How Big Is the Airplane That Matches the Width of an 8-Lane Roadway?

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The discussion highlights the impressive size of modern aircraft, particularly the Airbus A380, which is compared to an eight-lane roadway and noted for its massive engines. There is a debate on the future of air travel, with some arguing that large aircraft will dominate due to their efficiency in long-haul flights, while others believe smaller commuter airlines will thrive, as evidenced by the success of EasyJet and Ryanair. Comparisons are made to historical aircraft like the Spruce Goose, emphasizing the engineering achievements of both past and present. The conversation also touches on the infrastructure investments airports are making to accommodate these large planes. Overall, the future of aviation seems to hinge on balancing the demand for large jets with the potential growth of smaller carriers.
  • #51
Enjoy that F-14 video while you can. Almost all of the squadrons are retiring them. I believe there is only one active squadron left. Bummer.
 
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  • #52
FredGarvin said:
Enjoy that F-14 video while you can. Almost all of the squadrons are retiring them. I believe there is only one active squadron left. Bummer.


Can you hear this outside your window that far way fred?

NOOOOOOOO
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
OO!
! :mad:
 
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  • #54
The nice thing about my school is that it's on the flight path to Andrews AFB. So every day if you look up you can see Marine One doing circles around campus.. Or you can see the blue Hueys that VIP condy, Rummy or Cheney doing circles. I don't know why they have to sit there and do circle after circle around campus, I guess its because they are trying to look down girls shirts from up there. Or every once in a while you can see KC-135 tankers on their approach. Oh yeah, and then there's the new's choppers, and the Maryland state police helicopter too. That place is literally buzzing with helicopters all the time. Saw a Chinook the other day too, and a few black hawks. Oh, and there is a small airpark right next door too, so you can hear the cessnas and bonanza's taking off on full power as they climb out on departure.
 
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  • #55
cyrusabdollahi said:
That place is literally buzzing with helicopters all the time.
Pure heaven!

cyrusabdollahi said:
Saw a Chinook the other day too...
The only true aircraft worth even mentioning. One must make sure he genuflects when you say that holiest of names.
 
  • #56
I get Chinook's going over work quite often, they're bloody awesome machines. Not quite as scary as the time I was rock climbing in the French Alps one summer evening, and an Apache ascended in front of the sunset, silhouetting its arsenal, and pointing straight at me! Possibly one of the most menacing shapes mankind has ever designed!
 
  • #57
I actually had quite a few opportunities to fly with a bunch of the British chaps from the 18th squadron when I was stationed in Germany. Those guys knew how to have a good time after an airshow. The last time I saw any of them was the Air Tatoo in Middle Wallop in 1990. Good times.

BTW...For all of you aircraft junkies...I got to stand next to, under and near the only existing XB-70 in existence today (amongst other historic aircraft). Talk about a great day.
 
  • #58
FredGarvin said:
I actually had quite a few opportunities to fly with a bunch of the British chaps from the 18th squadron when I was stationed in Germany. Those guys knew how to have a good time after an airshow. The last time I saw any of them was the Air Tatoo in Middle Wallop in 1990. Good times.

BTW...For all of you aircraft junkies...I got to stand next to, under and near the only existing XB-70 in existence today (amongst other historic aircraft). Talk about a great day.
Cool! :cool:

Also, for those who want to follow a particular flight (US I think) - http://flightaware.com/

They were tracking Continental Flight 3161, an ERJ that blew two tires on the left landing gear during takeoff in Houston today. The plane landed safely at 06:22PM CDT (1922 EDT).
 
  • #59
FredGarvin said:
BTW...For all of you aircraft junkies...I got to stand next to, under and near the only existing XB-70 in existence today (amongst other historic aircraft). Talk about a great day.
Sweet.

When I was in Elvira NY, I had the chance to go for a flight in a B-17. They were just going through their pre-flight, and they had an extra seat. I couldn't justify the $350 to the wife though.:cry:
 
  • #60
DaveC426913 said:
Sweet.

When I was in Elvira NY, I had the chance to go for a flight in a B-17. They were just going through their pre-flight, and they had an extra seat. I couldn't justify the $350 to the wife though.:cry:
Ouch! Yeah, wives are funny about things like that. :rolleyes:
 
  • #61
FredGarvin said:
Enjoy that F-14 video while you can. Almost all of the squadrons are retiring them. I believe there is only one active squadron left. Bummer.

I wonder if its possible to buy retired airplanes before they end up in Arizona's scrap yard
 
  • #62
Probably not. Military hardware like that generally has to be decades obsolete and possibly even non-functioning to be legal for civilians to own.
 
  • #63
DaveC426913 said:
Sweet.

When I was in Elvira NY, I had the chance to go for a flight in a B-17. They were just going through their pre-flight, and they had an extra seat. I couldn't justify the $350 to the wife though.:cry:
My wife would know better...she knows there are only a couple of areas that she has no chance of swaying my intentions. Aircraft are number one.

P.S. Astro...you need to clean out your mailbox. It's full!
 
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  • #64
russ_watters said:
Probably not. Military hardware like that generally has to be decades obsolete and possibly even non-functioning to be legal for civilians to own.
I am not aware of any private citizen owning a supersonic military aircraft, and I am sure that there would be limitations on what engines would be available.

One might have better luck buing an old Russian or Chinese MiG, or the like. Speaking of which - http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/4962466.stm
Chinese man buys MiG through eBay

A Chinese businessman has bought an old MiG-21f fighter jet for nearly $25,000 (£14,000) on eBay to decorate his office, a Chinese newspaper reports.

Zhang Cheng bought the Soviet-made jet from a seller in the United States, where it is said to be in excellent condition though last flown in 1995.

And back in 1994 - http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/lancashire/3989019.stm
Vulcan bomber sale nets £15,000 - The former RAF nuclear bomber put up for auction on the internet has been sold for £15,000 to a pub landlord.
I'd love to have a Vulcan bomber. :biggrin:


IIRC, there are some old guys like the Lockheed T-33/F-80 Shooting Star and the T-34 around, and perhaps some F-86/F-100/F-102's, maybe even some F-104's. One might be able to get one, but one would probably have to be a member of the Confederate Air Force or Air National Guard.

P.S. Astro...you need to clean out your mailbox. It's full!
It's open again.
 
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  • #65
Astronuc said:
I am not aware of any private citizen owning a supersonic military aircraft, and I am sure that there would be limitations on what engines would be available.
There's a guy down in Texas who owns one of the world's largest private collections of aircraft. He had an astonishing number and variety. Can't remember a thing about him though.
 
  • #66
The researcher I worked for at UMIST went away quite often to try and source jet engines for the Aerospace Engineering department. We had a few Rolls Royce Trents around the place, but he had quite a lot of contacts.

I was impressed when he told me he'd been offered a Rolls Royce Olympus engine (ie Concorde) free of charge, disappointed when he turned it down due to lack of space; but I was absolutely gobsmacked when he returned from a business trip to China to tell me he'd been offered a Mig 25 for something like £4000!
 
  • #67
russ_watters said:
Probably not. Military hardware like that generally has to be decades obsolete and possibly even non-functioning to be legal for civilians to own.

That is mostly true. It is possible to buy a retired airframe from the air force, however it is usually just that the airframe, no engines, avionics, electrical/electronics, ect.
 
  • #69
I wonder if its possible to buy retired airplanes before they end up in Arizona's scrap yard
I'd like to take stuff from the scrapyards here. They got tanks and planes and some cool scientific equipment I hear. Illegal though.
 
  • #70
Astronuc said:
I'd love to have a Vulcan bomber. :biggrin:
Wow. A Vulcan? That is some serious history right there. I think there is only one flying in the world right now.

Any piece of government asset that people want to purchase has to go through a pretty lengthy "decommissioning" process. That is usually followed up by arranged auctions of some kind (at least for the stuff that I have ever been interested in). The thing about something like an F-14 is that they will keep a certain amount in mothballs for quite a while as a "just in case" measure. I haven't read anything about it, but I can not imagine that they will scrap all of them right off the bat.

I have heard stories of folks getting a hold of Chinese MiGs with armament still in them. Even so, I couldn't afford the space to park something let alone refurbish and maintain one (not to mention fill the tanks).
 
  • #71
That looks really cool Wolram. I would love to fly in any of those. I think the Buccanneer would be my first choice. I love that era of aircraft.
 
  • #73
Talk about mixed messages, that singapore airlines picture, the road markings read:

ZOOM
AHEAD
STOP
BUS
SLOW

Maybe that's what confused the driver...
 
  • #74
http://www.raf.mod.uk/downloads/wallpaper/typhoon_06_0800.jpg

Sex in the air

And this is a great shot:

sonic-boom.jpg
 
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  • #75
Cyrus,
That formation pic is pretty damned sweet. I can't imagine having that fly overhead.
 
  • #76
3trQN said:
sonic-boom.jpg

I have often seen and wondered about this shot. It is always listed as an amazingly-timed shot of a plane just as it's breaking the sound barrier.

Is that what we're seeing? Or is it merely a vapour effect from the shock wave (which still occurs at < Mach 1).

Anyone know for sure?
 
  • #77
It is water vapor condensing in the shock wave.
 
  • #78
There was a video at one of the sites posted early in this thread where you see that shock wave hanging around for several seconds on the pass of the plane. Probably you just have to stick around Mach 1 in the right kind of humid air...
 
  • #79
That's what I'm getting at. I know that wave sticks around. It flits in and out.

What I don't know is if it only occurs AT the sound barrier, or whether it merely requires the right conditions at subsonic speeds.
 
  • #80
a source said:
The clouds formed by the Prandtl-Glauert singularity are due to the near-sonic amplification of the pressure and temperature perturbations which naturally occur whenever air passes over any bump or object. Thus, an aircraft can fly at one-half or twice the speed of sound and generate no clouds. However, if the same aircraft flies at 0.95 or 1.05 times the speed of sound, the amplification implicit in (Pg2) may be enough to cause condensation in the low-pressure, low-temperature portions of the flow.

the source:
http://www.fluidmech.net/tutorials/sonic/prandtl-glauert-clouds.htm
 
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  • #81
Yeah. We've talked about that one before. Clausius pointed that out a while back. The aircraft doesn't need to be supersonic, but it does have to have established trans sonic speeds.
 
  • #82
Great pictures, guys. I loved that Tomcat routine. Thanks, all.
This is slightly off topic, but just in case anyone out there still doubts the ability of a camera to register a plane in flight:




http://img196.imageshack.us/img196/1954/b15wp.jpg

That, if anyone doesn't recognize it, is a high-velocity rifle bullet making it's escape from the back-side of a balloon.
 
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  • #83
Looks like a .22 at around 500fps. That still implies a shutter speed of about 10us (1/100,000th of a second), and/or a fast flash.
 
  • #84
I was going to suggest the http://ocw.mit.edu/OcwWeb/Physics/8-02Electricity-and-MagnetismSpring2002/VideoLectures/index.htm #22 has bullet shattering a bulb.
 
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  • #85
  • #86
FredGarvin said:
Yeah. We've talked about that one before. Clausius pointed that out a while back. The aircraft doesn't need to be supersonic ...
So, in terms of dispelling this myth, is it safe to say that this is NOT necessarily a pic of plane breaking the sound barrier?

FredGarvin said:
it does have to have established trans sonic speeds..."

What do you mean by this? You mean that, even if the plane is doing less than Mach 1.0, that the shock wave must still be transsonic to get that effect?


This leads me to believe that I'm just splitting hairs - that, give or take .05 Mach, this IS, for all intents and purposes, a pic of a plane breaking the sound barrier. That this could NOT be a pic of a plane doing, say Mach .9 or .8.
 
  • #87
So, in terms of dispelling this myth, is it safe to say that this is NOT necessarily a pic of plane breaking the sound barrier?

Yes, it is in the transonic region, that's all. Meaning the airplane is between mach 0.95-1.01 (ish) roughly. (It may or may not be breaking the sound barrier with the cloud formation)

This leads me to believe that I'm just splitting hairs - that, give or take .05 Mach, this IS, for all intents and purposes, a pic of a plane breaking the sound barrier.

Well, not really. This cloud does not visualize the shock wave of the flow. All it does is indicate the airplane is in the transonic region. If its flying below the speed of sound, it is not breaking the sound barrier.

As a final note:

Finally, it should be clear that Prandtl-Glauert condensation has nothing to do with "breaking the sound barrier" and is not a Star Trek-like "burst" through Mach one. An aircraft can generate a Prandtl-Glauert condensation cloud without ever exceeding the speed of sound.

Did you go through the link I provided you? It explains all this better than I or fred. (well, me at least)
 
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  • #88
cyrusabdollahi said:
Yes, it is in the transonic region, that's all. Meaning the airplane is between mach 0.95-1.01 (ish) roughly. (It may or may not be breaking the sound barrier with the cloud formation)
Somewhere there is a video of that - an F-14, I think, flying past a carrier at just under Mach 1, and as it flies through regions of slightly higher or lower humidity (remember, over the ocean, the air is always near saturation), the cloud comes and goes.

edit: found 'em: http://home.pacbell.net/ok3/

The F-14 video doesn't have sound, but the F-18 video does: no sonic boom, so the plane is just below the speed of sound, in the transonic region. The explanation on the website isn't very good, but on the F-4 pic, you can actually see where the shock waves come off the wing: near the area of maximum thickness on the top, and slightly further back on the bottom - the F-4 wing is not symetrical like many newer aircraft. The shock wave starts at the point of maximum thickness (where the air is moving the fastest and moves forward on the wing as the plane accelerates. If the plane doesn't accelerate, past the transonic region, the shock wave will just sit there on the wing and never move to the tip - making for an extremely bumpy ride.
 
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  • #89
Wow, that F-14 video is incredible!
 
  • #90
Not sure if my explanation was quite right about what moves where, but http://www.centennialofflight.gov/essay/Theories_of_Flight/Transonic_Flow/TH19G6.htm" is an illustration of it. The F-4 pic I mentioned above looks a lot like M=.9 sketch, with the supersonic (and therefore, lower pressure - causing condensation) region further forward above the wing than below).
 
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  • #91
berkeman said:
Looks like a .22 at around 500fps.
While I can't vouch for the speed, I can say that I've never seen a .22 rimfire bullet that looked like that. The closest that I've run across were Hornets or Yellowjackets, both of which are definitely supersonic. And I've seen very similar pictures where the bullet is clearly identifiable as a spire-point boattail hunting round. :-p
 
  • #92
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