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I came here expecting to see something about the A380. Completely wrong but not disappointed! The Stipa Caproni is definitely in a class of its own! p.s., A380

I came here expecting to see something about the A380. Completely wrong but not disappointed! The Stipa Caproni is definitely in a class of its own! p.s., A380s are nice inside but the outside hardly makes the heart sing. They remind me of the Spruce Goose. [0] [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hughes_H-4_Hercules https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hughes_H-4_Hercules

chasil 4y ago
A380s were a big bet that does not appear to have worked out. A few exponential increases in aircraft travelers could prove this wrong, and restart production, but that does not seem a near-term future. It was a noble effort, though.
- bobthepanda 4y ago
  The major issue is increased open skies agreements and better twin engine planes totally obviating a lot of hub-to-hub travel. The only real hubs with enough traffic to support a double deck plane are the massive Middle Eastern ones. Also, unlike the 747, the A380 is too heavy to be a freighter.
  - chasil 4y ago
    Interesting. I did not know that it wasn't designed with this flexibility. This seems short-sighted.
    - bobthepanda 4y ago
      The 747 was actually designed with this in mind from the get-go (hence the raised jumbo hump to allow front-nose loading), because the expectation was that they would not be in service very long until supersonic transports became the norm. The A380 is just too heavy when empty to carry much freight. It was already a struggle to find engines that could fly the thing, and for airports to upgrade runways to deal with its weight.
      - MomoXenosaga 4y ago
        Airports had to build new gates to service the A380. Ofcourse as it turns out very few routes can sustain 400-500 passengers. People want to fly directly to their destination- Amsterdam to Boston do not pass JFK.
  - bell-cot 4y ago
    > Also, unlike the 747, the A380 is too heavy to be a freighter. THIS. Peeking at Wikipedia - the Boeing 747-8F can carry 140 metric tons of freight. Vs. the A380's maximum payload is about 60% of that...in spite of having a empty weight almost 100 tons higher. You'd think the A380 was designed by a committee of 3rd-rate engineers, with pay proportional to the weight of their boondoggle...
    - bobthepanda 4y ago
      Airbus has always been a story of eventually competing in every Boeing segment as a matter of European pride. All indications were that four engines were going the way of the dodo. Boeing recognized this too and the 747-8 was more to distract Airbus than a serious next generation. No manufacturer is omnipotent though. Boring entirely ceded the midsize market segment to Airbus, so now reliable Boeing customers are replacing dated 757 and 767 aircraft with Airbus models.
      - themadturk 4y ago
        The feeling of a lot of people in Seattle is that the McDonnell-Douglas merger ruined Boeing. What had been a company run by engineers became a company run by bean-counters, and that has led to a certain lack of innovation in design. For instance, the 737 first flew in 1967, designed to be an airliner that could service small, even primitive airfields, and should have been retired decades ago. Instead it's been through four generations and 13 different models. (I'm a Boeing baby -- my parents met and married while both were employed at Boeing, and I'm really sad at what the company has become.)
      - lostlogin 4y ago
        > engines were going the way of the dodo. Boeing recognized this too and the 747-8 was more to distract Airbus than a serious next generation. Crediting Boeing with this intelligent move while they also stumbled though the 737 Max fiasco seems generous. However massive companies can multitask, so maybe I need to be more generous.
        4y ago
  - axiolite 4y ago
    > better twin engine planes totally obviating a lot of hub-to-hub travel. Yeah, but that was entirely predictable... There were twin-engine jets from both Boeing and Airbus flying trans-Atlantic, the 737 was a very popular aircraft, and the ETOPS rules went into effect in 1985, years before the very first steps in A380 development. The future direction of air travel was out there for any well-informed individuals in the industry to see.
    - bobthepanda 4y ago
      How far and how fast was always debatable though. Airbus was of the opinion that the composites and advances in material design that the 787 represented were not well-advised or going to work out, and they put their money where their mouth was. Also, a lot of it was due to LCCs and ULCCs eating legacy carriers' lunch. (The former exclusively uses tiny twin engines and the latter are the only operators of the large, hub-to-hub aircraft.) That model has proved more durable than some predictions, and even then that model hasn't always done fantastically; no long-haul LCC has worked out, despite the aircraft for such an operation technically existing.
- nawgz 4y ago
  I think the weight constraint must make it incredibly hard to fly outside of select routes; it is not trivial to build a runway which you can land and takeoff those bad boys from I can't see a world they ever build more of them in
  - hodgesrm 4y ago
    The big problem is filling the plane, not finding a suitable runway. That problem turned out not to be solvable.
dTal 4y ago
I'd say that reflects very well on the Spruce Goose, a design paradoxically well ahead of its time. I think it looks quite handsome.

chasil 4y ago

A380s were a big bet that does not appear to have worked out. A few exponential increases in aircraft travelers could prove this wrong, and restart production, but that does not seem a near-term future. It was a noble effort, though.

bobthepanda 4y ago
The major issue is increased open skies agreements and better twin engine planes totally obviating a lot of hub-to-hub travel. The only real hubs with enough traffic to support a double deck plane are the massive Middle Eastern ones. Also, unlike the 747, the A380 is too heavy to be a freighter.
- chasil 4y ago
  Interesting. I did not know that it wasn't designed with this flexibility. This seems short-sighted.
  - bobthepanda 4y ago
    The 747 was actually designed with this in mind from the get-go (hence the raised jumbo hump to allow front-nose loading), because the expectation was that they would not be in service very long until supersonic transports became the norm. The A380 is just too heavy when empty to carry much freight. It was already a struggle to find engines that could fly the thing, and for airports to upgrade runways to deal with its weight.
    - MomoXenosaga 4y ago
      Airports had to build new gates to service the A380. Ofcourse as it turns out very few routes can sustain 400-500 passengers. People want to fly directly to their destination- Amsterdam to Boston do not pass JFK.
- bell-cot 4y ago
  > Also, unlike the 747, the A380 is too heavy to be a freighter. THIS. Peeking at Wikipedia - the Boeing 747-8F can carry 140 metric tons of freight. Vs. the A380's maximum payload is about 60% of that...in spite of having a empty weight almost 100 tons higher. You'd think the A380 was designed by a committee of 3rd-rate engineers, with pay proportional to the weight of their boondoggle...
  - bobthepanda 4y ago
    Airbus has always been a story of eventually competing in every Boeing segment as a matter of European pride. All indications were that four engines were going the way of the dodo. Boeing recognized this too and the 747-8 was more to distract Airbus than a serious next generation. No manufacturer is omnipotent though. Boring entirely ceded the midsize market segment to Airbus, so now reliable Boeing customers are replacing dated 757 and 767 aircraft with Airbus models.
    - themadturk 4y ago
      The feeling of a lot of people in Seattle is that the McDonnell-Douglas merger ruined Boeing. What had been a company run by engineers became a company run by bean-counters, and that has led to a certain lack of innovation in design. For instance, the 737 first flew in 1967, designed to be an airliner that could service small, even primitive airfields, and should have been retired decades ago. Instead it's been through four generations and 13 different models. (I'm a Boeing baby -- my parents met and married while both were employed at Boeing, and I'm really sad at what the company has become.)
    - lostlogin 4y ago
      > engines were going the way of the dodo. Boeing recognized this too and the 747-8 was more to distract Airbus than a serious next generation. Crediting Boeing with this intelligent move while they also stumbled though the 737 Max fiasco seems generous. However massive companies can multitask, so maybe I need to be more generous.
      - 4y ago
- axiolite 4y ago
  > better twin engine planes totally obviating a lot of hub-to-hub travel. Yeah, but that was entirely predictable... There were twin-engine jets from both Boeing and Airbus flying trans-Atlantic, the 737 was a very popular aircraft, and the ETOPS rules went into effect in 1985, years before the very first steps in A380 development. The future direction of air travel was out there for any well-informed individuals in the industry to see.
  - bobthepanda 4y ago
    How far and how fast was always debatable though. Airbus was of the opinion that the composites and advances in material design that the 787 represented were not well-advised or going to work out, and they put their money where their mouth was. Also, a lot of it was due to LCCs and ULCCs eating legacy carriers' lunch. (The former exclusively uses tiny twin engines and the latter are the only operators of the large, hub-to-hub aircraft.) That model has proved more durable than some predictions, and even then that model hasn't always done fantastically; no long-haul LCC has worked out, despite the aircraft for such an operation technically existing.
nawgz 4y ago
I think the weight constraint must make it incredibly hard to fly outside of select routes; it is not trivial to build a runway which you can land and takeoff those bad boys from I can't see a world they ever build more of them in
- hodgesrm 4y ago
  The big problem is filling the plane, not finding a suitable runway. That problem turned out not to be solvable.

dTal 4y ago

I'd say that reflects very well on the Spruce Goose, a design paradoxically well ahead of its time. I think it looks quite handsome.