Posts about: "G-BOAD" [Posts: 19 Pages: 1]

Galaxy Flyer
We never had a case of lost pressurisation, ever. The cabin windows had dual laminated panes; an inner pressure pane and an outer thermal pane. We had dual systems that kept the cabin at a max diff' of 10.7 PSI, the engine bleeds pushing about 200lb of air per minute into the cabin. This allowed you to fly the cabin at an altitude of around a 6000' maximum only, right up to TOD. If you HAD to fly subsonically, the ideal was Mach 0.95 at FL290. (Subsonically the aircraft had similar range to normal, but took well over twice as long of course). If however you had to shut down an engine, your range deteriorated quite dramatically, and a diversion was usually sought.

It's great that Bellerophon is posting here again; we need a steely eyed Concorde pilot's input here (not just the boffins/nutters and nerds [that's me ]. To touch more on a couple of his valid points;
Fuel burn: The aircraft would naturally require less fuel as she became lighter and as a consequence gently climbed to maintain cruise Mach number, this is what the engine control system was doing all the time, even though the throttles were wide open it was 'tweaking'.. BUT, the decreasing IAS as you climbed, due of course to the reducing density, just like any other aircraft meant that drag was reducing too, so it was a combination of both of these factors, reducing weight and reducing drag.
Flying controls: It was a slightly weird but wonderful arrangement; pilots inputs would move a servo valve in the hydraulic relay jack, the jack would move in response and drive both a resolver AND mechanical linkages. The resolver ourput was sumed with the flying control position resolvers, and the error signal was fed into an autostab' computer, where it was summed with stabilisation demands (primarily axis rate and acceleration). The autostab computer would the directly drive the surface, and the reducing error signal would reduce the demand etc. While all this was going on, the mechanical linkages would slavishly follow, but as long as you were in FBW (what we used to call 'signalling') mode, these mechanical inputs were de-clutched at the PFCU, so did nothing at all. Only if there was an EXTREMELY unlikely failure of BOTH FBW channels would these inputs be clutched in and the flying control group (rudders, inner elevons or outer and mid' elevons) would then be in Mechanical signalling. The system redundancy was checked after engine start on every flight. But to reinforce what Bellerophon stated, there was no mechanical reversion here; without hydraulics you had nothing. Another aside here; the designers, being paranoid like all good designers (no offence Christiaan ) were worried what would happen if the controls would somehow jam up. A jammed mechanical flying control input run itself would have no effect on FBW operation whatsoever, due to spring boxes being fitted to the runs. A 'Mech Jam' light would be set, together with a separate red light and audio warning, but this was all. But to completely protect against the aircraft was fitted with a Safety Flight Computer (SFC) system. The idea was, if a control axis (pitch or roll only) jammed up, the captain could press down on a switch light set between the two halves of his control wheel, (at the centre of the 'W') and the Emergency Flight Controls would activate. Strain gauges at the front of the control wheel, two sets on each control column for pitch and roll axis, would input into an SFC that would covert the control force into an elevon demand. These commands were then fed into the autostab' computers, and hence directly into the controls. (A little like L-1011 CWS in a way). There was a little test button that was used to test this system, again after engine start. So although the controls were jammed, the aircraft could still be flown. (Never used in anger I'm pleased to report).
But there was a problem; if this system was inadvertantly used, the results could have been catastrophic, as the system was extremely sensitive indeed, and full elevon movement could be enabled with only moderate effort. Because of this hairy prospect some safeguards were obviously put in place. The first safeguard was an interlock in the autostab' engage logic; If the switchlight had been inadvertently selected beforehand (the light was green by the way) you would not be able to engage pitch or roll autostab's (both channels too) so you would not be going flying until that was fixed. The second safeguard was a little more subtle; A plastic, frangible cover was fitted over the switchlight, unless the captain pressed reasonably hard the cover would prevent the switchlight from being pressed. At least that was the theory, in practice this little bit of plastic could be a pain in the ass . It was carefully fashioned, and I seem to remember BAe charging the airlines a few hundred pounds each for these things. If some wally fitted the cover upside down (and unless you were careful it was easy to do) THE THING WOULD NOT BREAK!! I remember at Fairford in 1976, G-BOAD was on pre-delivery flight testing, and the late great test pilot John Cochrane was doing a test of the system. The cover on this occasion HAD been fitted upside down, and of course he could not plunge his thumb through it and engage the EFC button. After trying everything, in the end he removed a shoe, took out his pen, and smashed the plastic cover until it broke. (It's OK, the autopilot was engaged at the time). Unfortunately, his combined shoe/pen emergency device also wrecked the switchlight as well, so the system still could not engage. (There was only a switchlight on the captain's side). After he landed and he confronted us all with his dilemma, he was shaking; not with rage but with laughter. (This was the great John Cochrane, sometimes the dour Scotsman but he was always able to see the lighter side). After that event, careful instructions were issued regarding the fit of the cover, and it was modified and made a little more frangible.

MEMORIES
Like so many in the Concorde family, I have millions, I'd like to share a couple here. I remember at Fairford in mid 1974, a CAA test pilot (I honestly forget the gentleman's name) was taking the British pre-production A/C 101 (G-AXDN) for a special test flight. The reason that this flight was so special was that for the first time, the CAA were going to do an acceptance flight trial of the brand new digital air intake system. This revolutionary system had been retro fitted to 101 barely a year earlier, and being a brand new (and totally unique, in electronics terms) system had been plagued with teething troubles. It was quite reasonable for any airworthiness authority to have serious misgivings about any system that was going to wave great big metal lumps around in front of the engine compressor face, and that if only a few degrees out from the commanded position out could cause the engine to 'backfire' etc.
So anyway, 101 took off and disappeared into the very blue sky and we waited, and waited, AND WAITED. (I'd only left the RAF and joined the project a few months previously, and did not want my new association with this amazing aircraft to end). I was biting my nails, drinking coffee, losing my hair... (without the help of M2V ). Anyway after about 2 1/2 hours the aircraft returned to Fairford, and everybody crowds around the crew for the debrief. A very stern faced CAA pilot looked at us all, broke into a grin and said "as far as I'm concerned gentlemen, you've got yourselves an airliner". At that point the room was a study of total happiness, blessed relief, and a need to go to the loo..... But from my point of view, I will remember those words forever.
101, which now resides at the Imperial War Museum Duxford was the fastest Concorde ever. She achieved Mach 2.23, which was an incredible irony, as Concorde can trace a large part of it's developement history back to the BAC 223, proposed SST.
As far as flying memories go, I just don't know where to start; My first ever Concorde flight was in November 1976, out of Fairford on a pre-delivery test flight on G-BOAD. (Now sadly bobbing up and down on the Hudson, next to the USS Intrepid). I was staggered how fast and high we flew (Mach 2.08, FL580). Most of my flying up to that date had been in C-130's in the RAF, at around 340 KTS and FL300; Concorde also being infinately quiter in flight than the good old Herc'. I remember a BA QA guy showing me how I could touch the skin of the aircraft at Mach 2 (You reached behind a door busstle flap, moved your hand through some insulation until you felt bare metal). OUCH!! it was hot, very hot.
But I think one of my most memorable flight memories was aboard G-BOAG, (now residing in the Boeing Museum of Flight in Seattle) returning from BKK, having stopped off to refuel in BAH. We were forced to fly subsonic over Saudi, and got caught in this amazing electrical storm, There was St Elmo's fire cracking and bubbling all over the visor panels, but just as incredible was the long blue electrical discharge coming off of the nose probe; it seemed to extend about 50' in front of the aircraft. The crime was, none of us on the F/D had a camera. Every time I bump into the captain on that day (are you reading this Ian?), we go back to remonissing about that incredible flight. Also, later on the same sector, after we had decelerated to subsonic cruise again, this time flying up the Adriatic, we had another fascinating sight: It was getting quite dark now, and here we were, travelling at Mach 0.95 at FL290, when above us was all this Mach 0.8 ish traffic at around FL330-350. All we could see were all these navigation and ant-coll' lights above us, seemingly travelling backwards. It was quite a sight. On the original BAH-BKK sector a week earlier, we flew through some of the coldest air I'd ever seen; The air was at ISA -25, and at Mach 2 our TAT was only about 85 deg's C. (You could feel the difference too; the cabin windows felt only warm-ish to the touch). The upside also of all this was that your fuel burn was much lower than usual. (The only downside of course is that your TAS is a little lower). Rolls Royce did some analysis on the flight, and were amazed at how well the propulsion systems coped with some of the temperature sheers that we encountered, sometimes 4 to 5 deg's/second. They said that the prototype AFCS had been defeated by rises of only 0.25 deg's/second ).
Not meaning to go off onto a (yet another) tangent; Negative temperature shears, very common at lower lattidudes, always plagued the development aircraft; you would suddenly accelerate, and in the case of a severe shear, would accelerate and accelerate!! (Your Mach number, quite naturaly, suddenly increased with the falling temperature of course, but because of the powerplant suddenly hitting an area of hyper-efficiencey, the A/C would physically accelerate rapidly, way beyond Mmo). Many modifications were tried to mitigate the effects of severe shears, in the end a clever change to the intake control unit software fixed it. (Thanks to this change the production series A/C would not be capable of level flight Mach numbers of any more than Mach 2.13, remembering that Mmo was set at 2.04).
There was one lovely story, involving the Shah of Iran, having one of MANY flights in a developmment aircraft. The aircraft encounterd quite a hefty series of temperature shears that plagued havoc with some Iranian F4's that were attempting to close on the Concorde, to act as an escort for the Shah. (or so the strory goes). I'm still trying to picture these F4's, on full afterburner trying to get close to a Concorde cruising away on dry power). It is said that the F4's were having such difficulties, due to their relatively crude powerplant, coping with the temperature changes, that the Concorde was ordered to slow down, 'so the escorting F4's could catch up'!! True or not, it is part of Concorde folklore.

Dude

Nick Thomas
[QUOTE]Going back to expansion and paint. With the aircraft expanding approx 6 inches and a temp change up to 127`c, I guess a special kind of paint; able to withstand such adverse conditions; must have been used? When deciding on the paint specification was any consideration given to the overall weight of the paint?[/QUOTE
Can't remember much about paint spec's, but a lot of experimentation/trial and error was carried out with different paints until the right one was found. I remember when G-BOAD was delivered, that copiuous sheets of paint had peeled off in flight. Finally a superb polyurithane paint was found that did the trick perfectly.
Yes Nick, the life of the airframe was limited by the number of supersonic cycles, however modifications carried out extended the life of the airframe significantly. (and more were planned).
And the 'hat in the gap' stories are quite true.

ChristiaanJ

Quote:

Many years later, I discovered that several airline Concorde pilots did not even know the function existed....

This was the real beauty of the autostab' on all 3 axis; you could just safely take it all for granted. The Mach 2 engine out case was a classic, as not only would the aircraft yaw towards the dead engine but there was an adverse roll input, where the wing on the same side would LIFT due to the excess intake air for the failed automatically being 'dumped' through the now open spill door. If for any reason the aircraft HAD been under manual rather than autopilot control, then life without autostab would be rather uncomfortable to say the least. And putting further Concorde's achievements in terms of stability; the world's only previous large delta winged Mach 2 aircraft, the B58 Hustler, had the slightly awkward feature in the case of an outer engine failure at Mach 2, in that the yaw forces were sufficient to tear the fin off. This happened on more than one occasion during service life of the Hustler, but engine failure (or far more likely a deliberate precautionary shut-down) although hardly a non-event in the case of Concorde, it was routinely dealt with without drama or danger.

Dude

Blue concorde
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Yes, so my not-so-trivial questions, aimed more for F/E and Ground Engineers are:
1) with the same quantity on tanks 6 and 8, for example, 10 tons, there would be a roll tendency? I suspect yes, but not sure.
2) Using valves 6/7 and 5/8 would make lateral unbalance gone or they just leveled the fuel height on each pair of tanks? (Assuming that all these 4 tanks had the same height, what sounds logical to me)
3) Is there any table with these tanks quantities to reach lateral balance or the F/E did fine tune just by making elevons level?

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In answer to your questions , unlike the chart for C of G purposes there was no such chart for lateral trim rreasons. We would just transfer fuel across the ship so as to keep the elevons level at between 0 and 1 degree down. However when transfering fuel across the ship as the paired tanks are fore and aft of the C of G then when getting lateral trim you also affect the
C of G.

It is along time ago now and I cannot recall actual figures but your suggestion of between 500 and 700 kgs is I think a good ball park figure

The interconnect valves were never used under normal circumstances, but give it a go it might just over come your problem.

Nick Thomas

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remember that around 1980 one Concorde was painted on one side in the Singapore livery. Obviously the flight to Singapore would need at least one fuel stop. What I have always wondered is which part of the route was flown supersonic? Was she granted any overland supersonic rights? Also was it feasible to have a short supersonic section followed by a subsonic bit and then back to supersonic? I guess that having to use reheat to accelerate
twice to mach 2 would use too much fuel.

It was actually G-BOAD that was 1/2 painted in Singapore Airlines colours in the last part of !977
For more info on this subject check out this web site

CONCORDE SST : Singapore Concorde Services

The original route LHR- Bahrain flew subsonic across Europe and then accelerated to supersonic just off the coast in the north of the Adriatric. It was Supersonic then all the way to Bahrain avoiding islands in the Med but crossing the coast of the Lebenon still at supersonic speeds. This sector even with the long subsonic period [0.95 Mach] still cut the journey time LHR to BAH by 2.5 hours. For the crews the return trip to LHR was more exciting as once the throttles were opened to full power their position never changed until TOD. Once airbourne ---- reheat off at----------------- 500 ft
climb rating[switches] at----1000ft
climb/accel at 0.95r/heats back on and
away you go

The Bahrain - Singapore sector were my favourite though with only a short delay after Take Off before being cleared supersonic and because of the cold air temps at 50000ft plus the old girl would go up to 60,000ft and cruise there at Mach 2.0 and we would roar just south of Sri Lanka north of Indonesia and down the Malacca Straits slowing down and trying to avoid all the thunder heads

Although nothing actually to stop accelerating twice in a sector the fuel use on a long trip would usually not make this viable

NOTE How do you get the posh blue quote inserts

OK, I see others have already posted answers.
I've carefully avoided looking at them, but I'll might as well plug in mine now.

My personal problem is that I was involved in the very earliest days, before the aircraft went into service, and then in the last days and afterwards...
So the questions dealing with the in-service period are totally outside my field of experience... all I can do is guess, in case I saw the answers somewhere.

1) How many Concorde airframes were built?
Twenty-two.
Two static-test airframes.
- One at Toulouse, for purely static tests, and tests such as vibration and flutter.
- One at Farnborough, for the long-duration thermal fatigue tests.
(A few bits and pieces of the Farnborough test specimen have survived, and can still be seen at the Brooklands museum).
Two prototypes (001 and 002)
Two pre-production aircraft (01 and 02)
Two production aircraft used for certification, that never entered service (201 - F-WTSB and 202 - G-BBDG)
Fourteen production aircraft, seven that served with British Airways, seven that served with Air France.

2) As far as the British constructed aircraft went, name the destinations that were served?. Regular flight numbers only, excludes charters etc.
Not a clue as to the full list.
- Bahrain, obviously.
- JFK.
- IAD (not sure if that's rated as regular, or only incidental)
- Dallas (with Braniff)
- Barbados (of course, right until the end)
- Sngapore (with Singapore Airlines, and G-BOAD in Singapore Airlines colours on one side)
- Sydney (again no idea if that rated as a regular flight or only a few tries)

3) What was the departure time for the ORIGINAL morning LHR-JFK Concorde services? (Not called the BA001 then either).
Not a clue either. Vague memory of about 10:00 am which gave you a full working day in New York.

4) Further to question 3 above, what WERE the original flight numbers for the BA001 and BA003? (The morning and evening LHR-JFK services?)..
Never flew on them, never had to deal with them.
BA174 comes to mind from the depths of my memory, in that case BA003 would have been BA176?

5) There were no less than FORTY SIX fuel pumps on Concorde. What was the breakdown for these? (Clue; don't forget the scavenge pump )
M2dude, I did AFCS, not the fuel system. I believe you, but without pulling out some diagrams I honestly have NO idea.
I expect each tank had at least two pumps, which gets me up to 26.
Then there were a few emergency pumps for the trim tanks, and I suppose each engine had additional pumps associated with it.
Still nowhere near the 46 I need to find.....

6) What airframe had the only TOTALLY unique shape?
That would have been my old friend, 01 (G-AXDN), first pre-production aircraft, now at Duxford.
It was the first Concorde with the new transparent visor, but it still had the short tail that characterised the prototypes.
It was 02 (F-WTSA), the first French pre-production aircraft, that was close to the final shape of the production aircraft.

7) This one is particularly aimed at ChristiaanJ. What was the total number of gyros on the aircraft?
Good question.... never counted them all. But I'll try a guess.
First a nice one, the SFENA Emergency Standby Artificial Horizon (made by the firm I worked for).
Ran off the Emergency Battery Bus via a small independent inverter.
And if that failed too, it would still run reliably for several minutes on its own inertia.
Next, the rate gyros used by the autostabilisation system ; these measured the angular rate of the aircraft along the three main axes, pitch, roll and yaw.
There were six, three each for the two autostab systems.
Now the rest....
Each IMU (inertial measurement unit, part of the inertial naviagation system) had three gyros.
With three INS on board, that would make nine.
Much as I try, I can't remember other ones, so I'll look forward to the final answer.
I can imagine the weather radar using an additional gyro for stabilisation, but I never went there.

8) How many wheel brakes?
Unless this is a trick question, I would say eight, for each of the main gear wheels.
The nose gear did not have any brakes - unless there were some small ones to stop the wheels rotating after retraction of the gear, but not used during landing.

9) What Mach number was automatic engine variable intake control enabled?
No idea.
Mach 1.0 or thereabouts is my personal guess only.

10) Above each bank of engine instruments were three lights, a blue, a green and an amber. What did they each signify?
I know that they each monitored the status of one of the engines, because it was too complex for the pilots to fully monitor all the parameters of all four engines in the short time between start-of-roll and V1... they had too many other things to do.
But I don't remember what each light meant, would have to look it up in the manual.

11) At what airfied were the first BA crew base training details held?
No idea.
Was it Brize Norton, or Casablanca?

12) What LHR runways did Concorde use for landing and take-off? (Trick question, not as obvious as it might seem).
No idea.
Vague memory of it being systematically the North runway for noise issues.

13) What operator had serious plans to operate Concorde from SNN to JFK in the early 1980's?
No idea.

14) What development aircraft did not exceed Mach 2 until fifteen months after her maiden flight?
I would expect the obvious answer to be 002.
Working up from first flight to Mach 2 was a slow and laborious process, and in the end it was 001 that both flew first, and also went to Mach 2 first.
I don't think any of the other aircraft took that long.

A I said, I tried to answer all questions "off the top of my head", without looking at any other sources.

CJ

Mike-Bracknell
It is not nonsense, and you are quite at liberty to post here. Wow, that's still quite a question though Mike. There are two TECHNICAL issues that overshadow all others, namely airframe corrosion and hydraulic system deterioration. Unfortunately none of the BA aircraft were stored inside from the outset, so we have a real issue here as far as corrosion goes, plus all the hydraulic systems were drained, resulting in seal drying out and probable moisture ingress into the 3 systems. But given sufficient funds (and assuming you find an organisation to take over design responsibility from Airbus; ironic when you consider that without Concorde there would almost certainly have been no such organisation ) there is still no technical reason why the problems (and there are dozens of other problems to consider) could not be overcome, the money side of things is another matter
Looking first at the French fleet, the main candidate for restoration to flight status would be F-BTSD at Le Bourget. Not only has this aircraft been lovingly cared for and stored INSIDE, but the aircraft has had several systems (including the Green hydraulic system) powered and reservoirs not drained.
The British story is less clear; G-BOAA in East Fortune was effectively killed when the wings were cut off for transportation, so that one is out of the question. G-BOAB, the last and only Concorde at LHR has been left to rot outside, in fact holes were even drill in the fuselage to drain water, so this one is a no no too. G-BOAC at Manchester, now the oldest surviving production aircraft was initially stored outside, but now resides in a purpose built exhibition 'hangar'. Now she COULD be a potential candidate for consideration; when I last saw her just over a year ago she was absolutely pristine; a testament to the team that have been caring for her there. G-BOAD, stored next to the USS Intrepid in New York, we can probably forget, due to having been exposed to 7 years worth of salt water corrosion from the Hudson River. (Also, while she was temporarily stored in New Jersey a couple of years ago, some IDIOT in a truck bent the whole nose section when he hit her. The radome was smashed (replaced with a rather clever fibreglass fabrication) and the nose straightened with a blow-torch and hammer (I am not joking!!). G-BOAE at Grantley Adams airport in Barbados has been stored under cover for much of the time; provided she has not suffered too much from the wam damp atmosphere of Barbados, well she could be a potential candiitate too. G-BOAF in Filton, well PROVIDED she is still OK after her 'removal from public view' experience could also be a potential candidate also. And finally, G-BOAG in Seattle; well she had been left outside, right next to a highway (and close to a truck stop too). She did not look too good the last time I saw her; the undercarriage barrels werer all brown and discoloured and the paintwork was completely dull and matte. (She had a new paint job not too long before retirement too). So out of the 'BA Seven', I PERSONALLY would go for G-BOAF, G-BOAC or G-BOAG.
As I have said often here before, it is EXTREMELY unlikely that what you, Mike, suggest will ever happen, but in spite of what others might say, IT IS NOT IMPOSSIBLE. My own gut feeling is a resounding 'no', but I could be wrong, . (And NO ONE would be happier than I if I am wrong; I was with the BA aircraft through construction, flight testing and the entire service life with BA).
As for the cost? It really is a case of 'how long is a piece of string', but for 2 aircraft we could be looking in excess of $100 or more, who knows?
But as the Everly Brothers used to sing 'All I have to do is dream.'
Keep posting Mike.

Dude .

Landroger
Come on Rog, let's not be silly now. I was not 'upset', and you can use the 'T' word any time you feel that you need to lad. It's just that you used a very poor example to use when, I don't know what your point was anyway, comparing Concorde with any other aeroplane.
The J58 powerplant design for the SR-71 is superb, and considering the early 1960's era that it was developed, was nothing short of astounding.
For Mach 3 cruise air is bypassed around the engine core and fed staright into the afterburner duct, where it supplied the afterburner directly. Still a remarkable design though, even now.
Oh she didn't; she just leaked. (not on the same scale as the SR-71 though).. If you were nuts enough to walk under a fully fueled Concorde without an umbrella you often got quite wet and smelly. The leaks were 'drips' and not running streams, and maximum permissable leak rates were mandated and controlled, but if she became particularly 'drippy' it was straight back to the hangar for tank re-sealing for our Concorde. The fuel tanks were sealed using liquid viton rubber, the idea being that the viton when it solidified would filll in all the nooks and crannies of the tanks. Controlling leaks was one of the most time and labour consuming aspects of Concorde maintenance, to get in and seal some of the smaller tanks was challenging to say the least, and some pretty small chappies were required for some of the tank areas.
I still remember that when we were building Concorde, this idiot of a production manager at Filton (the same one that was responsible for the debacle of G-BOAD sitting on her tail) insisted that the fuel tanks were filled with fuel as soon as the tanks were completed, whether the sealant was dry or not. I still wonder how much of the in-service leak maladies could be directly attributed to him.

Dude

Just some notes on the side.

With the lack of comm from Airbus, of course we don't know the details, but I would have thought the problem is essentially the under-floor insulation, the same that causes the musty smell in the Fox-Charlie cockpit. If so, I doubt they'd bother to strip the cabin.

This is nothing new.
For "Filton", read "Filton airfield and the Airbus site".
At present, the 'permanent home' is planned to be at Cribb's Causeway, where land is already available.
Since this is only just on the other side of Filton airfield, so far there is no question of breaking up the airframe, or road transport.

I doubt this.... The "pressures" from these bodies and people consist only of noises on internet forums and in the press. As long as BA (as the owner), Airbus (as the current 'guardian' and legacy manufacturer) and the CAA (as the regulatory body) say "NO", Airbus knows perfectly well it'll never happen, pressures or no pressures.

My own take is simply, that they're fed up with a Concorde on their site, that their early 'enthusiasts' who campaigned for 'A Concorde at Filton' have now left, and that it's now Airbus exerting pressure on the Concorde Trust and other bodies to provide that 'permanent home' they've been talking about for years.

To be exact, 18,257 hours and 5,639 supersonic cycles
As noted in another post, not the lowest, but a lot less than the 23,000+ hours of G-BOAD and G-BOAE.

In 2003, the issue with G-BOAF was that she was almost 'out of hours', with only a few hours left until the next big overhaul (an 'Inter', IIRC).
At the time, this was the reason why G-BOAF did not partake to the full extent in the flying during the last months, so as to have a few hours 'spare' for the last few flights, and of course the final flight.

Nowadays of course this is pretty irrelevant since any aircraft after seven years outside would need a 'Major' overhaul at the very least .
And that's another reason why Airbus wouldn't be bothered by those "pressures" mentioned earlier... they know perfectly well nobody is going to come up with the \xa3100M +++ to re-create the necessary infrastructure.

CJ

VApilot2004
This really is a sad state of afairs I know. G-BOAD even had the 'radome tore off and the droop nose bent sideways by an idiot of a truck driver when she was stored in New Jersey 18 months or so ago. A new 'radome' was fabricated out of fibreglass (quite a reasonable attempt actually) and the bent nose? A hammer and blowtorch fixed that!! (I'm not joking). I have American engineer friends at JFK who can not even bring themselves to look at what Alpha Delta has become. They used to take exquisite care of Concorde during JFK transits, and to see her now, well it's just too much for those guys. (This is another personal one for me I'm afraid, G-BOAD was the first Concorde I ever flew on, November 5th 1976 out of Fairford).

Regards
Dude

dixi188
This incident could well have been G-BOAD #2 engine then; this one swallowed an intake ramp brake assembly. Details of this incident itself can be found in the links that I posted regarding 'When Intakes Go Wrong'

Regards
Dude .

Nick Thomas
Jeepers Nick, I must have about a million, but I'd like to share a few here. (Some of them I have prattled on about before in this thread, so I apologise for any repetitions).I suppose my very FIRST Concorde image would have to be in Swindon in 1970, when I was this young RAF 'erk' at nearby RAF Lyneham; I heard this loud roar in the sky over what is now Debenhams, and looked up and saw for the very first time Concorde 002, along with her attendant Canberra chase plane.
My next memorable image was at Fairford in the summer 1974. (No longer a young RAF erk, but a still fairly young lad now working for BAC). I'd seen quite a few spectacular take-offs in my short time at BAC, but A/C 101 (G-AXDN) was being flown by a French DGAC pilot (I forget the gentleman's name I'm afraid) and did the most amazing of take-offs. It was the clearest of blue summer skies, and this guy rotated 101 and just climbed steeply into the Gloucestershire sky, and climbed and climbed until she was virtually out of view; truly memorable.
Another image that I will never forget is the view of Concorde taking off from JFK RW31L, viewed from the right side of the runway sat in a truck (I did this dozens of times and never tired of watching the spectacle). It always amazed me how ANY airliner could turn and climb that amazing fashion, and would try and keep her in view as she did an almost complete circuit around JFK. (But I found the view from the aircraft, when seated in the supernumerary seat just behind the captain even more amazing. You'd looked out of the rear L/H window and see nothing but the water of Jamaica Bay going by, very fast and VERY close).
Another GREAT image was in 1995; on a special test flight on-board G-BOAD out of LHR. I was sat on the flight deck with the three guys (just us four on the whole aeroplane) and we were positioned just aft and to the left of the BA189 Concorde service to IAD. We started the supersonic acceleration together, but as we peeled off south for our extensive test flight, the BA189 (can't remember for the life of me the registration) just seemed to streak ahead just like the Starship Enterprise, and was out of sight completely quite soon after that.
And I shall never forget the very sad view of the last ever Concorde take-off, watching from the side of Heathrow RW 27R in November 2003. OAF took off with all her usual grace, but symbolically just disappeared into the overcast, dark and gloomy sky. My own final personal image after 33 years of watching Concorde is that the aviation world, just like that November sky, is a far gloomier place without her.

Best regards
Dude

I took this one over the Atlantic, of G-BOAF, BA002 at Mach 2 FL 560 from G-BOAD FL 480 Mach 1.9 (test flight) in July 2003. (Mach 3.9 closing ).

Best rgards
Dude

Wow, what a great thread! I started reading it yesterday and am up to page 19 so far! I flew on the wonderful white bird once, in 1999, a Manchester - round the bay at Mach 2 - Paris flight in G-BOAD. And the wonderful thing was I did the entire flight, push back at Manchester to parking at Paris, in the jump seat! What a fabulous experience - thank you Roger!

Here's a picture I took as the aircraft turne left towards the French coast:



One memory is climbing through 50,000 feet over South Wales before turning down the Bristol Channel. It was glorious August day and I had a great view forward past the captain and particularly out of the left window. The speed over the ground at Mach 0.95 seemed noticably faster than a subsonic jet, and that view was breathtaking! The Bristol Channel was edged in golden yellow beaches, and I could see right across south west England to the English Channel. In my headset the controller called another aircraft; "Speedbird 123 if you look up now you will see you are about to be overflown by Concorde". I leaned towards my side window and there was Speedbird 123, a tiny scurrying beetle miles below us. From this height the fair-weather cu looked as if they were on the ground - like small white splodges from some celestial artist's paint brush.

We cruised at Mach 2 and 60,000' over the Bay for a while and the pax came forward to view the flightdeck. I was amazed how patient was the supernumery captain who was answering the same questions over and over again was (the flight crew were too busy to chat).

The approach to CDG looked far steeper than other airliner approaches I had witnessed from the flight deck; more like one of my glide approaches in the Chipmunk! But it wasn't, of course, as we were following the 3 degree glideslope. I guess it was an illusion brought about by the steep pitch angle.

I remember the captain resting his hands on the throttles as they shuttled back and forth under autothrottle control, the smooth touchdown, the 'landing' of the nosewheel followed by full forward stick, and thinking "we'll never make that turn off". Then on came the powerful reverse and the brakes, I was thrust foreward in my harness, the speed disappeared, and we made the turnoff easily!

Oh, and that stange bouncy ride in the flight deck on the ground as the long nose forward of the nosewheel flexed over every joint in the taxyway. So bad at times it was difficult to take a photograph!

What an experience!

I have a question which I hope hasn't been answered in the pages (20 to this one) that I've yet to read.

From an earlier post I understand that the anti-skid used a rotational reference from the unbraked nosewheels to compare to the rotation of the mains, and that with gear down in the air a substiute nose-wheel referance is supplied which, because the mains are not yet rotating, allows the anti-skid to keep the brakes off.

But what happens when the mains touch down with the nosewheels still high in the air? What (if anything) inhibits wheel braking until the nosewhels are on the ground (and therefore rotating)?

Also, this thread started with a question about the lack of an APU. When Concorde was parked could the aircon and cabin lighting be powered by external electrical power, or did the cabin aircon without engine power require an external 'aircon unit' to be connected? Or was aircon simply not available without at least one engine running?

And one for Landlady or any other CC. If a table top was set up between the cabins during service, how did the 'front' crew service the first 2 rows of the rear cabin?

Being 'up front' for my entire flight, I missed out on the cabin service. But superb though I'm sure that was, under the circumstances it's not something I regret!

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

I went to have a poke around G-BOAD this afternoon at the Intrepid museum.

Am sad to say she's in a bit of a sorry state - paint peeling off in places which is no doubt due to being outside in the full weather of NYC. For example, there's still several inches of snow on the wings/elevons from the storm half a week ago.

Inside is no better - visible mould on some of the seats which are enclosed underneath a plastic display case type affair, printed on which are some alleged facts about Concorde, but at least one of them was completely wrong.

Such a shame. I have only been to see two of the preserved frames, this one and G-BOAA at East Fortune and I have to say the latter is a far better experience. At least someone seems to care about educating people about the aircraft and keeping it in good 'nic, which is not what you can say about the one in New York.

Another Concorde on a river, I think we have seen enough of that situation with G-BOAD. The damp river location isn\x92t the best location for a Concorde, even if it does look good.
Lets find good homes from them, undercover!

CliveL (And ChristiaanJ)
Sure can Clive. These are the BA 5102 numbers, Air France 5101 numbers were corespondingly identical chronologically.: G-BOAC - 5102-01. G-BOAA - 5102-02. G-BOAB - 5102-03. G-BOAD - 5102-04. G-BOAE - 5102-05. Although G-BOAG (G-BFKW) and G-BOAF (G-BFKX) were originally Variant 192 (British Unsold) aircraft, these correspondingly became 5102-06 and 5102-07. I wonder if anyone here remembers G-BOAF doing her pre-delivery flying at Filton registered as G-N91AF? I remember when I was at Filton doing one of my Concorde type courses in 1980, and there was good old Foxy Lady with her 'Branniff' registration. She was re -re-registered to G-BOAF prior to delivery to BA.

The Component 30 skin thickness issue was not relevant for RELIFE 2 ; you and I know that the major 'skin' issue here was the centre fuselage crown area. The issue of Component 30 was a 201/202 issue only. (Assuming that the French had the need/desire/capability of adding another airframe to their fleet.
And sorry everyone about the \xa330 cost of converting 202 into an airliner, I meant (dumb ass that I am) \xa330 MILLION.

Best regards
Dude

Save Bristol\x92s Concorde and the Brabazon Hangar

The Brabazon Hangar dominates the south side of Filton Airfield. During the 1960s it became the home of the UK Concorde production line, but Concorde wasn\x92t the first aircraft to be built within this amazing structure.
The hangar was originally built during the 1940s to enable the construction of the massive Bristol Aircraft Company\x92s type 167, which is better known as the Brabazon and hence this is where the name of the hangar came from . This giant airliner aircraft had a 230ft wingspan, and was powered by eight pair-coupled Bristol Centaurus piston engines and was Britain\x92s attempt at a non-stop trans-Atlantic airliner.

The prototype flew in 1949 six years and \xa33 million after the conception, and sadly the aircraft was already obsolete. The British de Havilland Comet jet-powered airliner was already well on the way and on the other side of the Atlantic, Boeing were developing their 707, and both of these would fly faster and carry more passengers than the Brabazon The prototype flew for a short while and a second turboprop-powered prototype (Brabazon II) was being built when the project was abandoned. Both aircraft were subsequently broken up in 1953.
With the demise of the Brabazon project Bristol was then left with one of the largest aircraft production facilities in Europe and therefore the giant Brabazon hangars were put to other uses, these included being used for the production line for the much more successful Bristol Britannia airliner.

But the Brabazon hangar has become more famous today as the birthplace of all the British built Concordes, ten airframes were built there, one prototype known as 002, one pre-production known as 01, one development production known as Delta Golf, and of course the seven airliner production airframes detailed below\x85
G-BOAA
G-BOAB
G-BOAC
G-BOAD
G-BOAE
G-BOAF
G-BOAG
Concorde 216 G-BOAF was the last Concorde built anywhere in the world, and of course the very last one to fly in November 2003. During her final flight she flew back to her birthplace, to Filton to form a major part of a new planned Bristol aviation museum. The plan was to house the whole of the Bristol Aviation Collection, known as the BAC, in one building, a centre to celebrate Bristol\x92s incredible aviation history, and let\x92s not forget that Bristol led the world.
But like so many things in this fast changing world, ideas and directions soon change and as in this case not for the better.
Heritage Concorde has heard of one idea that it wishes to push forward with anyone who would be willing to work alongside the group. With next years closure of Filton airfield, one incredible heritage building stands at risk of being ripped down and lost forever, the Brabazon Hangar. So why not use this building as the centre of the history of Bristol aviation and space industry, and in memory of the man who started it all, Sir George White. It\x92s large enough to form one of the most incredible museums in the world; it would be able to house the whole BAC collection with Concorde 216 at the centre, where she was built.
This idea needs to be looked into and not dismissed so easily by the people leading the effort for the new museum. Heritage Concorde will start to develop this idea further.

Any ideas, any offer of help or advice???
Steve de Sausmarez

It was indeed! I have spoken to many Concorde pilots and most confirm the unexpected phenomenal climb rate at light weight in base training. They were briefed to level off at 1,500 feet but on their very first flights on the real aeroplane (it'd been all sim prior to that) some went way beyond. I'm told the record was 4,000 feet! One told me "I used to get it turning - that cooled things down!".

My one and only Concorde flight (G-BOAD) was Manchester to Paris via the Bay for 60,000 feet and M2. I was lucky enough to be in the jump seat for the entire flight so didn't suffer 'small window' limitations! My most memorable view was about 50,000' over South Wales looking through the windscreens. The whole of SW UK was visible on that glorious August day in 1999, with the scattered occasional cu looking as if they were on the ground! The bright yellow of the beaches around the coasts of Wales and England stand out in my memory, as well. As do other aeroplanes flying west-east very far below us!

At 60,000' the sky was amazing - dark blue fading to very dark overhead. And of course the curvature of the Earth clearly visible.

Despite flying interesting aeroplanes for well over 30 years myself, that flight in AD is a magnificent highlight I will never forget!

For those who want to sit in the P1 seat and try out those lovely cabin seats, come and see our G-BOAC at Manchester!