Aircraft News Weblog

Category: battery

  • Boeing and Airbus on track?

    The Boeing Dreamliner is back in the air and the Airbus A350 is completing the first elements of the flight test program required for certification. So all is well in the Big Two manufacturers world. Or is it, such is the nature of the business that this assumption will never be accurate. There will always be setbacks and problems when each airframe, engine combination is pushing back the boundaries of fuel economy and efficiency.

    There is a huge requirement to reduce all the negatives like fuel burn and aircraft weight while increasing the load and range of the aircraft. The development of the airliner design from the first jet airliner, the De Havilland Comet, to the latest Boeing or Airbus aircraft has been amazing in the last 60 years. Every time I think they have reached the ultimate in design they exceed it with the next aircraft.

    The Boeing 737 was, and still is the work horse of the Seattle based manufacturer. It was challenged by the A320 family and now the Big Two are competing for another prize with the 787 and A350 by flying non stop from London England to Sydney Australia as a regular commercial route.

    Quite amazing that Louis Bleriot managed the first powered flight across the English Channel in 1909 and now in 2013 we are vying for non stop scheduled flights from London to Sydney.

    I can’t wait to see what they will come up with next.

  • B787 Dreamliner battery fix?

    There is some progress in the Boeing 787 Dreamliner battery problems. Boeing have given the FAA full details of a fix for the Lithium Ion battery overheating problem. Although the details are being kept under wraps, the fix has to include a new container for the battery which will prevent damage to the aircraft in case of fire and a method of venting fumes outside. There also has to be a redesign of the wiring or monitoring system to prevent the battery overheating in the first place.

    Further investigation in Japan, where both All Nippon Airways and JAL have had battery incidents on their Dreamliner’s, has resulted in wiring problems being discovered connecting the APU and the Aircraft main battery. The details of these problems are still being investigated and reported to Boeing.

    The original problem with the battery has not been discovered so all possible causes have been identified and fixes proposed to address them. The real test will be when the aircraft starts operating again as there is only so much that can be simulated on the ground or by controlled test flights.

    A long term fix may be the change of the battery type but nobody is talking about that.

    The update from the NTSB that was published in December 2014 blamed the battery problem on the design and possible manufacturing issues with the batteries. The blame was spread between the FAA and Boeing for not considering the consequences or even possibility of a battery cell overheating and affecting other cells. The manufacturing process was also targeted with foreign material found to be introduced into the batteries.