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bob321c
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Cessna Single-Engine Turboprop Around the Corner?
from bob321c
wrote 2 years 26 weeks ago
putting the cabin door between the club seats in a shortened Cessna Mustang jet fuselage, the Mustang turboprop would compete directly with the Meridian and TBM-850 in a very limited turbine entry market.
By using the standard length Mustang jet fuselage, adding more power, and a potty seat opposite the door behind the club seats. Similar to the CompAirAviation.com CA-11 or Kestrel.Aero, or the older King Air 90 and Cheyenne, etc. It opens up another stepup product for them to add to their turbine family. 4,000 King Air's and Cheyenne's can't be wrong, and owners are looking to retire them for a new technology aircraft.
Large gains from current technology are very possible. 400 knot top speed, and a 400 mph cruise at 41,000', on half the fuel burn of a VLJ. This sounds impossible for a turboprop, but this was already accomplished 30 years ago by the the Cheyenne 400LS (mullers.net/mike/cheyenne) in 1980! The CA-11 and Kestrel are already targeting aircraft for this market, but it will take a stable company with experiance and cash to pull it off in this economy.
Air France 447: Was it a Deep Stall?
from bob321c
wrote 1 year 50 weeks ago
From what have I read above, the A330 auto-trimed to full up trim and then the autopilot disconnected and went into direct law. In direct law the auto-trim is disabled, and was then stuck at full up trim causing the jet to fall.
The A330 also has no angle of attack display, unless all 3 ADR's are turned off so airspeed is replaced with AOA and altitude is displayed in degraded GPS altitude. No pilot I know would turn off all the ADR's in the middle of the ocean at night. There needs to be an emergency switch to display this information when there is a loss of airspeed information.
The Transition to Unleaded Fuel
from bob321c
wrote 44 weeks 5 days ago
We need to follow Brazil's lead by switching aircraft over to ethanol, which is 106 octane ( www.AlcoholCanBeAGas.com ). This could be used in our aircraft easily, just like they already do in Brazil. Fuel can be produced for about $1.00 / gallon from any plant material waste, like grass clippings, mesquite seed pods, or cattails (up to 10,000 gallons / acre!).
There is even a compact unit ( www.MicroFueler.com ) about the size of a refridgerator, that produces 35 gallons of ethanol ever 3 days automatically, with only a water hose and power connection, bulk sugar, and yeast.
Not only can it power internal combustion engines up to 18:1 compression ratios without pinging. It can also power turbine engines with almost zero pollution, it actually cleans the air! Since ethanol already contains oxygen, fuel consumption decreases above 12,000' over avgas, with a power increase.
Dragsters and race cars have used alcohol for years for the increased octane (pinging) and safety factor. Gasoline has fumes that spread out on the ground that are very explosive, alcohol evaporates safely into the atmosphere. Gasoline flames up when hit with water, alcohol is dilluted and flames go out immeadiately. Boaters use alcohol stoves to prevent explosive fumes in their bilges.
The astronaut Gordon Cooper, once flew an unmodified NASA T-38 from Indianapolis to Houston when he was called back on an emergency to substitute for the Apollo 10 Commander. Jet fuel was unavailable, so he called the race track to deliver him alcohol to fly his jet back.




