If you were dreaming that there is a future for the last 747 passenger jet version, sorry, it just looks even less likely than before.
The details of how Boeing has been forced to lock out the tail tankage on the 747-8I or Intercontinental, to avoid a flutter scenario, is detailed in Flightblogger’s latest dispatch.
It is important to read the full story, as linked to on Flightblogger. This last passenger version of the 747 is due to be delivered, much delayed, to Lufthansa, from the end of next month, but the airline is now referring to ‘by the end of the first quarter’ or up to a month late.
As specified by Lufthansa, the jet looks interesting, although many regard it as shaded by the 777-300ER even though the latter is a lower seating capacity airliner. However the 747-8i Lufthsansa wanted is optimised for payload/range sector that don’t require full load capacity that is equivalent to Los Angeles or Abu Dhabi from Sydney/Melbourne non-stop.
Or put more bluntly, it can’t do the key routes that Qantas or Virgin Australia might have thought about should they even seriously evaluate its use. Now that it has lost maybe 400 nautical miles of range, the only route to America that a 747-8i could fly unrestricted is to Honolulu.
This isn’t where anyone expected the 747-8i to end up performance wise.
Which raises the question as to what the 747-8F is delivering to its customers. Is the cost of new freighter, for the performance is in actually delivering, worth it compared to the best examples of converted ex-passenger 747-400s?
Cathay Pacific may be able to answer that question within a few months. And it says it is evaluating the 747-8i as an alternative to the A380. These developments aren’t a good omen for Boeing.
15 Comments
Isnt this the second flutter problem with the 747-8 ? I understand the first was fixed by a slight re-jig of the wing flaps or the outboard ailerons which are fly by wire. These are one of the benefits of FBW as they can cancel these situations out without the plots being involved.
http://www.wired.com/autopia/2011/02/looking-inside-boeings-new-747/
Whatever initial problems with the 747-8 I much prefer flying, as a passenger, in the 747 to the 777. I have found the 777 a much noisier aircraft, up the pointy end or further back, so much so that a good set of noise cancelling headphones is almost a must.
Itfisher at #2. I agree. I had the interesting experience recently of flying SYD-LAX return in the space of a couple of days. Going there A380, coming back 777. I’m still trying to get the ringing noise out of my ears. The 777 is a very capable aircraft and a great advertisement for how new plane development should, and can, be done, but the passenger experience on long haul leaves a lot to be desired.
Same here, as a mere paying customer the experience of flying BA 777 SYD-LHR & return last year was pretty horrible. Noisy, (much more so than A340 and 747-400+), stuffy (maybe it was just BA settings?) and somehow cramped. I read with dread that more airlines are using 777s on long haul but perhaps they’re not all as bad as the 200ER I went on.
The 777-300ER is just as bad for cabin noise at the 777-200ER in my experience. I had a 77W flight Singapore-Auckland before Christmas and my ANR headphones died on me. Absolutely painful it was having to endure the remaining 7 hours or so without noise cancelling.
Upgraded to Business Class on the return trip mainly just for the fact they give you noise-cancelling headphones to wear in that cabin.
I have found previously on the A380 that the noise-cancelling headphones were almost redundant. Hopefully the 777 NG/-8/-9 or whatever it will be called will have some good sound insulation seeing it is an otherwise capable aircraft.
Funny, I actually prefer flying the 777 to the 747 – I think I am just over being crammed in with so many other bodies and 747s I’ve flown in recently are starting to look a bit tired. Mind you, I always have my noise cancelling earphones in, even while sleeping.
Having flown internationally a fair bit over the last 3 years, I prefer the 777/A330 sized aircraft as loading and unloading is a lot faster.
Given the difficulties with delivering both new aircraft (eg. 787) and improvements to existing aircraft (eg. 747-8), will airlines be so ready to commit to orders sight-unseen? But if they don’t, then there won’t be the core revenue to make anything new or improved. Have we reached the point where the sales pitch has exceeded the engineering capacity?
O/T – I kind of like seeing 747s plying their trade and for me the skies around commercial airports will be a lot less interesting when they eventually phase them out in favour of twin-engined wide body aircraft (777, A340 etc) or the (IMO) fugly A380.
But then if you rewind 35 years when the 747 began to dominate I daresay others said the same thing.
12A or the exit row on the upper deck is very nice in a 747.
The 380 is better, though.
Especially in row 4.
Heh, heh…
So, maybe I’m missing something, but the original Flightglobal article says:
“Boeing said the absence of tail fuel tanks will reduce the range of the VIP configured 747-8 by about 550-930km (300-400nm), depending on the aircraft’s configuration.
For airline operators, the impact on performance will be minimal, said Boeing, as chosen configurations of its customers will prohibit the use of the tail’s fuel tanks when non-fuel payload exceeds 60% of the aircraft’s maximum structural payload.”
Have 747s got a lot quieter in the last few years? I ask because in late 2003 I flew on a 747 from London to Kuala Lumpur, then on a 777 from there to Adelaide. The 747 was significantly noisier than the 777.
Airbus (cracks) as well as Boeing (flutter) always dismiss / play down issues. Good to have bureaucratic / inflexible / independent well paid & educated civil servants that put their finder on open nerves and demand a good solution, regardless of the (financial) consequences. IMO a strong independent government is the basis of sustained flight safety. When they become cooperative & market driven safety collapses.
Being a software engineer, I don’t think software should be used to plaster over inherently unsafe or unstable systems. Software is rarely perfect, although it can be a lot more reliable that a lot of hardware and what if that software flutter dampening system encounters ailerons that won’t actuate?
For public use systems, the system need to be passively safe – that is they must tend towards stability when perturbed, not the other way around. The later was the problem at Fukushima.
http://youtu.be/iTFZNrTYp3k
To me this is just asking for trouble and I’d refuse to board.
Contrary to this post, the 747-8i without these horizontal stabilizer fuel tanks is well within reach SYD-LAX and probably has enough reserves for LAX-SYD into the wind (~6500nm given ~7500nm range w/o these tanks), but not SYD-ORD, SYD-DFW or SYD-JFK. Then, ORD and JFK are out of range for the A380 with “typical” load factors.
Then, 747-8F doesn’t have horizontal stabilizer fuel tanks, yet -8F’s might just be over weight typical of early production aircraft.
Tying the above comments about ‘noisy’ cabins back to airplane design and configuration you have to remember that a 777 being a twin jet has higher thrust per engine than a four engine plane. Other factors are a seat above the wing will screen some noise than if you are in the rear of the cabin. I also notice that some passengers are comparing flights that a ‘into headwinds’ with those that mostly have tailwinds. The head wind flight is usually quite a bit longer duration and the pilots would normally use higher thrust to maintain economical cruising speed .
For the 747-8 second flutter problem, understand that a fix will be certified for new production and retrofitted to existing planes which will then allow range shortfall to be recovered. The reason for the new flutter conditions being found is of course the 747-8 has a brand new wing shape compared to the previous versions of the 747. Cant see how Boeing is going to make any money on their significant investment on a new wing with the paltry orders they have taken and are likely to get. The whole program is really a spoiler for the A380 as shown by the rock bottom prices offered for the old 747-400 to discourage A380 orders at the prices Airbus would like.
ghostwhowalksnz
But it makes up for it by only having half as many engines.
In my (admittedly very limited) experience with 777s, the’re quieter and more pleasant than 747s or A340s.