Posts by user "Brit312" [Posts: 35 Total up-votes: 0 Page: 2 of 2]¶

Each engine had associated with it a set of lights , Blue, Amber, and Green

BLUE reverse light --- this reflected the correct operation of the
reverse thrust.

Flashing, rev selected but buckets in transit
On steady reverse selected and achieved

Amber Configuration
[CON] light----------- ON if reheat fails with no loss of engine RPM
On if reverse selected and primary nozzle greater
than 15%

Green Go light---------- This light monitored the engine for correct power
for take-off in that

Fuel flow and P7 had to match or exceed a pre
calculated figures, which were preset on their
individual gauges prior to take off.

The secondary nozzles had to within their
take-off limits

The CON light is off

In the case of No 4 engine the N1 limiter has
returned to normal position

Now normally there was a call of 100kts and at that point there had to be 4 green GO lights illuminated otherwise the t/off would be aborted. There was a concession to this in that if runway/ conditions /weight allowed the takeoff could continue with only 3 green lights illuminated at 100 kts as long as the
affected basic engine was OK[ this covered the loss of one reheat]

The green lights were considered necessary if the aircraft was using a rough runway and nose nodding could interfer with correct engine instruement monitoring and were also handy as the pilots could at a glance check whether they had at least minimum eng power for t/off.

To keep things simply their use was standard on all T/offs rough or otherwise

In 1987 we also used Machrihanish because they were digging up the end of Prestwicks runway which made it too short for touch and go

In1998 we also used Porto as I think Chateauroux asked us to leave after too many noise complaints

Before we started base flying at Brize Norton there was a lot of negative opinion about it due to possible noise. The first day of training the airport was saturated with noise complaints, however what the local population did not know was that the Concorde had gone U/S and did not fly on that day. They could not see due to cloud cover but what they were complaining about were the RAF VC-10 in the circuit , and these aircraft had been training there for months with no complaints.

Shannon was always considered too risky for Concorde to base it self at for Base training, however in 1998 when things in N.Ireland had settled down a bit we did base a Concorde for a few days in Shannon for base training.

If I remember correctly during all the flight testing program at Fairford, BAC built a lay-by on the main road so that the public could watch the aircraft come and go free of charge. Apparently some bright spark bought himself a white coat and a roll of parking tickets and started charging people for parking. Now that is what you call free enterprise

The engine intake guide vanes were heated [on selection] by a hot air bleed from the exit of the HP compressor. Other than that there was not hot air bleed for anti icing purposes

Now the leading edges of the intakes and the leading edges of various bits within the intake along with the underside of the wing in front of the the intakes were deiced by a combination of continuous and cyclic electrically heated mats.

All of this electrically heated deicing was infact extened engine deicing so as to ensure that when the ice came off it would be in small enough chunks for the engine to digest without damage. [Another system almost direct from the Bristol Britannia]

The fin nor the rest of the wing had any anti icing system

I have to admit I had to look up my old manuals to ensure I was correct , and I can now confirm that in Concorde's Precautionary Engine Shut Down Checklist there is no item requiring the crew to shut the LP fuel cock, so they did not forget they stuck to the checklist

Now I do not know what event happened to require the engine to be shut down, and if it was for fuel loss then yes the crew should have been moitoring the difference between fuel on board and fuel used figures and I am sure they were. However if they were also slowing and descending then the fuel system would be quite active and the difference between fuel on board and intergrated fuel left could vary very much during this phase of flight as the fuel cooled and you found that the gauges were still showing a few hundred Kgs each, even though the pump low pressure lights were on

It would not have been until they had settled down at Mach 0.95 with fuel transfer still that a proper appraisal could be made of the difference between the two fuel remaining indication and now the loss of fuel in the appropriate collector tank.

Not sure where they were when they started their subsonic diversion but believe me even with everything going for you there would not have been huge amounts of fuel left, by the time the aircraft got to Halifax

Perhaps if there is any blame it should lie with the people who wrote the checklist, by not putting an item in to cover such a case as this

It seems to me thet poor old Air France are blamed when

1] They deviate from the checklist as was suggested in the crash

OR

2] Stick to the checklist as in this case

Now you might say what about airmanship, well they did use it, perhaps a bit earlier would have been better, but easy to say without knowing all the facts.

Hey Dude,

If you quote a drill and then blame the crew for not doing something which is not in the drill you have to realize some one will correct you.

Anyway enough said

QUOTE]I'm wonder if all 4 Olympus 593 all died in flight and unable to restart. Is it
possible to be able to land at the nearest airport[/QUOTE]

As CristiaanJ says , it depends on how far the nearest airfield was away, but given that there was one close enough then yes in theory it was possible.

On Concorde there were two checklist to cater for a four engine failure that assumes the engine have flamed out but not seized thus the system can be fed by windmilling engines. The two drills are

4 ENGINE FAILURE ABOVE MACH 1.2

4 ENGINE FAILURE BELOW MACH 1.2

When above M1.2 the windmilling speed of the engines should keep the engine generators on line and you should have good hyd pressure also.
Therefore the main point of the drill at this speed is to try and relight the engines, by selecting relight on all 4 engines at the same time. You normally got the chance to go through 2 and some times 3 relight sequences before the speed dropped to Mach 1.2

At mach 1.2 with no engines then the windmilling speed is reaching a point where it is not sufficent to hold the generators on line so the drill concentrates on switching as much of the systems onto essential electrics which will be supplied by the hydraulically driven emergency generator.
To help support the yellow and green hyd system below M1.2 the ram air turbine is lowered. Engine relights will continue to be attempted but as you are on essential electrics now they can only be attempted individually.

If no relights and below 10,000ft then the c/list tells you to prepare the aircraft for landing by lowering nose/visor and gear by emergency systems with speed reduced now to 270 kts. To conserve hyd pressure being mainly derived now from the RAT for the flying controls the emerg gen is switched off during the approach and approch speed is 250 kts with min landing speed
of 200kts

During this all this descent the aircraft had to be flown and navigated, radio calls made along with PA and cabin briefing and all the normall descent checklist complied with so you can imagine it was quite a busy time

This drill used to be practised on the sim ,but the crew would normally find the engines started to relight before 10,000ft so as to give the crew confidence that the drill worked.

However after many years of operation there was some talk about doing away eith the drill as no one could envisage it ever happening. then the BA 747 lost all 4 engines in the volcanic ash cloud and all such talk stopped

The route from Bahrain to London was quite good to, as once the throttles were opened for Take-off they were never touched again until the decel in the north of the Adriatic. The departure went if I remember correctly like

Throttles opened for take -0ff
At 500 ft switch off reheats
At 1000ft select Climb Rating with the switches on the overhead panel
At M0.95 select reheats in pairs
At M1.7 switch off reheats
At 50,000ft select Cruise Rating on the switches on the overhead panel

Sit back and have lunch before decel

The aircraft would be heavy and the ground temps high so the climb accel would be slower than out of Cardiff,but it was still impressive.

A couple of points on some of the latest entries

Discharge valves

We definately used alternating systems outbound and inbound and only No 1 system had thrust recuperators. I think the original idea was that No 1 system would be used always with No 2 sytem being a back up. However from the start BA operated as I said alternating per sector so as to be sure that both system were working. The same logic went for the engine starting ignitors which were used Lh or Rh per sector. This logic caused more problems with starting than any other although a way was found to over come this problem

under wing

Not sure if I am on the same thread as others but there were definately strengthening straps / doublers fitted on the underside of the wing outboard of the engines, which were on a wing root/wing tip alignment. This surprised everybody as they seemed to go against all the need for limiting drag that had been impressed on us during the lectures.

These strengthening straps were fitted a few years after the start of service due to small cracks appearing in the outer wing, and only seen on BA aircraft. This was put down to the fact that in the early years BA Concordes flew heavy and subsonic for extended periods across Europe, on their route to Bahrain, whereas Air France aircraft always accelerated shortly after take off

Also either side of the engines there were two tubes on the underwing which went fore /aft. These tubes were the drain outlet for their respective engine dry bay and directed any fluid to the trailing edge of the wing.

Mind you all this is some 30 years ago so the old grey matter could be playing me tricks

Mike,

On your original photo you can see perhaps 5 span wise smudges just forward of the dotted red line on the engine. On your second photo you can see them again with three just forward of the registration letters. The problem is that the aircraft in the photos are too clean and so they show up less.

These straps were quite neatly done but for Concorde they were rather agricultural. As far as I remember only BA aircraft suffered this problem for the reasons stated before, but I am not surprised to see that Air france aircraft were also modified.

All though the number of Concorde pilots was relatively small there were afew more than 97

Britsh Airways ------ Air France

Captains 73---------------------- 74

Co-Pilots 62 --------------------- 54


Total 135 --------------------- 128

Grand total of Pilots 263 [ includes two women]

Flight engineers 57-------------------------56

These numbers do not include the French and British flight test crews

During the early years there was some doubt from the CAA that the aircraft could be handled in Mech signalling in the transonic region. Lots of meetings were held, and finally on a test flight the gentleman was invited again and one of the original training Captains flew the aircraft perfectly through the transonic area whilst descending in Mech Signalling. With that said it was a delicate area and control inputs had to be gentle and small so I understand



Yes there was an Ignitor selector labelled LH--Both--RH, however the engines would be started using only one ignitor. This caused a few small but annoying delays as if the selected ignitor failed the start would have to be stopped the starter given a cooling period and then a further engine start using the other ignitor would be attempted, however it did give a running check that both ignitors were working.

This was not very popular with the crews and the ground engineers were persuaded to test the ignitors before presenting the aircraft for service. However due to the engine starting Fuel Pump switching, this resulted with a small fire in the hangar, and so the crews were back to starting on Lh or RH ignitors.

If I remember correctly the RR Conways on the VC-10 also had 2 ignitors per engine with a LH--Both-RH selector.

At one time there was a suggestion that BA adopt the Air France technique where the F/E did this check on the ground pumps prior to engine start, which did not go down very well with the F/E. It was fortunate that some one came up with the suggestion that this would wear the ground pumps out , and so this check stayed as apilot check after the engined were running [Thank God]

If you remember, if something went wrong with the Flying control check the F/E was always busy. This gave him a chance to think up a suitable answer or even better the pilots did the check again and it now worked.

No dude we never came to see you boys for the "Pilots Tech Refresher" as we always had to keep those lectures very simple as otherwise the pilots would go to sleep.

Now I have to admit coming across the hangar to consult with you boys when preparing for a new sequence of F/E "Tech Knowledge Checks". Not that we did not understand it, you understand, but mainly to make sure that we were correct before some clever line F/E informed you of your error. Very embarrising that, and I should know

Dude

Now, not so touchy, as if you had quoted all of what I said you can see that I did agree we came to the hangar for info as well as for a good chat

Perhaps I should have said

" before some clever line F/E informed me of my error"

It is easy [by looking in my book] to confirm the starting sequence was
3421 or for a Push Back it was 3 then 2 followed by 4 then 1, after pushback was complete

Now the hard part is to remember why, and perhaps it was because that is the way in BOAC/BA we had always started engines, but on previous aircraft I do remember there being a reason such as brake pressure or electrics, which was not the case on Concorde. However I seem to remember that the hydraulic pump layout on pre production Concordes was not always the same as the airline version, so this might have had some influence

However by starting 3 then 4 first it did allow engine start to commence with the passenger finger still in place. Now unlike the French the flying control checks were carried out by a pilot as engines were being started and it started with "Blue" being selected which was sourced from 3 and 4 engines.
Now I think this was only because 3 and 4 were the first engines to be started rather than the reason, but it was handy to speed things up.

Now I have heard a rumour you understand that sometimes when things were running late the 3 and 2 engines would be started at the same time, but you have to understand this is only a rumour

?

I think you are referring to the 100kt call, when the F/E was expected to give a call as to the state of the powerplant [both engine and reheat] achieving desired power for take off. He was assisted in this decision by the illumination of 4 green lights [ one per engine] which came on if the engine power was OK. Should one green light fail then he would confirm the correct engine operation by observing that engine's N2 and Area position

If all OK at 100kts the F/E would call ---- "Power Set"
If not all Ok then he would call ----------" Engine Failure" which would
result in a rejected Take off

In the early days there was no concession and every take off had to have 4 green lights illuminated so the call then was " 4 Greens" , but when the concession came along that term would not fit so the change in call

The concession were
1] one green light out [seeabove]
2] and basically if weight, and airport conditions allowed it a take off could be continued even with one reheat failed at 100kts

Up to 60 kts the F/E could reselectt a failed reheat so hoping it would be
OK by 100kts
At 100kts the conditions in the above concessions applied
Above 100kts the take off would continue even if a reheat failed however
if another fails when below V1 the take off would be rejected

So finally to answer your question the correct call [well in 1998] was

" Power Set "

Christiaan,
Just to add a bit more to your explanation is that

The reheat decision speed on every take off was 100kts

If the little tag showed 4 then you needed 4 reheats at 100kts to continue
the take-off

If the little tag showed 3 then at 100 kts you could continue the take-off even if one reheat had failed

If above 100kts you could always continue with the take off, even if a reheat had failed [ always required 3 reheats working]

So if it was a "3 reheat day" and a reheat failed prior to 100kts then a further reheat failure between 100kts and V1 would require the take off to be rejected.

Hope that makes sense??