23rd Aug 2010, 14:03
permalink Post: 81
On the ITVV Concorde DVD the Captain explains that during the cruise climb at mach 2 the auto throttles were armed and would be used as required. Then during descent the throttles were gradually pulled back whilst the autopilot was given an IAS of I think 350 knots. Therefore the plane would have to descend to maintain that speed. He explained that the power settings were chosen to ensure that there was sufficent cooling etc.
My query is if an autoland was to be undertaken was the auto throttle system able to maintain the required landing speed or would the pilot have to manage the throttles? I guess that decreasing or increasing the pitch to control speed when on the glide slope would not be a good idea.
Thanks again
Nick
My query is if an autoland was to be undertaken was the auto throttle system able to maintain the required landing speed or would the pilot have to manage the throttles? I guess that decreasing or increasing the pitch to control speed when on the glide slope would not be a good idea.
Thanks again
Nick
23rd Aug 2010, 14:16
permalink Post: 82
Approach handling was an interesting exercise - being so far down the back of the drag curve (over 100kts below best L/D) very accurate thrust handling was required.
The autothrottle was always used for approach if servicable, except for a two-engined approach, and was absolutely excellent. There were two, operating in parallel, and if the speed was more than a couple of knots out for more than a few seconds it was unusual. In IAS ACQ mode there was an active input from the INS which tracked grounspeed and so enabled anticipatory throttle movements during wind changes - if an autoland runway was available the preferred method of dealing with an approach likely to experience windshear was to carry out an autoland. (I think I speak for everyone, though, if I express a preference for the just going somewhere else option).
In Supercruise one autothrottle only was rearmed if the associated autopilot was engaged - it wasn't active but was available to cater for sudden drops in temperature which could cause unpleasant sudden high rates of climb if the temp shear was sufficient.
The rest of the flight - basically manual thrust, usually with the throttles fully forward.
Maybe one day we'll start making aeroplanes with such sophisticated systems again...........there's still lots that hasn't been hinted at on this thread
The autothrottle was always used for approach if servicable, except for a two-engined approach, and was absolutely excellent. There were two, operating in parallel, and if the speed was more than a couple of knots out for more than a few seconds it was unusual. In IAS ACQ mode there was an active input from the INS which tracked grounspeed and so enabled anticipatory throttle movements during wind changes - if an autoland runway was available the preferred method of dealing with an approach likely to experience windshear was to carry out an autoland. (I think I speak for everyone, though, if I express a preference for the just going somewhere else option).
In Supercruise one autothrottle only was rearmed if the associated autopilot was engaged - it wasn't active but was available to cater for sudden drops in temperature which could cause unpleasant sudden high rates of climb if the temp shear was sufficient.
The rest of the flight - basically manual thrust, usually with the throttles fully forward.
Maybe one day we'll start making aeroplanes with such sophisticated systems again...........there's still lots that hasn't been hinted at on this thread
2nd Sep 2010, 09:10
permalink Post: 188
Nose Leg Retraction
I cannot think of a civil airliner where the nose gear retracts backwards - they all retract forwards. Except the Trident fleets where the NLG was offset from the centre line of the fuselage and retracted sideways. I remember my Avionic colleagues teling me that this was designed specifically because the Cat3b autoland was so accurate they didn't want the pax to have an uncomfortable ride as the nose wheels rolled over the runway lights on landing
3rd Sep 2010, 19:58
permalink Post: 202
ChristiaanJ
During AUTOLAND a flare manoeuvre was instigated by the Pitch Computer at 50' radio, where a fairly simple flare law was invoked. I seem to remember that the law , which used a combination of radio rate (from the RadAlt) and vertical acceleration (from the INS) gave you a commanded height rate of 10'/second at 50', exponentially reducing to 1.7'/second at point of main wheel touch down.
The autoland on Concorde was both extremely accurate and reliable, and an awful lot of guys said they hated using it 'because it can land the aircraft
better than I can'; their words NOT mine. (Personally I never bought that one, the guys were just modest as far as I was concerned
). This in my opinion is an absolute testament to the AFCS designers; ChristiaanJ and his colleagues at SFENA and GEC Marconi.
To give the complete final approach story; as the aircraft tracked the glideslope in LAND mode, the autopilot G/S deviation, like most aircraft, was geared as an inverse function of radio altitude, and at 75' radio this deviation was flushed down the loo altogether, leaving the A/P to hold radio rate for just a few feet. At 50' the flare was instigated, and at around 35' DECRAB was commanded, where the yaw channel would use a rudder input alone to 'kick off drift' and align the aircraft with the runway centreline. (Concorde did not employ a fwd slip manoeuvre in crosswind conditions, being a slender delta). The 'final' command was at 15' radio, when the autothrottle smartly retarded the throttles. (The Pitch Computer flare law of course continuing to control decent rate all the way down). On touchdown the autopilot would be manually disengaged and the nose gently (usually
) lowered to the ground. (Concorde was only designed and certified as a CAT 3A system, so there was no automatic rollout guidance. However there was a runway guidance symbol on the ADI, which used a combination of Localiser deviation and lateral acceleration, to give you runway rollout track).
Now the flare law was tested every autoland, at G/S capture, and failure of this test resulted in the loss of LAND 3 status on the landing display panel. The most common defect of all with the Concorde autoland was in fact failure of the flare test, when at G/S capture, the previously illuminated LAND 3 indication would drop all of it's own to LAND 2. A simple changeover of autopilot paddle switches would nail the offending Pitch Computer, which would then be replaced before the next trip.
Dude
Quote:
| During landing, Concorde isn't flared at all, it is flown onto the ground at a constant pitch attitude. |
The autoland on Concorde was both extremely accurate and reliable, and an awful lot of guys said they hated using it 'because it can land the aircraft
better than I can'; their words NOT mine. (Personally I never bought that one, the guys were just modest as far as I was concerned
). This in my opinion is an absolute testament to the AFCS designers; ChristiaanJ and his colleagues at SFENA and GEC Marconi.
To give the complete final approach story; as the aircraft tracked the glideslope in LAND mode, the autopilot G/S deviation, like most aircraft, was geared as an inverse function of radio altitude, and at 75' radio this deviation was flushed down the loo altogether, leaving the A/P to hold radio rate for just a few feet. At 50' the flare was instigated, and at around 35' DECRAB was commanded, where the yaw channel would use a rudder input alone to 'kick off drift' and align the aircraft with the runway centreline. (Concorde did not employ a fwd slip manoeuvre in crosswind conditions, being a slender delta). The 'final' command was at 15' radio, when the autothrottle smartly retarded the throttles. (The Pitch Computer flare law of course continuing to control decent rate all the way down). On touchdown the autopilot would be manually disengaged and the nose gently (usually
) lowered to the ground. (Concorde was only designed and certified as a CAT 3A system, so there was no automatic rollout guidance. However there was a runway guidance symbol on the ADI, which used a combination of Localiser deviation and lateral acceleration, to give you runway rollout track).
Now the flare law was tested every autoland, at G/S capture, and failure of this test resulted in the loss of LAND 3 status on the landing display panel. The most common defect of all with the Concorde autoland was in fact failure of the flare test, when at G/S capture, the previously illuminated LAND 3 indication would drop all of it's own to LAND 2. A simple changeover of autopilot paddle switches would nail the offending Pitch Computer, which would then be replaced before the next trip.
Dude
3rd Sep 2010, 21:58
permalink Post: 208
Quote:
|
Originally Posted by
Brit312
If I remember correctly ground effect tended to force the aircraft nose down, so requiring the pilots to pull back on the stick as if they were flaring ,but in fact what they were doing was as you say maintaining the pitch attitude constant.
|
M2dude ,
Reading your description of the autoland, you must be quoting from documentation, no?
I've still got the AFM, but i don't think it's as detailed as that?
And for me it's now too long ago to remember it in full detail, without any documentation to cross-check.
Quote:
| This in my opinion is an absolute testament to the AFCS designers; ChristiaanJ and his colleagues at SFENA and GEC Marconi. |
BTW, it was still Elliott at the time.... both SFENA and Elliott have gone through a few permutations since.
CJ
4th Sep 2010, 10:49
permalink Post: 212
BRIT312
This story is totally hilarious, can't quite get this visual out of my head. ('100 KTS, POWER SET' sounds so boring in comparison).
I never had the good fortune to meet any of the Braniff guys; sounds like there was certainly a character or two there. It really is a pity that their operation never really got a chance to expand into the proposed Pacific Rim service, who knows, it might really have done something.
It's generally known that the BA aircraft were temporarily re-registered to facilitate Braniff's operation out of IAD to DFW; G-BOAA, B, D & E were re-registered from G-BOAA and so on, to G-N94AA etc. Being an older registration, G-BOAC was re-registered as G-N81AC. At IAD, the 'G' part of the registration was covered over, leaving a now perfect 'American' tail number. Only five aircraft were involved in the operation (at the time BA operated just six aircraft, G-BOAF was still at the manufacturers at Filton, and G-BFKW (later to become G-BOAG) was on loan from British Aerospace. In order for the necessary FAA certification, required for operation by a US airline, a modification package were required by the FAA. Some of these modifications seemed a little 'picky' and irrelevant at the time (they still do). However some modifications were certainly not in this category, and quite honestly should have been 'picked up' by the CAA & DGAC during original certification of the aircraft. As an example, if the flying controls had been operating on GREEN or BLUE hydraulics only (due to an indicated spool valve jam) and that particular hydraulic system was subsequently lost, there was originally no automatic switching to select the standby YELLOW system into the flying controls; the controls would have been completely unpowered until a manual selection was made by the pilot. . One of the 'FAA Mods' was to facilitate just that, so if this (extremely unlikely I grant you) scenario had occurred, then YELLOW would automatically been selected into the controls, and at no time would the controls have been in an unpowered state.
The Braniff operation ended in May 1980, due to heavy losses on the subsonic only route, and it's a rather sad irony that aircraft G-BOAF had been modified and reregistered at Filton, from it's original registration of G-BFKX to G-N94AF. Unfortunately the aircraft was delivered to BA in June 1980, one month too late to participate, and prior to delivery it's registration was converted to it's 'normal' British registration; all other aircraft also reverted to original registrations also.
ChristiaanJ
Not really, being the sad b****d that I am, I still remember the Concorde flare law of: h+5h. = 0, so it was fairly easy to work out the programmed descent rates. (I did have to check the final 1.7'/second figure though). The rest I'm afraid is straight out of this sad old memory of mine.
Bellerophon
A brilliant description of the mechanics of final approach. It's so easy for us mere mortals to forget just what an involved and skilled process it was, to fly, and in particular land our totally amazing aircraft.
Dude
Quote:
| Now the F/E had a couple of calls to make prior to V1 relating to how good the engines were performing the most important being at 100 kts, however before we got that far the Braniff F/E stood up in his harness and let out the cry " Gee Whiz look at the son of a bitch go". |
I never had the good fortune to meet any of the Braniff guys; sounds like there was certainly a character or two there. It really is a pity that their operation never really got a chance to expand into the proposed Pacific Rim service, who knows, it might really have done something.
It's generally known that the BA aircraft were temporarily re-registered to facilitate Braniff's operation out of IAD to DFW; G-BOAA, B, D & E were re-registered from G-BOAA and so on, to G-N94AA etc. Being an older registration, G-BOAC was re-registered as G-N81AC. At IAD, the 'G' part of the registration was covered over, leaving a now perfect 'American' tail number. Only five aircraft were involved in the operation (at the time BA operated just six aircraft, G-BOAF was still at the manufacturers at Filton, and G-BFKW (later to become G-BOAG) was on loan from British Aerospace. In order for the necessary FAA certification, required for operation by a US airline, a modification package were required by the FAA. Some of these modifications seemed a little 'picky' and irrelevant at the time (they still do). However some modifications were certainly not in this category, and quite honestly should have been 'picked up' by the CAA & DGAC during original certification of the aircraft. As an example, if the flying controls had been operating on GREEN or BLUE hydraulics only (due to an indicated spool valve jam) and that particular hydraulic system was subsequently lost, there was originally no automatic switching to select the standby YELLOW system into the flying controls; the controls would have been completely unpowered until a manual selection was made by the pilot. . One of the 'FAA Mods' was to facilitate just that, so if this (extremely unlikely I grant you) scenario had occurred, then YELLOW would automatically been selected into the controls, and at no time would the controls have been in an unpowered state.
The Braniff operation ended in May 1980, due to heavy losses on the subsonic only route, and it's a rather sad irony that aircraft G-BOAF had been modified and reregistered at Filton, from it's original registration of G-BFKX to G-N94AF. Unfortunately the aircraft was delivered to BA in June 1980, one month too late to participate, and prior to delivery it's registration was converted to it's 'normal' British registration; all other aircraft also reverted to original registrations also.
ChristiaanJ
Quote:
| Reading your description of the autoland, you must be quoting from documentation, no? |
Bellerophon
A brilliant description of the mechanics of final approach. It's so easy for us mere mortals to forget just what an involved and skilled process it was, to fly, and in particular land our totally amazing aircraft.
Dude
Last edited by M2dude; 4th Sep 2010 at 13:12 .
20th Sep 2010, 16:18
permalink Post: 424
Interesting & nostalgic thread. Nice to see this monumental aviation achievement still generates such passion...
In case it's of interest (and suitable health warning as the memory fades)...
The heat did evaporate water vapour in the airframe - reducing corrosion. I remember when the 5 BA aircraft were returned to service, after the post-accident mods, their weight and balance certificates were prepared and found to be out by (IIRC) more than a tonne. This represented water in the airframe present after a year on the ground, and was gone again after a couple hours of supercruise on return to service. Back to the weighbridge for new W&B Certificates....
Vortex lift caused buffet which felt very similar to a conventional wing's stall/low speed buffet. At landing weights (I hate the trend of using the term "mass": weight is a force, mass is not!) you felt the buffet start as you reduced speed (CAS: Vc) to about 250kts. It was handy as a reminder that you should select visor down / nose to five below 250kts (the recommendation was as you slowed through 270kts, but latterly we were in the habit of holding at 250kts nose/visor up - I think TCAS was quoted as a backup to the more limited visibility in that config). At takeoff weights, the buffet went at more like 270kts accelerating. So I'm pretty sure there was no vortex lift at AoA > 7 degrees (250kts at LW).
Recommended subsonic cruise at MTOW was F260 / M0.95 which was equal to Vmo of 400kts (CAS). It was best cruise because Vc=400kts was also min drag at MTOW. F280 meant a slightly more draggy speed of 384kts, but some preferred it because when cleared to climb & accelerate supersonic (the official expression was "go for it") it gave you a bit of slack against Vmo when eng put the reheats in. But we tended to ignore the overspeed warning anyway: it was supposed to go really really fast...
We never flew with visor down and nose up unless it was bust - that config was only used during pushback (except one captain who always thought it looked better visor up....). Visor down max Vc was 325kts/M0.8 so it would limit subsonic cruise, and besides it made a racket like that.
It was a beaut in x-winds - a total lack of yaw-roll couple meant you just straightened the 'plane up with rudder and carried on into the flare as normal. No roll to counteract, and the sideways "lift" created by the rudder deflection on the fin pretty much equalled the x-wind drift. Nice.
Wind limits were Crosswind 30kts (15kts contaminated or autoland), Headwind for autoland 25kts (or manual "reduced noise" approach: that's a technical way we used to reduce the noise footprint down to 800' by flying at 190kts then reducing to a target speed of Vref+7kts at that point). Tailwind 10kts. All these limits were, of course, subject to "on the day" performance limits calculated at the time. I seem to remember there was an over-arching limit of 6000' on r/w length, subject again to "on the day" performance limits. OK, I cheated on this paragraph and dug out FM Vol 2a.
There were loads of other limitations which were, by and large, more "esoteric" than a conventional airliner and which had to be learned for the conversion course. It really made the head hurt, and would have been impossible without a big loverrly picture of the beast on the wall chucking out yellow smoke and making noise. Even a static picture of her seemed to make noise...
No one who flew it could really believe their luck, but one thing for sure is "they don't build them like that any more"...
Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhh..........
In case it's of interest (and suitable health warning as the memory fades)...
The heat did evaporate water vapour in the airframe - reducing corrosion. I remember when the 5 BA aircraft were returned to service, after the post-accident mods, their weight and balance certificates were prepared and found to be out by (IIRC) more than a tonne. This represented water in the airframe present after a year on the ground, and was gone again after a couple hours of supercruise on return to service. Back to the weighbridge for new W&B Certificates....
Vortex lift caused buffet which felt very similar to a conventional wing's stall/low speed buffet. At landing weights (I hate the trend of using the term "mass": weight is a force, mass is not!) you felt the buffet start as you reduced speed (CAS: Vc) to about 250kts. It was handy as a reminder that you should select visor down / nose to five below 250kts (the recommendation was as you slowed through 270kts, but latterly we were in the habit of holding at 250kts nose/visor up - I think TCAS was quoted as a backup to the more limited visibility in that config). At takeoff weights, the buffet went at more like 270kts accelerating. So I'm pretty sure there was no vortex lift at AoA > 7 degrees (250kts at LW).
Recommended subsonic cruise at MTOW was F260 / M0.95 which was equal to Vmo of 400kts (CAS). It was best cruise because Vc=400kts was also min drag at MTOW. F280 meant a slightly more draggy speed of 384kts, but some preferred it because when cleared to climb & accelerate supersonic (the official expression was "go for it") it gave you a bit of slack against Vmo when eng put the reheats in. But we tended to ignore the overspeed warning anyway: it was supposed to go really really fast...
We never flew with visor down and nose up unless it was bust - that config was only used during pushback (except one captain who always thought it looked better visor up....). Visor down max Vc was 325kts/M0.8 so it would limit subsonic cruise, and besides it made a racket like that.
It was a beaut in x-winds - a total lack of yaw-roll couple meant you just straightened the 'plane up with rudder and carried on into the flare as normal. No roll to counteract, and the sideways "lift" created by the rudder deflection on the fin pretty much equalled the x-wind drift. Nice.
Wind limits were Crosswind 30kts (15kts contaminated or autoland), Headwind for autoland 25kts (or manual "reduced noise" approach: that's a technical way we used to reduce the noise footprint down to 800' by flying at 190kts then reducing to a target speed of Vref+7kts at that point). Tailwind 10kts. All these limits were, of course, subject to "on the day" performance limits calculated at the time. I seem to remember there was an over-arching limit of 6000' on r/w length, subject again to "on the day" performance limits. OK, I cheated on this paragraph and dug out FM Vol 2a.
There were loads of other limitations which were, by and large, more "esoteric" than a conventional airliner and which had to be learned for the conversion course. It really made the head hurt, and would have been impossible without a big loverrly picture of the beast on the wall chucking out yellow smoke and making noise. Even a static picture of her seemed to make noise...
No one who flew it could really believe their luck, but one thing for sure is "they don't build them like that any more"...
Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhh..........
28th Sep 2010, 18:27
permalink Post: 479
Quote:
|
Originally Posted by
Nick Thomas
I was wondering if it was possible to hand fly Concorde when she was supersonic?
|
But I would say yes , just tedious, and needing the PF to pay far more attention minute-to-minute to all the various basic flight parameters, and fly them, rather than just monitor the autopilot doing the job.
Quote:
| Therefore would the failure of one or both autopilots mean that you would have to divert to the nearest airport? |
The autopilots were quite reliable, and what's more, they were essentially independent, so the probability of both failing during the same flight was pretty remote.
If one dropped out in flight for whatever reason, you'd engage no. 2 and continue.
The only situation where losing both autopilots within a minute or so of each other would be critical, would be during a Cat.III autoland, and just before that you'd run an autotest of both computers. The probablity of then losing both almost at the same time during those last few minutes was in the order of 10E-09 or less, and indeed never happened.
Quote:
| Also how long after takeoff would it normally be before engaging the autopilot? |
CJ
PS I should add, that normally only one of the two autopilots was engaged, with the other powered but inactive, and IIRC, with AP1 active, AP2 would refuse to engage until you disengaged AP1.
Only in LAND mode could both APs be engaged at the same time, with normally no.1 flying and no.2 as a "hot" standby.
The system was referred to as "fail active", in that no.2 would already be synchronised to what no.1 was doing, and would take over totally automatically, without a hiccup (except an "oh merde" from the pilots, probably).
Quoting from memory.
28th Sep 2010, 21:51
permalink Post: 485
ChristiaanJ
Your quote from memory is correct, although Land PRIME only was required for the second autopilot to be engaged.
Autopilot disengagememnts in Land mode werer in fact extremely rare. (Love the 'oh merde'bit though). The most comon autoland problems were the loss of Warning and Landing Display LAND 3 annunciation. Most problems were due to a failed flare test in the Pitch Computers at G/S capture and failures in the BCII inertial comparator.
Dude
Quote:
|
Only in LAND mode could both APs be engaged at the same time, with normally no.1 flying and no.2 as a "hot" standby.
The system was referred to as "fail active", in that no.2 would already be synchronised to what no.1 was doing, and would take over totally automatically, without a hiccup (except an "oh merde" from the pilots, probably). |
Autopilot disengagememnts in Land mode werer in fact extremely rare. (Love the 'oh merde'bit though). The most comon autoland problems were the loss of Warning and Landing Display LAND 3 annunciation. Most problems were due to a failed flare test in the Pitch Computers at G/S capture and failures in the BCII inertial comparator.
Dude
Last edited by M2dude; 29th Sep 2010 at 08:17 .
15th Jan 2011, 10:59
permalink Post: 1100
A Journey Back In Time !!
OK, here is a photo that I took at Fairford in November 1976. I'd just had my very first Concorde flight on a brand new G-BOAD, and took this flight deck photo in the hangar later that afternoon (the doors are open hence the late afternoon Cotswold sky. The point of this rather poor (sorry guys, I was young for goodness sake) photo is to look at just how subtly different the 1976 flight deck WAS.
The first thing I know EXWOK and BELLEROPHON will (maybe) notice is that originally OAD had a 'normal colour' electroluminescent light plate on the visor indication panel. (If I remember rightly (it was a million years ago chaps) when this one 'stopped lighting' we could not get a replacement and had to rob 202 (G-BBDG) at Filton; this one being the same black development aircraft colour that OAD has to this day.
The OTHER first thing that you may notice is the Triple Temperature Indicator on the captains dash panel. (The first officer had his in in similar position). These got moved around (twice in the end) when TCAS was installed in the mid-90's. It was amazing just how much equipment got moved around over the years, in order to 'shoe-horn in' various bits of extra equimpent.
The cabin altimeter here fitted just above the #1 INS CDU also got moved (to the centre consul) when the FAA 'Branniff' modifications were embodied later in the 70's. It's spot got occupied by a standy altimeter mandated by the FAA but this was removed after Branniff ceased flying Concorde; the cabin altimeter returning to it's former home. The REALLY observant will notice that there is neither an Autoland Ca3/Cat2 identifier on the AFCS panel (glued on by BA at LHR) or the famous and precision built 'Reheat Capabilty Indicator' flip down plate fitted to the centre dash panel a few years later by BA.
Also not shown here, as they were buyer furnished equipment also fitted at on delivery LHR, are the two ADEUs (Automatic Data Entry Units, or INS Card readers). These were located immediatel aft of the CDU's and were used for bulk waypoint loading ('bulk' being 9, the most that the poor old Delco INU memory could handle). These were removed in the mid 90's when the Navigation Database was fitted to Concorde INUs, and bulk loading then was achieved by simply tapping in a 2 digit code. (Hardly the elegence of FMS, but still very elegent in comparison with the ADEU's, and worked superbly). A little note about these ADEU things; You inserted this rather large optically read paper data card into the thing and the motor would suck the unsuspecting card in. As often as not the ADEU would chew the card up and spit the remnants out, without reading any data, or not even bother spitting out the remnants at all. Removing these things FINALLY when the INUs were modified was absolute joy!!
ps. When G-BOAG (then G-BFKW) was delivered in 1980 it had neither any of the Branniff mods or ADEUs fitted. (Also the INS was not wired for DME updating). This meant that obviously she could not fly IAD-DFW with Branniff but also she could not do LHR-BAH either, because of the lack ADEUs. (You could not manually insert waypoints quick enough over the 'Med', or so the guys told me. So for the first few years good old FKW/OAG just used to plod between LHR and JFK. And plod she did, superbly. She never did get the ADEUs (not necessary thank goodness when the INUs got modified) but we wired in DME updating and so she could navigate around with the best of them.
My gosh I do prattle on, sorry guys.
Best regards
Dude
PS Welcome back Landlady, hope you've recovered from your fall XXXX
The first thing I know EXWOK and BELLEROPHON will (maybe) notice is that originally OAD had a 'normal colour' electroluminescent light plate on the visor indication panel. (If I remember rightly (it was a million years ago chaps) when this one 'stopped lighting' we could not get a replacement and had to rob 202 (G-BBDG) at Filton; this one being the same black development aircraft colour that OAD has to this day.
The OTHER first thing that you may notice is the Triple Temperature Indicator on the captains dash panel. (The first officer had his in in similar position). These got moved around (twice in the end) when TCAS was installed in the mid-90's. It was amazing just how much equipment got moved around over the years, in order to 'shoe-horn in' various bits of extra equimpent.
The cabin altimeter here fitted just above the #1 INS CDU also got moved (to the centre consul) when the FAA 'Branniff' modifications were embodied later in the 70's. It's spot got occupied by a standy altimeter mandated by the FAA but this was removed after Branniff ceased flying Concorde; the cabin altimeter returning to it's former home. The REALLY observant will notice that there is neither an Autoland Ca3/Cat2 identifier on the AFCS panel (glued on by BA at LHR) or the famous and precision built 'Reheat Capabilty Indicator' flip down plate fitted to the centre dash panel a few years later by BA.
Also not shown here, as they were buyer furnished equipment also fitted at on delivery LHR, are the two ADEUs (Automatic Data Entry Units, or INS Card readers). These were located immediatel aft of the CDU's and were used for bulk waypoint loading ('bulk' being 9, the most that the poor old Delco INU memory could handle). These were removed in the mid 90's when the Navigation Database was fitted to Concorde INUs, and bulk loading then was achieved by simply tapping in a 2 digit code. (Hardly the elegence of FMS, but still very elegent in comparison with the ADEU's, and worked superbly). A little note about these ADEU things; You inserted this rather large optically read paper data card into the thing and the motor would suck the unsuspecting card in. As often as not the ADEU would chew the card up and spit the remnants out, without reading any data, or not even bother spitting out the remnants at all. Removing these things FINALLY when the INUs were modified was absolute joy!!
ps. When G-BOAG (then G-BFKW) was delivered in 1980 it had neither any of the Branniff mods or ADEUs fitted. (Also the INS was not wired for DME updating). This meant that obviously she could not fly IAD-DFW with Branniff but also she could not do LHR-BAH either, because of the lack ADEUs. (You could not manually insert waypoints quick enough over the 'Med', or so the guys told me. So for the first few years good old FKW/OAG just used to plod between LHR and JFK. And plod she did, superbly. She never did get the ADEUs (not necessary thank goodness when the INUs got modified) but we wired in DME updating and so she could navigate around with the best of them.
My gosh I do prattle on, sorry guys.
Best regards
Dude
PS Welcome back Landlady, hope you've recovered from your fall XXXX
Last edited by M2dude; 15th Jan 2011 at 11:29 .