Thread: Boeing to take on Airbus with (1000 seat) giant 797

Originally Posted by Jay

Boeing is preparing a 1000 passenger jet that could reshape the Air travel industry for the next 100 years. The radical Blended Wing design has been developed by Boeing in cooperation with the NASA Langley Research Center. The mammoth plane will have a wing span of 265 feet compared to the 747’s 211 feet, and is designed to fit within the newly created terminals used for the 555 seat Airbus A380, which is 262 feet wide. The new 797 is in direct response to the Airbus A380 which has racked up159 orders, but has not yet flown any passengers.

....Boeing decide to kill its 747X stretched super jumbo in 2003 after little interest was shown by airline companies, but has continued to develop the ultimate Airbus crusher 797 for years at its Phantom Works research facility in Long Beach, Calif. The Airbus A380 has been in the works since 1999 and has accumulated $13 billion in development costs, which gives Boeing a huge advantage now that Airbus has committed to the older style tubular aircraft for decades to come.

....There are several big advantages to the blended wing design, the most important being the lift to drag ratio which is expected to increase by an amazing 50%, with overall weight reduced by 25%, making it an estimated 33% more efficient than the A380, and making Airbus’s $13 billion dollar investment look pretty shaky. High body rigidity is another key factor in blended wing aircraft, it reduces turbulence and creates less stress on the air frame which adds to efficiency, giving the 797 a tremendous 8800 nautical mile range with its 1000 passengers flying comfortably at mach .88 or 654 mph cruising speed (another advantage over the Airbus tube-and-wing designed A380’s 570 mph)

....The exact date for introduction is unclear, yet the battle lines are clearly drawn in the high-stakes war for civilian air supremacy.



http://www.newtechspy.com/articles06/boeing797.html

ROFL!

How much you wanna bet they started this project the second they heard about Airbus' A380? And all the while they were saying "our stance on the A380 is that it is too big."

Originally Posted by ArmchairGeneral

Now that is a sweet plane. Is it CGI? My only problem with these blended wing designs is the lack of window seats, but you can't have everything, I suppose.

A Discovery Channel show that I saw was about this plane, and they said that there would probably be tv's mounted into the seats, so that people could watch a movie or play games or watch the outside from a camera that was mounted somewhere on the plane.

Originally Posted by Dago

...Didn't Boeing abandon it during the Mid 90's?

Well, the concept is still alive anyway... Who knows if it will ever be developed.

By JEREMIAH MCWILLIAMS, The Virginian-Pilot
© May 5, 2006

HAMPTON –– Perched atop a support stand in the bowels of a cavernous wind tunnel at NASA Langley Research Center, the X-48B prototype airplane evokes visions of a UFO. However, emblems from NASA, the Air Force and The Boeing Co.’s Phantom Works on its black and green composite body give a better indication of its origins.

The X-48B Ship No. 1 is a test vehicle – shrunk to 8.5 percent scale – for what developers hope one day could be a massive troop transport or fuel tanker. On Thursday, researchers unveiled the plane for a low-speed wind test at Langley’s Full-Scale Tunnel.

The plane’s blended wing body design resembles a flying wing, as opposed to a more traditional tube and wing configuration.

“These kinds of airplanes have some pretty quirky aerodynamics,” said Norman Princen, chief engineer for the X-48B at Boeing’s Phantom Works in Huntington Beach, Calif. “A conventional airplane has a tail and normal wings. Those are things you can see and touch and know they’ll do their job. Here, we’re taking all that away. Instead, we’re relying on computer smarts.”

To stabilize the X-48B in flight, the plane will rely on computer-guided flaps on the rear edges of the wings rather than a vertical tail fin.

“It’s unconventional,” said Drew Landman, an Old Dominion University associate professor who manages the wind tunnel under an agreement with NASA, as he stood near the plane in the shadow of the wind tunnel’s twin propellers. “You don’t see a lot of these things being built throughout history. They’re different, but there’s no reason they can’t be tamed.”

The X-48B prototype has a 21-foot wingspan, but a full-scale version could stretch about 240 feet from tip to tip – as large as a Boeing 747.

The flattened profile of the X-48B could yield serious advantages in fuel efficiency, Princen said. The plane has a high cargo capacity compared with outside surface area, which means it experiences less air drag than standard craft, he sai d.

The potential of the X-48B, which follows in a long line of “X-” or experimental aircraft, has caught the Air Force’s eye.

The blended wing body “concept has the potential to cost-effectively fill many roles required by the Air Force, such as tanking, weapons carriage, and command and control,” said a statement by Capt. Scott Bjorge, the plane’s program manager for the Air Force Research Laboratory.

The plane is the result of cooperation between government and industry and across national borders. Boeing’s Phantom Works in Huntington Beach designed it. Boeing subcontracted with England’s Cranfield Aerospace Ltd. to build the X-48B.

Plane No. 1 – not to be confused with No. 2, which still is in England being prepared for flight – has undergone stress tests at Langley’s Full-Scale Tunnel since April 7.

Boeing representatives say the program is still young and that the plane is perhaps 15 years from hitting the runways as a military craft. Engineers would have to tackle numerous challenges to make that happen, they said.

“There’s a long road to prove this thing out,” Princen said. “It’s not something where we’ll see products coming out in the immediate future.”

Boeing spokesman Thomas Koehler declined to say how much Boeing has spent on the X-48B. H e said the project involves less than 50 Boeing employees nationwide.

The X-48B is scheduled to have endured 250 hours of testing at the wind tunnel by the time testing ends May 12. Then it will go to Edwards Air Force Base in California for remote-controlled test flights later this year. The plane is expected to be able to reach altitudes of 10,000 feet and speeds of 138 mph .

On Thursday afternoon, engineers started up the propellers – each about three stories tall – to drive air over the plane at 62 mph . The plane’s wings rocked slightly as engineers in the control room raised the plane’s nose to simulate a takeoff or landing.

“This is the fun part of the job: seeing the concepts come together into reality,” said Dan Vicroy, senior research engineer at NASA Langley Research Center , as he watched the plane from an observation deck, propellers thrumming in the background. “It makes it all worthwhile.”

http://home.hamptonroads.com/stories...978&ran=172953

Here's the pic from the article.