3 ms·

True, but you'd need, at minimum, a well-trained crew to operate. The catapult settings vary by take-off weight. Who manages that? Does each airline run their

True, but you'd need, at minimum, a well-trained crew to operate. The catapult settings vary by take-off weight. Who manages that? Does each airline run their own crew (contract) as they do other ground services? Or does the airport run it? The airframes would have be heavier, beefed up to take that load. FWIW, the Navy version of the F-35 weighs ~5000lbs more than the AF version's 29000 dry weight (granted, that's also additional folding wing changes). It also costs about 20% more per unit. Anyways, it's all certainly possible. Just impractical without a real need. But catapult launch ballistic passenger gliders would be pretty cool.

M95D 2mo ago
Take off weight is calculated anyway. Airport crew could do it based on calculated weight comunicated by pilots. With current technology it could even be automated - pull the airplane 10 m at a fixed (low) power setting, determine how fast it accelerated, calculate mass, increase power accordingly for the rest of the takeoff distance. Even an Arduino could do it. Or simply apply the maximum force supported by the airplane's attachment point (front landing gear) no matter what the weight is. Airframes would probably not need much strenghtening. I expect that the forces from wheel breaks are aprox. the same. PS: With a catapult / winch launch, the MTOW could probably be increased a little - more passengers and cargo for the same flight costs.