Bizjet notebook (Part 2) More from the NBAA notebook of Budgie News' s bizjet expert, Larry Learjet. So when is a VLJ really a VLJ? Aircraft Investor Resources (AIR) drew some disbelief in Orlando for muddying the waters by naming its planned Dynasty single-engine turboprop a VLJ - very light jetprop. At the same time, EADS Socata was running a cartoon at its booth promoting the TBM 850 "very fast turboprop" over VLJs. So now do we get: personal jets vs impersonal jets very fast turboprops vs not so fast turboprops very light jets vs very light jetprops entry-level jets vs my jet is bigger than your jet? Dassault chief test pilot Yves "Bill" Kerherve on flying the fly-by-wire (or in French, fil-par-voler/wire-by-flight surely?) Falcon 7X via "lateral stick" (ie sidestick): "It's good not to have that old-fashioned thing in front of you - the yoke."
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USAF C-17 suffers compressor stall at Richmond air show in Australia Flight tests of the RAAF's new C-17 on-board self-deployable ABU are going "flaming well", according to Flt Lt 'Bluey' Strewth. Tests using a borrowed USAF C-17 reached a climax with the 'full-monty' MBBQ condition, and will be completed when ther system must stand alight for a full five minutes without ground interference Engine speak From the "not-quite Yuckspeak" files we bring you NOD = "native" object damage (vs "foreign"). Apparently this is when bits come off one compressor blade and hit the ones next to it. To help nephews and nieces everywhere, remember this special little saying: "A NOD's as good as a ding to a blind aeroengine mechanic." Sun meets Moon In a recent Financial Times story about a proposed Chinese mission to the Moon, the head of the Chinese National Space Administration, a Mr Sun, says the lunar spacecraft "will take pictures of the Moon from 200km away and analyse atmospheric conditions between it and the Earth". Budgie News spaceman Joddrell Blank asks: "Does this mean that the real reason the Space Shuttle has wings is that it actually does 'fly' in space, and does it mean all these years the USA and Russia have lied to us and in fact we could just take an airliner there for a long distance flight? Of course if we could it would obviously have to be ETOPS (extra-terrestrial operations) capable." Secret 737-1000X revealed? "Tehran, Aug 29, (BNA) An Iran Air passenger plane, with 300 people on board, made an emergency landing at Bander Abbas Airport today. Iranian News Agency (IRNA) said the Boeing 737 was on its way from Tehran to Malaysia." (From a Bahrain News Agency clip spotted by nephew Chris Brady.) |
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Source: Flight International
