The Future of Flight

Roland Piquepaille writes "With "High Times," the Economist delivers a very long and extremely well-documented article about the future of aviation during the next fifty years. It tells us about pilotless planes, with 32 countries currently developing more than 250 models of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV), primarily for combat purposes. The article also looks at future civilian pilotless planes and at the future of personal aviation. But what captivated my attention in this article was the last part about future commercial supersonic and hypersonic (at least five times the speed of sound) planes. In particular, the Economist describes the HyperSoar. "The HyperSoar is a concept for a craft flying at ten times the speed of sound and able to reach any point on the globe within two hours." This overview contains more details and references about the HyperSoar which would fly from Los Angeles to New York in 35 minutes."

According to my own virtual tests

[Jesrad]

I've done a few tests in X-Plane [x-plane.com] and came to the conclusion that with today's rockets and advanced materials it might be fairly easy to make a suborbital plane that can go from Paris to New-York in under an hour. I've got three different designs that could do it. The one obstacle is leading edge temperature at supersonic and hypersonic speeds, but shockwave shaping and the use of cryogenic fluid (liquid hydrogen ?) like on the 70s' XB-70 Valkyrie can overcome it.

Don't worry, long flights will be around a while

[CPUgrind]

To bad all the major airlines don't want faster planes because of the effect it would have on the schedules of flights. Faster planes have been available for years and it still takes about 4 hours between NY and LA on commercial flights. Not to mention the sonic boom of faster than sound travel not being allowed (one of the reasons the Concorde was never used across the US).

Environmental Issues?

[Zo0ok]

What fuels are we supposed to use for civil flight in 50 years?

Today, the commersial airlines do not pay any environmental fees whatsoever on their fuel (correct me if I am wrong - I would like to be).

The energy cost for travel by flight is much higher than for other transport methods.

I guess that especially super/hyper-sonic flight will not be considered before the environmental issues (noise, not the least) are completely resolved.

In 50 years, I hope we have airplanes fueled by hydrogen produced in nuclear facilities.

2hrs...impressive!!

[joggle]

Considering it takes about 90 minutes to orbit the earth at LEO (or 45 min to go 'anywhere'), getting anywhere in 2hrs is very impressive. I wonder if it flies inverted so that its lift prevents it from entering orbit.

Mach 5?

[penguinoid]

Mach5 is about 1500 m/s. Escape velocity (the speed at which you need to go to leave earth and go to space without accelerating more) is 1100 m/s. Would that mdan that a hypersonic plane must fly uside down so is not to fly out into space?

UAV vs Airline piolts

[atherton2]

commercial airlines have an accident rate of 0.06 crashes per million hours of flying whereas the Northrop Grumman Global Hawk UAV used by the US military has 1600 crashes per million hours of flying. This shows that the UAVs have a long way to go before we can trust our lives to this tecnology.

35 min. NY to LA passenger flights? Keep dreaming!

[phillymjs]

When they were designing the SR-71, the Skunk Works had a hell of a time designing the life support systems for the pilot-- and that's just one guy in a space suit. At Mach 3, the heat generated by air friction is sufficient that if the cockpit air conditioning system fails, he's in deep shit. If you're reading this and you think in your lifetime you're going to see passengers flying in casual clothes more than three times faster than the SR-71, you'd better think again.

Even if it does become technically feasible, so few people will be able to afford it that it would be completely impractical to try to build a passenger transportation business around it.

~Philly

Re:UAV vs Airline piolts

[atherton2]

It is surely influenced by those factors, but I don't think it account for all of the diffrence. Also what would happen to a commercial UAV if its satalite uplink is lost? Would it crash, would an emergency piolt have to be onboard to take over?

Re:According to my own virtual tests

[transient]

There are more than just aerodynamic obstacles. How much fuel do your designs consume? What sort of load are they capable of carrying? I bet I can make ten different planes that fly from here to the moon in an hour, with no useful load and at a cost of four trillion per launch. Not to say that your designs aren't practical -- I'd just like to point out that designing airplanes is one third engineering and two thirds economics.

Re:Travel time

[netringer]

You left out "please be sure to arrive at least two hours before your scheduled flight due to security procedures."

That doorstep-to-doorstep time is EXACTLY why Dr. Bruce Holmes [nasa.gov]of NASA's AGATE [nasa.gov] research program has predicted the end of hub and spoke airline system and the enpowerment of small aircraft with new tehnologies like "highways in the sky." [nasa.gov] http://lava.larc.nasa.gov/BROWSE/agate.html [nasa.gov]

They found that SLOWER planes do much better on flights of 600 miles or less. The current airline system wins for longer trips like coast-to-coast.

My ancient plane goes only 150MPH, but I can be in the on my way in an hour. I will be 150 miles closer to the destination by the time the airliner leaves the gate.

The research suggests that planes can be made safer and easier to fly and require shorter runways, so communities will be encouraged to BUILD airports nearer city centers The Air traffic system would be automated so each plane would "own" a smalller piece of airspace around it and be warned if another aircraft is nearby.

OT: Sick Bags

[MyHair]

Speaking of sick bags, they used to have one in every seat back. On my last flight I realized I haven't seen a sick back in a long time, and I fly several times a year, so I rooted around the seatback pockets in front of me and found no sick bags.

How do they handle sick bag situations now?

Then again, in my many many flights I have never seen anyone use a sick bag.

History of Flight

[JuggleGeek]

Lets not forget the history of flight.

On Dec 17th, 1903 [canoe.ca], the Wright Brothers made history. Flight has come a long way in 100 years.

Personal flying is fun and getting better

[dloyer]

Change takes a long time for airplanes. A small airplane may last more than 30 years and fly just as fast and as far as a new airplane.

Wings and engines have not changed much in 50 years.

But... New electronics are finding their way into small planes that anyone can learn to fly.

Now GPS makes it hard to get lost. New electronic flight displays are replacing 50 year old "steam gauge" instruments.

Sooner or later, someone will perfect cheap and reliable fly by wire controls that will make small aircraft much simpler to fly and reduce training time and improve safety.

Today, personal flying is a fun way to travel. Just yesterday was a beautiful, sunny day. I flew up to New Hampshire just to enjoy the view.

On warm days, my wife likes to fly with me down to Martha's Vineyard, a small island off the coast of Massachusetts where we can land on a grass strip 50 feet from the beach. When the sun goes down, we just get back in the plane and fly home.

Flying is a very old dream. Anyone can learn to fly, but be warned, once you start, it is very addictive! Flying is not just a way to get from here to there. It is a lot of fun all by itself.

Planes, trains, and automobiles.

[Latent Heat]

The auto/airplane fuel economy comparisons have some variables. I can pretty much get 31 MPG highway cruising in my Ford Taurus while a packed 747 can get 60 seat-MPG. But if it is my wife and I, we are getting better than 60 person-MPG in the Taurus.

The airplane has some interesting scaling laws. The 747, say, gets 60 seat-MPG (you probably have to look at some actual data rather than max range data because max range has reserve for headwinds, diversion to alternate airport, but the 60 seat-MPG is not far from the mark). I am guessing, but I would say a 757 may get close to 100 seat-MPG New York-LA (the 757 is a lighter plane which is lighter per passenger, carries less fuel than a trans Pacific flight, the PW 2037 is a really efficient engine). But if you operate the 757, say Minneapolis to Detroit, I would bet the fuel mileage may drop to 40-50 seat MPG because of the energy cost of climbing to cruising altitude, low-and-slow flight in the landing pattern.

From reading a trucking magazine at a truck stop, I learned that an 18-wheeler with good aerodynamic fairings and a late-model Diesel engine gets about 6 miles per gallon. If you figure 8 miles per gallon for a bus, an intercity bus can give over 300 seat-MPG. As for the train, I am willing to guess that for a transcontinental train like the Chicago-Seattle Empire Builder, what with sleeping and dining cars, U.S. standards that passenger cars be built like tanks to withstand derailments (European passenger cars are much lighter), and all of the mountain passes on the western routes, the train is probably little different than the airplane and at the 50-60 seat-MPG range.

These Diesel commuter trains where they have one locomotive pulling 6 or 7 100-passenger double-decker cars may get something in the 500-600 seat-MPG. But if you go for acceleration and frequent stops such as a subway train, or if you go for high speed, I bet your seat-MPG start working their way back to the car and airplane range.

Interesting that you should mention high-speed rail. Part of what makes my Taurus get 31 highway MPG is that I pretty much stick to 65 MPH. All those dudes passing me doing 75 or 80 are probably getting more like 25 MPG or less. I read that the highly-streamlined but quite fast TGV's are maybe a factor of 2 better than air - I am guessing maybe about 100 seat-MPG. And that 300 MPH Japanese maglev may be comparable to air, perhaps in the 40-50 seat-MPG range.

If you start going fast, think of going at airplane speed but doing it at ground level where the air is thicker. Part of how jets get their efficiency is that they fly high -- the thin air reduces the power on their turbine engines without the losses of throttling, and the thin air allows them to go fast without too much drag. They have to pay for that efficiency with a long climb to cruising altitude. Coupled with large-long range planes being heavier, there is probably a sweet spot in efficiency for perhaps a 1500-3000 mile trip.

John F. Kennedy Jr.

[Latent Heat]

I looked into private aviation as transportation, and for anyone thinking about it, buy yourself the plushest luxury car (Lexus, Mercedes), and you will end up getting to your destinations much safer, not that much slower, and will on a life-cycle basis end up spending much less money. Interesting you mention Martha's Vineyard -- the safety issue and JFK Jr. comes to mind.

There was a Golden Age of private aviation -- perhaps the mid 1960's, when a Piper or a Cessna was competitive with a luxury car. What has happened since then is that liability insurance has driven the light plane manufacturers into the ground and priced light planes out of the market.

We can all get mad at lawyers and call for tort reform and exemptions for plane manufacturers. But flying a light plane is a much riskier activity than driving a car, and the high liability insurance making planes really expensive is society's way of saying that we place a high value on human life, or at least on human life lost in transportation accidents, and the legal system coupled to the market system has perhaps made the correct decision in trying to get people to drive rather than fly themselves.

You mention the "steam gauges" and the need for a glass cockpit in a light plane. The "steam gauges" are there because they are simple and reliable -- and perhaps safer unless there is an enormous breakthrough in light plane avionics.

The engine controls are very primitive and manual: throttle, mixture control, and in some cases, propeller speed: not much more sophisticated than a lawn mower. If you have a turbo engine, you have manual control over boost pressure and have to follow rules for both advancing and retarding the throttle so as to not ruin the engine. In the 1980's there as some attempt at modernization: Porsche came out with an engine with electronic controls and "single-lever power control." But I don't know if this changed the general market trend that light plane manufacturers went out of business or went high-end (half-million dollar plus airplanes), and the only affordable planes are the ones stamped "Experimental" (i.e. I built it myself so I can't sue anybody).