private R&D is another matter). https://lemire.me/blog/2013/02/26/does-academic-research-cause-economic-growth/ https://lemire.me/blog/2013/02/26/does-academic-research-cau...