Spits escorting a different kind of Boeing

[The Inspector]

I kid you not! You will all be astounded the first few times an 87 or 47-8 takes off as you watch, the sharks teeth stop the aft fan cowl lip shrieking which makes most of the noise, you can barely hear the inlet fan gently buzzing, it makes a 767 sound like an F-18 in noise comparisons.

[JBoyle]

Does anyone else think the nose of the 787 has a passing resemblance to Meatball on Black Sheep Squadron?

S

Okay, I know this is off topic....


Yes, I thought the same thing.

It's a Bull Terrier (not a Pit Bull or one of the many other similar breeds)....you may also remember them as Spuds McKensie (sp?) from the beer commercials in the 80s, or better yet as Patton's dog "Willie" in Patton.

JDK...I too met the Sheriff (and Lady) of Nottingham. His staff called my office at Bentwaters and asked for a tour. Long, funny story. Hilarity ensued.

[Sasquatch]

Funny to hear them called that, Inspector; around here on the 787 Program the cutouts are officially called "chevrons". And interestingly, they are individually sized and contoured to attenuate sound specific to their location around the cowling. Listening to the 787 taxi by at Paine, I'm reminded that the Trents on that bird sound pretty much unlike any other commerical plane I've heard, very quiet with a whispering or blowing overtone and soft "blowing" spool-up...the only thing I can recall hearing sound similar is the Navy's Lockheed S-3B Viking anti-sub plane...we called them "Hoovers" (like the vacuum cleaner) aboard the carriers, as they resembled a loud electrolux or Kenmore

--Tom

Those are called 'Sharks teeth' and are designed to keep ALL the engine noise within the boundries of an airport , like.....Heathrow. Where as the noise footprint of a stage 2 727 is 54 square miles, if you listen to the video all you hear are the MERLINS, not the 90K # each TRENTS, this beauty has nearly the same thrust as the 747-100's with half the engines. I wonder if they could hear the MERLINS inside the 787?
Couldn't say about the dog in the series, can't stand Robert Conrad and the show seemed to have three rotating scripts so didn't watch it much-also had EAA stuff to do during that time span.

[Cking]

Hi Sasquatch. Since you are involved with the beast can I ask you two questions?
1. Do you get any cracking between the vallys of the chevrons? It just looks a prime area for cracking to me.
2. How noisy are the compressors that supply the air conditioning system? I work on the line and I just wonder how much of a scream they put out, the equipment cooling fans on most Boeings are loud enough!!

Rgds Cking

[the330thbg]

Does anyone else think the nose of the 787 has a passing resemblance to Meatball on Black Sheep Squadron?

S

LMAO

[Sasquatch]

Cking,

So far I have not heard of any cracking issues in the chevrons. The folks here seem pretty good at designing with composites, so I'd be surprised if the design did not take into account such tendencies, especially in such an acoustically intense area. And I've not heard the ECS compressors myself, so can't offer an opinion. Hopefully they'll go easier on your ears than previous models. Wish I could offer more, but I'm not in those info loops.

--Tom

[The Inspector]

The ACM's are all electric so no bleed air to spin the compressors of which there are 7 on each pack and each pack is just about big and long enough to serve Thanksgiving family dinner on. The guys in the cartoon shop (engineers) may call them 'chevrons' but I think of Chevron as where I fuel up my car and bike, ramp slang has them pegged as 'sharks teeth'

[Cking]

Thanks Inspector and Sasquatch
The noise aircraft make on the ground is a thing of mine. Possibly due to the constant whistling in my head. Other people complain about voices in their heads, I can't hear them!
I'm a worrier so I'll worry about the Chevron's/Shark's teeth/Toblerone fairing's in my own time!
(I do need to get out!)

Rgds Cking

[The Inspector]

CKING,
in that case donot stand anywhere near the R/H main gear aft body fairing on a DC-10 or MD-11. Thats where the APU fire horn is and it's 190 Dba and about ten feet over your head, louder than the Space Shuttle launch from the viewing area, sort of the equivalent of standing between 2 top fuel dragsters running in the pre stage with both pumps on, painful!
and as long as 8 of the 10 voices say 'don't shoot' believe them.