Restoration of first commercial jetliner

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First aircraft that I ever flew in.
But by that time, they had non square windows!
The airline was DanAir.

Comets were fitted with Hard points so they could befitted with JATO type rockets to assist takeoff if required.
 
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Interesting. I recall reading about why airplane windows are oval, but didn't know it was that plane. Very interesting engine integration...
 
I never understood the design of the early 60's Chevy and GMC trucks until I first saw some of these pictures. A light bulb moment!
 
It may look like window to the media but a fuselage crack developed that included the
forward escape hatch and no where near a passenger window... To uncover the culprit a
Comet fuselage was submerged in water tank and subjected to pressure changes simulating
the effects of a continuous series of of 3 hours flights while hydraulic jacks worked the
wings to reflect actual flying conditions.

Quote Epic of Flight the Jet Age
"Slowly new evidence accumulated. The pressure changes had pulled rivets through the skin
and caused cracks in the fuselage, frame and floor beams. After the equivalent of 3,057
flights, a large split suddenly appeared at the forward escape hatch. Had the jet been a
loft, it would have immediately broke up. The Comet's fatal flaw had been found."


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CM6ALYU1.jpg
 
Ah, the Comet. An inspiration to Douglas engineers who came up with the Death Cruiser 10 and its successor the More Death 11.
 
Originally Posted By: L_Sludger
Ah, the Comet. An inspiration to Douglas engineers who came up with the Death Cruiser 10 and its successor the More Death 11.


While neither of those planes have a stellar rep, I don't hear you whipping the workhorse of the Mad Dog's, the MD80? its long and recycled history is well known, with endurance and a rep similar to 737 Classics
 
As someone who has worked in the airline industry for 25+ years, including employment with BLB (Boeing Long Beach a.k.a. Douglas Aircraft), I would like to hear your justification for that statement.

Originally Posted By: L_Sludger
Ah, the Comet. An inspiration to Douglas engineers who came up with the Death Cruiser 10 and its successor the More Death 11.
 
Originally Posted By: JHZR2
Interesting. I recall reading about why airplane windows are oval, but didn't know it was that plane. Very interesting engine integration...


Beyond the windows being oval, I believe the aircraft skin is thicker in a band running along the window line.

Years ago, I was in the Chicago Museum of Science and Industry (an interesting place, I highly recommend it) anyway, they have an airliner, a 727, hung off a balcony. The side of the plane is cut through so you can see what's inside and enter the plane. I remember seeing how the aircraft skin was about .031" aluminum, except for a band running the window line, there it was thicker, perhaps .062". I did pause for a moment and consider how the design lesson to make the windows oval and the aircraft skin thicker had cost many lives...
 
Originally Posted By: kschachn
As someone who has worked in the airline industry for 25+ years, including employment with BLB (Boeing Long Beach a.k.a. Douglas Aircraft), I would like to hear your justification for that statement.

Originally Posted By: L_Sludger
Ah, the Comet. An inspiration to Douglas engineers who came up with the Death Cruiser 10 and its successor the More Death 11.


A big series of high-profile crashes from the 80s through the 90s don't convince you? Those names were earned.

I'm not going to wag my credentials - no need - but I've been in the airline industry and in aerospace engineering, and still am.
 
Originally Posted By: michaelluscher
Originally Posted By: L_Sludger
Ah, the Comet. An inspiration to Douglas engineers who came up with the Death Cruiser 10 and its successor the More Death 11.


While neither of those planes have a stellar rep, I don't hear you whipping the workhorse of the Mad Dog's, the MD80? its long and recycled history is well known, with endurance and a rep similar to 737 Classics

The DC9 and MD80 are fine aircraft. The KC-11 is a fine airplane as well.
 
Whoa, how many were due to design flaws leading to airframe failure? Flight 232 I might concede (although that had a direct cause of an uncontained engine failure). But the rest?

You also made the connection between the Comet's design and the DC-10/MD-11. How do you figure?

http://www.airsafe.com/events/models/dc10.htm

Are you a pilot? I'm not "wagging" my credentials either. But I do know what I'm talking about.

Originally Posted By: L_Sludger
Originally Posted By: kschachn
As someone who has worked in the airline industry for 25+ years, including employment with BLB (Boeing Long Beach a.k.a. Douglas Aircraft), I would like to hear your justification for that statement.

Originally Posted By: L_Sludger
Ah, the Comet. An inspiration to Douglas engineers who came up with the Death Cruiser 10 and its successor the More Death 11.

A big series of high-profile crashes from the 80s through the 90s don't convince you? Those names were earned.

I'm not going to wag my credentials - no need - but I've been in the airline industry and in aerospace engineering, and still am.
 
KC-11?? What??

If you mean KC-10 then explain how it is different than the DC-10. One is a "Death Cruiser" and the other a "fine airplane"? They have the same basic fuselage design and the same flight software. How are they different?

Originally Posted By: L_Sludger
The DC9 and MD80 are fine aircraft. The KC-11 is a fine airplane as well.
 
I'll admit that my previous statement deriding the engineering of the DC/MD trijet types by Douglas engineers was off the mark and I'd retract it if I could.

kschachn, thanks for the correction on the tanker type! KC-10 indeed.

The KC-10 has a better safety record and is better suited to its mission than the DC-10 was for passenger transport. You could say the same for the type being used right now in cargo ops, except for the porpoising FedEx plane at Narita back in '09.. that one was really hard to watch.

I can guess that you're nostalgic for the heyday of the DC-10. I understand that. I'm nostalgic for the heyday of the L-1011.
wink.gif


Now, as much as I'll say about a particular type, I'll concede that no type is immune to disaster. The 777 had the best record in the industry until just very recently with those Malaysian Air flights.
 
Death Cruiser?
More Death?
Both of these types were operated very sucessfully in passenger service, although there were many more DC-10s than MD-11s.
The only built-in problem the -10 had involved the orginal aft cargo loading door, the latching mechanism of which could be easily overpowered by a ramper eager to get the door buttoned up for the push. A tragic accident resulted from this, although had the ramper been properly instructed in properly latching the door, the accident would never have happened.
The -11 simply requires very close attention to approach speeds and a willingness on the part of the pilot flying to go around and not try to salvage an unstabilized approach.
The -11 was, after all no more than a stretched -10 with smaller tail feathers and thus less elevator authority available.
MDC did an excellent job of developing new aircraft from old designs. Boeing liked the ultimate DC-9 development enough that they built it as the 717, ex-AirTran examples of which will be operated by Delta for at least the next decade.
Not bad for a design that entered service more than a year before the first 737.
The DC-10 may have gotten all of the ink, but there were also a number of hull losses with fatalities involving both the L-1011 and the 747.
 
Originally Posted By: Rick in PA
Article on restoration of Air France Comet.

I always thought the Comet was a beautiful plane, although those jet engines in the wing root must have been a bear to work on.


Air France?
I was going to call foul on this but Air France did briefly operate the type.
This restoration will not be a cheap or easy task.
I hope that this aircraft flies again.
Where do you get parts for a de Havilland Ghost engine?
For that matter, what other firm would have named a couple of their aircraft Vampire and Venom, with a couple of Dragons and Doves thrown in?
 
Originally Posted By: fdcg27

Where do you get parts for a de Havilland Ghost engine?


Oh that's not too difficult. Almost no moving parts compared to an axial flow engine. Tolerances should also be loose enough to make replacement turbine blades or whatever else needed pretty easy to reproduce. This engine only has one turbine stage. Volvo Aero (Now part of the GKN Aerospace conglomerate) would have the blueprints to this engine and can easily be contracted to make more of those parts. Even a private machine shop with an EDM machine and a CMM can make and qualify those parts to modern standards. If there's any old engine that would be easy to fix up, it would be one of those ancient centrifugal-flow jet engines.

If they get REALLY hard up, I could even do it for them.. haha.
 
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