For you guys that are into building model commerical jets, Boeing is going to roll out the 787 tomorrow. From what I have been reading about the 787, it,s an awsome plane. The one thing that I am dissappointed about it is it will not have the joy stick controls like the Airbus. It will have the yoke type controls. Severial airline pilots that I know that fly both Boeing and Airbus say that they prefer the joystick type controls.

It depends on the flight control system. You see, in Boeings, except for the 777's and the 787's, the PCU's that move the control sufaces are directly controlled by the yoke. In the Airbuses The PCU's are controlled by a computer that is commanded by the control stick.

The difference is that you feel the control pressure against the yoke in the Boeings and you don't feel it in the Airbus. There are a couple of other differences as well.

Also, in the older Boeings, if you roll the plane into a 30 degree bank and let go of the controls the plane will slowly roll back to wings level...because of dynamic stability. The Airbus will maintain that 30 degree bank because the plane is always in CWS. In other words the autopilot is always on and you command it with the contol stick. This is just a simple explaination, by the way.

I don't know why Boeing chose the traditional yoke for the 787 but I can tell you that the 777 has it because the United Airlines pilots and ALPA put alot of pressure on Boeing to install the center control column instead of the side stick. (United was the launch costomer for the 777)

We can tell who the guys are that came from the Airbus becuase their first few simulator sessions are pretty rough. The Airbus does so much work for you that it dulls your basic flying skills a little bit. The older Boeing involve more of the "old school" flying.

P.S. I fly 737's for US Airways...owned and operated by America West Airlines.

Fly-n-hi,
Do you think that Boeing needs to replace the 737 in the near future. I see that US Airways bought a bunch of A320. The 737 is a great plane. Over 5000 were made over the years. Todays 737 is not the same as the early models, but the design is from the 60,s, and is not a fly by wire like the A320. I read in the Arizona Republic that Airbus again past Boeing for total planes sold in 2007. A good friend of mine flys for Southwest, an all Boeing airline. He used to fly for Frontier that went from Boeing to Airbus, and he liked to fly the Airbus. He flew F-16s when he was in the the airforce so maybe thats why he prefers the side sick.

If you have a joystick, you aren't flying the aircraft, the computer is. You are just telling it what to do.

According to our corporate guys the Airbuses are all replacement aircraft. As far as I know they intend to replace all 737-300's and 400's, all 767-200's, and all but 20 ETOPS 757-200's. Although, we think that the Boeings will be around for a while. The new Airbuses are supposed to start arriving in 2009.

The order was 60 Airbus narrowbody types, 22 A350's, 10 A330's (or optional A340's). Plus, we already had an order for 37 Airbus narrowbody types which brings the total to 97 narrowbody types.

Our 737's (AWA) are getting tired. They always have broken stuff, the AC doesn't work very well, the lavs always stink, and the interiors are awful.

Does Boeing need to replace the 737? I don't know. It a good airplane but its behind the tech curve...thanks to Southwest. You see, Boeing wanted to put the 777 cockpit in the 737NG. That would have simplifed the differences training between the 777 and the 737. But Southwest said that they wanted the 737NG to have a common type with the 737-300 to keep their training costs down. So Boeing put the older style cockpit (with MFDs) in the NGs.

I've heard that Boeing is working on the 737 replacement, which will be called the 797, but I didn't hear that from an official source.

I think one of the reasons that we didn't get Boeings is because we are so far down the waiting list for planes that we wouldn't get our first 737NG until 2013 or later. Also, Airbus gave us a smokin' deal because they've had some financial problems.

As far as which plane is better...its like Ford vs. Chevy. It seems the Airbus philosophy is to let the computer do more of the flying and the Boeng philosophy is to let the pilots do more of the flying. There's pros and cons to either philosophy.

Airbus did indeed gain more orders than Boeing after the Paris Air Show. It's something like 550 Boeings to 650 Airbuses.

I have read that the 797 will be a giant blended wing design that will carry up to 1000 passangers. Boeing is getting help from NASA on the design.

It's nice to dream, but no matter how many radical concepts there are, they always go with safe, established configurations. I really doubt we'll ever see the flying wing airliner as long as it's so economical and easy to stick wings on a tube.

...easy to stick wings on a tube.
You make that sound like it's a bad thing.

:tongue:

Well, it IS getting a bit boring. :)

I remember magazines from the 1950s and 60s proposing all sorts of exotic airplane shapes that were supposed to be populating the skies by "the year two thousand!!" None of them survived simple practicality and economics (and of course, the financial fear of big corporations not wanting to risk something TOO different).

You present an interesting question:

What sort of design would be different, yet aerodynamically
sound enough to be an efficient people mover?

It would have to have structural strength to take the constant
abuse of continued use for thirty/forty years.

And be comfortable and practical for current airport use!

Boeing's flying wing design needs folding wings to be able to come up to a normal existing jetway. Not only is it added weight, complexity and expense to the airplane, but how many passengers are going to be freaked by the irrational fear that the wing might fold up in flight?

A huge amount of the seats in the flying wing are in the middle of the fuselage, completely out of sight of windows. That conbtributes to motion sickness and claustrophobia. Plus, there weren't very many windows on the thing in the first place due to the design. I don't know about anybody else, but I LOVE to look out of airplane windows! I not only love to, I HAVE to, or I get motion sick.

The wing span on the the wing design is about the same as the A380, so I don,t think that it will have folding wings.

Ah, but the article I saw did show folding wings. :shrug: