The Concorde... an engineering marvel?

I am sick and tired reading comments like this;

- Concorde had been an engineering marvel second to none in the history of civil aviation
- Such a plane, Americans nor the Russians could match such a great technological feat, this was our space program.
- Americans have killed Concorde because they couldn't build one..and so forth..

I think these people are either ignorant, or people with inferiority complex who don't have the slightest idea about the subject..

In fact,the Americans have mastered the SST technology long before the Europeans in late 1950's XB-70 ,although a strategic bomber but almost the same size as Concorde incorporated technologies far ahead of Concorde..

Both Boeing and Lockeed SST projects would have a great success and superior to Concorde if the Congress had not stopped them in 1971.

People seem to forget that the SR-71 had been the greatest engineering achievement in aeronautics the world had ever seen.. Even today ,RollsRoyce and the others lacking the engineering skill and technological capacity to built an engine like Pratt&Whitney J58 (in fact nobody could)..

I think it was a great mistake to cancel the SST project in America in 1971 ..

The problem with an SST is the air travel market is demanding cheaper flights, not faster flights. Which is unfortunate for aviation enthusiasts, because big flying buses are kind of boring.

Lets address some of your comments here:

I am sick and tired reading comments like this;

Are these quotes you've heard in person .. Seem's like they came out of the daily press or from non official sources.

There will be people out there who want to make Concorde 'King' of the airways. Also others out there who want to stick in the knife to the US/Russia and show the world they aren't always top dog in the aviation world. So you can take or leave those statements at will!

As for:

- Concorde had been an engineering marvel second to none in the history of civil aviation

I don't see nothing wrong with that statement. Seems a fair thing to say as it was engineering marvel considering it took two governments to shell out the publics cash and make this project succeed. Then for BA to made it profitable. These guys deserve some bragging rights!

Both Boeing and Lockeed SST projects would have a great success and superior to Concorde if the Congress had not stopped them in 1971..

Well we won't know will we as it didn't get the 'GO' light.. Is this not a foolish outbreak of the inferiority complex. Mine is better than yours won't work here as yours never got in the air.

Poeple seem to forget that the SR-71 had been the greatest engineering achievement in aeronautics

Yes its one of the great aviation achievements. Won't disagree with that fact.

Even today ,Rolls Royce and the others lacking the engineering skill and technological capacity

RR have created some great aero engines in there time. I doubt they lack the skill to go ahead, just not the money or need to invest the time in coming up with a monster engine. There's no market for such a beast today.

Fact, Concorde flew and the SST didn`t. The Russian attempt flew and was used by NASA for high speed research. Curiously similar to Concorde!!!!!
RR lacking the skill and knowledge, that`s laughable.

As for politics stopping production of better aircraft, ever heard of the TSR-2? An aircraft that was (supposedly, as I don't know first hand) much better than the F-111, and would have seriously dented the US export market for that a/c, funding British aircraft development for years to come. Now the British aircraft industry has gone the same way as the car industry, all thanks to the Labour party.

Concorde solved the problems better than 'Concordski' which I believe was demoted to cargo, and (although this might be rumour-as I said I don't have any first-hand knowledge of the development of these a/c) the American version had trouble even keeping the paintwork on...

Of course the SR-71 was faster, but Concorde was a passenger a/c! That's a whole bunch of considerations that SR-71 didn't need to bother with.

Yes Catisfit, a sad story the TSR-2. The whole program was mismanaged. There was too much government interference. Do you know that the British ministry of defence even wanted a say in the design of the cockpit! They had 4 hour meetings to decide where a single switch would be placed, always getting it wrong!

You just can`t build aircraft like that. The Labour government wanted to buy the "cheaper" F-1 eleven. The RAF eventually got the Phantom. A great aircraft, then put british Spey engines into it just to appease public opinion. They were not the right engines for the Phantom in my opinion. The original J-79s` were much more efficient and powerful at the high altitudes required for an interceptor. Eventually the Tornado fulfilled the TSR-2 role. 15 years later the Tornado wasn`t considered as good as the TSR would have been! It is interesting to note that when American test pilots flew the TSR, they were very, very impressed by it. They commented that the Brits can come up with wonderful designs and the superior American management and industrial application process should build the things!

One good thing that came from the TSR were its` engines, the Bristol Olympus units. These were developed a lot by RR and SNECMA and used on the Concorde. These turbojets developed over 38,000lbs of thrust each .4 engines in total.
Talk about engineering marvels, the engine intakes slowed down the airflow to 300mph, even when Concorde cruised at 1,350mph. The intakes are a 40 year old design! It is still a world leading design. The Concorde paint was a special stretchy "stuff" that didn`t flake off at supersonic speeds. (Remember the XB-70 paint after high speed flights). Concorde also had fully automated landing systems.

The "Concordski", the TU-144 I think, why it was relegated to a cargo aircraft, rumour says that it just wasn`t viable as a competitor to Concorde. It was noisier inside the cabin. Aeroflot pilots refused to fly the aircraft which they considered dangerous to fly! Who in the west would want to fly a dangerous TU-144 Aeroflot plane rather than BA or Air France! It would also have been subject to the same noise restrictions that hampered Concorde`s routes.

The SR-71 is probably the biggest marvel of them all, I love the aircraft and was sorry to see it go.

Concorde solved the problems better than 'Concordski' which I believe was demoted to cargo, and (although this might be rumour-as I said I don't have any first-hand knowledge of the development of these a/c) the American version had trouble even keeping the paintwork on

The worlds leading nation in aerospace technology have difficulties with paintwork.? .Maybe landing on the moon was easier?

There is nothing that can be built in the UK or France that can't be built in the US.. (the contrary is often the case) Both projects from Lockeed and Boeing would have been great successes (from engineering point of view) had congress decided in 1971 in favor of allocating further public funds to the projects.On the other hand,the commercial disaster experienced by CONCORDE, shows today that the decision was right..

First of all ,the American SST project was far more ambitious than Concorde which resulted in frequent design changes and modifications which is normal but required more money and time.

In late 60's, the opposition against the SST in general also in the UK(Source ,Brian Calvert) was mounting because of sonic boom and enviromental damages and so forth.

To my knowledge there hasn't been any firm commitment from major airlines to buy the aircraft at least not in sufficient numbers to justify further investments from public funds especially in times of budget constraints caused by the Vietnam War..Besides,It was clear that the type of aircraft would only be allowed to fly over unpopulated areas.In view of these developments,like many other high tech projects of the past,it was killed.

Concorde has been the reincarnation of the British Aerospace Industry which enabled it to regain the image which was lost after the Comet fiascos of the 50's and its ineffectual successors BAC111, Trident and VC-10..

I was also obvious that one crash would mean the end of Concorde considering the fact that only 13 aircraft were in operation..

<<Talk about engineering marvels, the engine intakes slowed down the airflow to 300mph, even when Concorde cruised at 1,350mph. The intakes are a 40 year old design! It is still a world leading design<<

The technical features of Concorde such as the special intake arrangements with ramps and the fuel management systems (cross-feeding between fuel tanks to overcome center gravity problems at Mach 2 )were known before Concorde existed ! I would strongly suggest that you visit the MIT next time you are in Boston and you will see PhD dissertations on the subject written in late 50's..

Don`t disagree with (almost) everything you said in your latest post Duplex.
Except......Yes, even the most advanced aerospace nation CAN have trouble with SST paint, why the hell not??????? I am sure that problem would have been overcome.

The SST would have been a great success??????? I don`t have your crystal ball so we will never know! It would have been subject to the same restrictions as Concorde over noise levels. Ie, no +Mach flights over mainland US and other countries. As I have said, Concorde flew for decades, SST did not.

The reincarnation of the British aerospace industry really came about from British Aerospace aquisitions of most of the big players in the UK. BAE is now the worlds 4th largest defence contractor.

Is it so hard to accept that "some" things are done better abroad than in the US? Yes, the US is the WORLD leader in so many areas, but not all. Concorde wasn`t matched by anybody, period.
I was wondering, did you have a bad vacation in the UK once, you seem to want to knock all things British Duplex. I have visited the US many times, even worked there, up in New York state. I love the country and its people, had some great times. Long may we be allies!
I dont think the vast majority of Americans get upset when some other country in the world does something better, they embrace it and try to improve on it. Wasn`t it Calvin Coolidge that said, "The business of Americans, is business".

America didn`t invent the jet engine or Radar, nor the Telephone or the Computer, the Television, etc, etc. The US embraced the technology and made it BETTER!

Duplex wrote...

"The technical features of Concorde such as the special intake arrangements with ramps and the fuel management systems (cross-feeding between fuel tanks to overcome center gravity problems at Mach 2 )were known before Concorde existed ! I would strongly suggest that you visit the MIT next time you are in Boston and you will see PhD dissertations on the subject written in late 50's.."

Yes.......I did say it was an old design, which commercial aircraft featured it before Concorde Duplex? Shifting fuel between tanks to maintain stability on take off/ landings and flying were not mentioned by me.

I was wondering, did you have a bad vacation in the UK once, you seem to want to knock all things British Duplex

Of course not..

Sorry..I am sure about the BAe systems being 4th or the 5th largest after Boeing, EADS, Lockeed and Northrop Grumman ..Maybe you are right.

Concerning the BAe Systems,it is sad to see that your government is doing everything possible to sabotage this great company by forcing them to share defence projects with the FRENCH.... (Future Aircraft Carrier,unmanned aircraft etc..).

They are quite capable of tackling these projects alone!

ARRRGHH!!! You are right! Nobody here in the UK wants French involement with the new carriers. Just another example of the UK government wanting to build the cheaper option. They want the French government to shoulder some of the financial burden with subsidies for their own companies involement. Believe me, BAE want the deal to be exclusive to them alone! BAE have a lot of political clout in the UK in terms of contracts.....This is of concern to some people over here. It seems however that there is already enormous co`operation between Thales of France and BAE on the carrier design.The French Navy want a second large carrier to cover the Clemenceau. The 2 goverments want to share costs, the way to do that is to build commonality between the two navies.

The French Ucav nEUROn has SAAB of Sweden, HAI of Greece, EADS Spain, the Swiss`, Alenia of Italy on board. They are led by Dassault. It looks likely the UK will go with the US led "joint unmanned combat air system". The UK goverment is already a partner in this project.I don`t think the UK Gov` want to upset the US too much by going with the French on that one! BAE has been working on a low radar observable UCAV called the Nightjar for some years.

duplex wrote:The worlds leading nation in aerospace technology have difficulties with paintwork.? .Maybe landing on the moon was easier?

Well, it happened, as snypa777 says.

duplex wrote:There is nothing that can be built in the UK or France that can't be built in the US..( the contrary is often the case )

I think this is your problem. There are plenty of things the US can do better than the UK (as you say, NASA is a prime example), but there are plenty of things the UK can do better than the US (build cars, for example). Another thing some Americans (such as yourself) are very bad at compared to Europeans, is admitting that you are not the best at everything you do. A little humility can go a long way, especially on the back of some pretty substantial evidence.

duplex wrote:On the other hand,the commercial disaster experienced by CONCORDE,shows today that the decision was right..

Well, BA were making profit from Concorde for a while before the Paris crash, enough that they committed to an expensive upgrade for each a/c to ensure that the same thing could not happen again if another Concorde was nailed by FOD in the same way. Unfortunately this was completed just before 9/11 and that hit pretty hard, eventually leading to its demise.

I don't understand your quip about paint flaking. The XB-70 flew faster than Mach 3, somewhere the Concorde never approached. As the resident Blackbird experts will attest to the temperatures at that speed are much more extreme than Mach 2. (F-15s don't have problems with paint coming off).

The Concorde failed because there was not enough demand for high speed, high priced air travel. The majority of the flying public wants cheap, cheap, cheap. Which is the same reason no other supersonic passenger liners were ever developed. There was no money in it.

Guysmiley wrote:I don't understand your quip about paint flaking. The XB-70 flew faster than Mach 3, somewhere the Concorde never approached.

Of course, but with the 733 Boeing were not just content to compete with Concorde's M2.04, they decided they had to make something bigger, better, faster. The 733 was supposed to cruise at Mach 3, which was one of the decisions that led to its failure. While Concorde could use Aluminium, Boeing had to look at Titanium and swing-wings. The variable-geometry was eventually dropped in favour of a delta-despite the fact that the original 733 had beaten the delta Lockheed (um, L-2000?) in the shootout.

There were many factors involved in the 733's failure to advance from the mock-up phase, including fuel prices (as always) and environmental concerns, but one of the biggies was that it was just too complex and overambitious.