[TETENAL]

What's that smoke?

By the way, does the A380 change the way the tail fin is attached to the fuselage? That was a common point of criticism since the tail fins fell off easily in earlier Airbus'.

The tail fin of the A380 looks very large in proportion to the plane. Is there a reason why it needs a larger one than other planes?

[badidea]

Originally posted by TETENAL:
What's that smoke?

First start of the engines (don't know exactly)!

By the way, does the A380 change the way the tail fin is attached to the fuselage? That was a common point of criticism since the tail fins fell off easily in earlier Airbus'.

The tail fin of the A380 looks very large in proportion to the plane. Is there a reason why it needs a larger one than other planes?

No, the VTP (vertical tail plane) is attached the same way on every airplane since 30 years...NOT!
As far as I know the problem was with the rudder and not the VTP (and only on the A-300)!?
Larger planes need larger VTPs (I have no idea since I have nothing to do with the design of the tail fin)!

[TETENAL]

Originally posted by badidea:
First start of the engines (don't know exactly)!

Doesn't look like coming from the engines. That's why I asked.

As far as I know the problem was with the rudder and not the VTP (and only on the A-300)!?

The Airbus that crashed in New York lost its entire tail fin and as far as I understand the connection between tail fin and fuselage requires a lot of maintenance.

Larger planes need larger VTPs!

Well so far that's logic. But larger planes need superproportional larger tail fins? That's what it looks like and if so would have been interesting to know why.

ps:
Is the size of the tail fin depended on the size of the plane or is it maybe the mass of the plane? Maybe it's the mass and the A380 is very heavy compared to its length (due to the two levels) and that's why the tail fin looks so large.

[badidea]

Well TETENAL, I am sorry that I can't give you any answer to your questions - the funny thing is though that I asked myself the exact same things just before I posted the picture here (at least the smoke question - I am thinking about the size of the tail fin since a longer time but have no contact to the appropriate designers here)!

I don't think that the size of the tail fin is related to the mass of the airplane but more to the cross-section of the body...
I'll see if I can find someone who can give me a better answer!

[iLikebeer]

Originally posted by TETENAL:
Doesn't look like coming from the engines. That's why I asked.

I didn't think it looked like it was coming from the engines either. If it is, it's probably the oil covering the inside components of the engine after manufacture burning off on the first startup.

Well so far that's logic. But larger planes need superproportional larger tail fins? That's what it looks like and if so would have been interesting to know why.

ps:
Is the size of the tail fin depended on the size of the plane or is it maybe the mass of the plane? Maybe it's the mass and the A380 is very heavy compared to its length (due to the two levels) and that's why the tail fin looks so large.

The tail fin has to be large enough to give both stability and positive control forces. It has to have a large enough moment arm to do that. Moment arm is basically distance X force. The length of the plane isn't much longer than other similar aircraft but it has a double deck, so they had to use a larger tail.

Think of pushing on a door to close it. It requires a certain amount of force. If you double the thickness(mass) of the door, pushing on the same point of the door would require twice the force to close. Doubling the size of the tail plane serves the same purpose.

[chabig]

The overall size of the vertical stabilizer is sized for one purpose only--to provide the required directional stability.

The rudder is sized for two purposes: 1) to provide sufficient lateral control in case of engine failure (on the A380 the rudder would be sized to maintain control with the loss of two engines on one side), and 2) to provide sufficient lateral control during crosswind takeoffs and landings.

In my opinion, the vertical stabilizer of the A380 looks proportionally right. Stability in large part depends upon the size of the tail and its moment arm--its distance from the center of gravity. Surface area in front of the center of gravity is destabilizing, while surface area behind the center of gravity is stabilizing. So airplanes with shorter fuselages need to have larger vertical tails. The A380 fuselage is short compared to its height, so the tail needs to be pretty big to provide the required stability.

I placed outlines of all of the Airbus family in this picture. You'll see that the planes with longer fuselages have proportionally smaller tails, while the planes with shorter fuselages have proportionally larger tails. In particular, check out the tail of the A318, which has a very short fuselage.

Chris

[Weyland-Yutani]

Originally posted by iLikebeer:
I didn't think it looked like it was coming from the engines either. If it is, it's probably the oil covering the inside components of the engine after manufacture burning off on the first startup.

That is it exactly

When a new engine is started up the first time there is a lot of smoke.

[Weyland-Yutani]

Here she is with her younger siblings [sorry theolein I'm putting it back for now. this is the A380s 15 mins of fame]

[driven]

Originally posted by badidea:
UPDATE:



I have a few more and better pictures but since they are not available on the net yet, I won't post them either!

Current date for First Flight is now 04/20/05...

That's just a tease.

[theolein]

Originally posted by TETENAL:
What's that smoke?

By the way, does the A380 change the way the tail fin is attached to the fuselage? That was a common point of criticism since the tail fins fell off easily in earlier Airbus'.

The tail fin of the A380 looks very large in proportion to the plane. Is there a reason why it needs a larger one than other planes?

Acording to the caption at
airliners.net, it's "F-WWOW (cn 001) Engines destorage (here #3) The smoke is created by the combustion of the "storage oil" in the engine fuel system"

[glideslope]

Originally posted by badidea:
UPDATE:



I have a few more and better pictures but since they are not available on the net yet, I won't post them either!

Current date for First Flight is now 04/20/05...

There is no way this aircraft will fly on 4-20-05. It will be on Static only at Paris. It won't be close to it's original performance claims ( off by 3% .)

It won't even come close to the 300 airframes required to break even. Airbus is praying for 200 orders, and that seems unlikely at this point.

The A350 is dead in the water. The 787 is seeing to that. NWA will announce a large 787 order soon. This was almost unthinkable 6m ago.

What you are seeing is the 21st Century Concorde. Sure it's cool. It has new technology, breaks some new ground. But it won't sell in numbers. Airbus is in full panic mode. Don't believe me? When was the last time anyone read anything from John Lahey shooting his big mouth off about the A380? Not a word since the "weight reduction" program was revealed. Which of course has led to all the "last minute structural enhancements."

Hopefully Airbus will learn from this. My grandmother always told me to "never count my chickens until they hatch." Words that still apply in 2005.

[Weyland-Yutani]

Originally posted by glideslope:
There is no way this aircraft will fly on 4-20-05.

How do you know?

Originally posted by glideslope:

It will be on Static only at Paris. It won't be close to it's original performance claims ( off by 3% .)

Again how do you know?

Originally posted by glideslope:

It won't even come close to the 300 airframes required to break even. Airbus is praying for 200 orders, and that seems unlikely at this point.

You are quite the Nostradamus

Originally posted by glideslope:

The A350 is dead in the water. The 787 is seeing to that. NWA will announce a large 787 order soon. This was almost unthinkable 6m ago.

Airbus doesn't seem to think so, since their A350 project is still <go> and they are not known for losing money on their projects. I can't think of one jet airliner family they make that isn't a success.

How do you know what and when NWA will order?

Originally posted by glideslope:

What you are seeing is the 21st Century Concorde. Sure it's cool. It has new technology, breaks some new ground. But it won't sell in numbers. Airbus is in full panic mode. Don't believe me? When was the last time anyone read anything from John Lahey shooting his big mouth off about the A380? Not a word since the "weight reduction" program was revealed. Which of course has led to all the "last minute structural enhancements."

There were 19 Concordes "sold". Airbus has already sold more than 150 A380s. The A380's selling point is economy vs. speed, like that of the Concorde.

Perhaps John Leahy is too busy selling planes to be chatting about the rival

Originally posted by glideslope:

Hopefully Airbus will learn from this. My grandmother always told me to "never count my chickens until they hatch." Words that still apply in 2005.

Those are wise words.

Take care and fly safe!

[jknight8907]

Originally posted by glideslope:
What you are seeing is the 21st Century Concorde. Sure it's cool. It has new technology, breaks some new ground. But it won't sell in numbers. Airbus is in full panic mode. Don't believe me? When was the last time anyone read anything from John Lahey shooting his big mouth off about the A380? Not a word since the "weight reduction" program was revealed. Which of course has led to all the "last minute structural enhancements."

What? Do some research.


Concorde failed because it was not economical. It was not economical because it had (1) high fuel burn, and (2) low number of seats. Which meant that ticket prices were higher to cover the fuel cost. That and some other factors killed the Concorde.

On the other hand, the A380 will have plenty of seats, and will be quite fuel-efficient for it's size. Assuming the airlines don't undercut prices to the point where they are operating at a loss (as the majority are now....rising oil prices, decreasing ticked cost) then the A380 and the airlines operating it will be quite successful.

[theolein]

Originally posted by glideslope:
There is no way this aircraft will fly on 4-20-05. It will be on Static only at Paris. It won't be close to it's original performance claims ( off by 3% .)

It won't even come close to the 300 airframes required to break even. Airbus is praying for 200 orders, and that seems unlikely at this point.

The A350 is dead in the water. The 787 is seeing to that. NWA will announce a large 787 order soon. This was almost unthinkable 6m ago.

What you are seeing is the 21st Century Concorde. Sure it's cool. It has new technology, breaks some new ground. But it won't sell in numbers. Airbus is in full panic mode. Don't believe me? When was the last time anyone read anything from John Lahey shooting his big mouth off about the A380? Not a word since the "weight reduction" program was revealed. Which of course has led to all the "last minute structural enhancements."

Hopefully Airbus will learn from this. My grandmother always told me to "never count my chickens until they hatch." Words that still apply in 2005.

Nice little flag waving session you made there. This nationalistic one up manship seems really crazy to me, given that both Boeing and Airbus have dozens of subcontractors from all around the globe and both are only interested in one thing: selling planes. If either company made any of the nationalistic crap statements that have abounded in this thread, they would lose sales in other countries where such nationalistic jingoism tends to make potential buyers angry.

In any case, and I've said this before, what about the small airliner market? Both Brazil (Embraer) and Canada (Bombardier) are starting to dominate this market, which is the biggest market by far, but I don't see any flag waving there, now do I?

I personally think Boeing makes great planes, and the 777, 737 and 787 are all excellent, and I also think Airbus makes great planes and I think the A380 is doing extremely well despite the continual doom and gloom aimed at it by Boeing's fan club and PR dpeartment. The A380 hasn't even flown yet and there are already how many orders, some 155 firm and 100 options? Added to that the fact the there will obviously be newer derivatives of the A380 over time (stretch, shortened) and there is a continual market of airliners who will need to replace 747's in years to come. I wouldn't count the A380 out just yet.

In any case, It doesn't really matter, becuase one plane version it's the one company who has a better plane, and the next plane version, it's the other company who has the better plane.

As for the A350, I think it is also too early to count it out. It's pretty obvious that Boeing is doing a tremendous amount of lobbying in Washington in order to try and slow Airbus down politically, but I think that will ultimatley fail, because Airbus has just as good a case with US government subsidies of Boeing's other departments. Plus, Airbus has the opportunity to see just how good the 787 is and to try and improve on that, just as Boeing did with the 777-200LR in competition to the A340-500. It's as I said: One day it's Boeing, the next it's Airbus.

[Weyland-Yutani]

I for one love the A vs B competition. It promotes competition and innovation in an amazing and thrilling industry!
Super jumbos and ultra long range aircraft..
this is like the 50s and 60s all over again

[badidea]

What's wrong with you, glideslope???
Do you have a problem with size??
Do we make you feel inferior?

Get over it!

[OreoCookie]

Originally posted by glideslope:
There is no way this aircraft will fly on 4-20-05. It will be on Static only at Paris. It won't be close to it's original performance claims ( off by 3% .)

It won't even come close to the 300 airframes required to break even. Airbus is praying for 200 orders, and that seems unlikely at this point.

The A350 is dead in the water. The 787 is seeing to that. NWA will announce a large 787 order soon. This was almost unthinkable 6m ago.

What you are seeing is the 21st Century Concorde. Sure it's cool. It has new technology, breaks some new ground. But it won't sell in numbers. Airbus is in full panic mode. Don't believe me? When was the last time anyone read anything from John Lahey shooting his big mouth off about the A380? Not a word since the "weight reduction" program was revealed. Which of course has led to all the "last minute structural enhancements."

Hopefully Airbus will learn from this. My grandmother always told me to "never count my chickens until they hatch." Words that still apply in 2005.

They already have at least 150 orders, not bad for a plane that never took off till now, huh?

Some Arabic airlines are asking for a stretch version even and Airbus will consider it (aka they will do it if it makes economic sense). Sure, Boing's new airliner will be good competition, but that is what it's all about. With competition you get better, more efficient products. And I don't think Airbus is going to leave Beoing the whole dreamliner's market segment to itself

Beoing is at a disadvantage right now, you can argue all you want, but I have the impression they didn't know where they were supposed to go (ergo no direction). Airbus had a direction and although you can argue it's the wrong one (as Boeing does), they still have one. The proposed 747X didn't work, so they try to bring to market a complementary idea.

[theolein]

Originally posted by Weyland-Yutani:
Here she is with her younger siblings

..snip image...

Hey, do you think you could please post a link to the image instead of posting it inline. It really messes up text in the thread.

[Weyland-Yutani]

Originally posted by theolein:
Hey, do you think you could please post a link to the image instead of posting it inline. It really messes up text in the thread.

Sure I could. Simply by removing the [img] tags around the url.

:looks at thread name:

Seeing as this is a [JPEG orgy] thread though big pics are to be expected, no?

[TETENAL]

Originally posted by theolein:
Hey, do you think you could please post a link to the image instead of posting it inline. It really messes up text in the thread.

This is marked as a "JPEG Orgy" thread. Posting inline images is its purpose.

[badidea]

Originally posted by TETENAL:
This is marked as a "JPEG Orgy" thread. Posting inline images is its purpose.

...and they also are supposed to be "A380-SIZE"!

[Weyland-Yutani]

Originally posted by badidea:
...and they also are supposed to be "A380-SIZE"!

You guys are right.
If there was ever the right occation and the right thread for a huge in-line photo then this is it!



[goes back and puts img tags back on!]

[theolein]

No sh*t.

[mrtew]

Originally posted by TETENAL:
This is marked as a "JPEG Orgy" thread. Posting inline images is its purpose.

I love big images as much as the next guy, especially of the A380 believe me, but I have to agree that it makes the rest of the thread really difficult to read! If you're going to post such huge pictures, at least post MORE of them so I won't get distracted by all the bitching. :-]

[badidea]

Originally posted by mrtew:
... at least post MORE of them so I won't get distracted by all the bitching. :-]

As you wish...

[Lancer409]

very beautiful airplane.

time for boeing to step it up =)

[theolein]

Originally posted by badidea:
As you wish...

...

Molto grazie, malpensa.


The funny thing about the A380, I find, is that it, too me at least, somehow doesn't look as big as a 747, possibly because of the hump on 747's back exagerating its size, possibly because the A380 lacks some feature that indicates its size when it stands alone.

[OreoCookie]

Originally posted by theolein:
Molto grazie, malpensa.


The funny thing about the A380, I find, is that it, too me at least, somehow doesn't look as big as a 747, possibly because of the hump on 747's back exagerating its size, possibly because the A380 lacks some feature that indicates its size when it stands alone.

Well, all you need is a good way to compare sizes. I saw a photo of one of the huge engines mounted on a regular `small' Airbus (not sure which model anymore, maybe a 340) and it dwarfed the three other engines.

[chabig]

[badidea]

Originally posted by OreoCookie:
Well, all you need is a good way to compare sizes. I saw a photo of one of the huge engines mounted on a regular `small' Airbus (not sure which model anymore, maybe a 340) and it dwarfed the three other engines.

I saw one attached to a 747 - too bad I don't have this picture anymore...

engine pictures:

edit: chabig was faster





found a small picture of the engine attached to a 747 (but not really spectacular)

[dcmacdaddy]

Originally posted by badidea:
As you wish...

I think I would crap my pants if I was driving that little Peugeot and looked up and saw that thing driving overhead.

I know we had the discussion already abour re-inforcing runways and taxi-ways and things like that. But what about this "access road"? I sure as hell hope someone checked the weight limit on it.

[badidea]

some more:



this picture is now really too huge for inline posting

[badidea]

IMPORTANT UPDATE for official first flight date!!
I just recieved information that the picture below contains a riddle that tells you the day, month and time when the big show will start...

...take a very close look and have fun (I am not kidding but I also don't know if this is really true and I won't tell the solution)!!

[badidea]

Some more pictures:

[TETENAL]

http://ww2.planepictures.net/32/14/1112977441.jpg

What's in those � pardon me � ass-cheeks it has? Is that the cargo-area?

[analogika]

Wheel-wells, probably.

Those six-wheelers have to hide somewhere.

[badidea]

Originally Posted by TETENAL

What's in those � pardon me � ass-cheeks it has? Is that the cargo-area?

You mean the belly fairing?
As with most technical questions about the master structure...I don't really know...wheels probably yes but I think it is also very important for the stability of the wings!?

[chabig]

Those fairings hold the landing gear when it's retracted.

[theolein]

It's also where the wing box is, I think, the part that stops the wings and the body going seperate ways. I think it's also the first all composite wing box in an airliner.

[Weyland-Yutani]

Here is a photo of A380 rotation!



Well, allegedly anyway. I can't wait to see it fly!!!!!!

[Jim Paradise]

What's with that Airbus Skylink plane? I can't deny that it's rather odd-looking.

[analogika]

Any plane designed to transport parts of commercial airliners, including wings and fuselage parts, is bound to look rather odd.

[glideslope]

ROFLOL. This pic is a Photoshop creation. It has been discredited on other forums.

[theolein]

If the A380 had already started rotation tests etc, you can be sure it would have been in the news.

[badidea]

Originally Posted by glideslope

ROFLOL. This pic is a Photoshop creation. It has been discredited on other forums.

Link please! We were asking this ourselves this morning when this picture rotated our Airbus mailboxes.
On the other hand it's quite the time right now for those tests - at least the full speed test should have been scheduled for today...but we don't get any better news either...

[Weyland-Yutani]

Originally Posted by badidea

Link please! We were asking this ourselves this morning when this picture rotated our Airbus mailboxes.
On the other hand it's quite the time right now for those tests - at least the full speed test should have been scheduled for today...but we don't get any better news either...

The consensus at airliners.net is that the rolling photo is a photoshop. A good photoshop but a photoshop. Just wanted to share

This baby will roll this week and perhaps it will be time for 1st flight too! I'm excited!!

[badidea]

Originally Posted by Weyland-Yutani

This baby will roll this week and perhaps it will be time for 1st flight too! I'm excited!!

It's already rolling since a few days and if you would solve the riddle a few posts above you would know that you should be PREPARED!!!!!!!!

by the way...
airliners.net is killing me!
Where did they get this interior picture????

[Weyland-Yutani]

Originally Posted by badidea

It's already rolling since a few days and if you would solve the riddle a few posts above you would know that you should be PREPARED!!!!!!!!

by the way...
airliners.net is killing me!
Where did they get this interior picture????

Looks like Mr Stephan Levavasseur snuck aboard with his camera

Oh and that riddle.. grr. All I see is beautiful Airbuses!! Rumor has it 1st flight is tomorrow or friday. I guess short of actually hanging around the TLS perimiter I'm prepared. Wheee!!

Hints on how to solve the photo are appreciated..

[badidea]

Originally Posted by Weyland-Yutani

Oh and that riddle.. grr. All I see is beautiful Airbuses!! Rumor has it 1st flight is tomorrow or friday. I guess short of actually hanging around the TLS perimiter I'm prepared. Wheee!!

Hints on how to solve the photo are appreciated..

Ah well, since I just recieved new information that disproves the date from the riddle, I can solve it now anyway...

If you look closely at the windows you should notice that one of them is red (it's also on the official picture you can find on airbus.com). The red window is number 20, if you start to count from the left and it is also just underneath the "A" -> April, 20th
If you want to find out at which time it should have happened, you have to sum the numbers on the VTPs: 340 + 600 + 380 = 1320 -> 13h 20min

An email with this riddle circulated our mailboxes a few days ago (and it originated from Toulouse) but we haven't been sure if we should believe it (because first flights usually always start at 10 o'clock but my french colleague meant that the frogeaters in TLS might very well do something like this ).

Right in the second while I am typing here, I recieved another email that confirms the new rumors about first flight being scheduled for *snip*(I might win a flight to TLS on *snip* - wish me luck in 1,5 hours)!


By the way, the rotation picture is really a fake - this was confirmed by a french colleague from TLS this morning!


edit: I shouldn't post the date on a public forum

[driven]

What is a "rotation test"?

Do they simply tilt the aircraft back? Or ... was that a runway test at speed?