boeing

I got an e-mail Friday morning from my contact at Boeing alerting me to the fact that the aerospace giant delivered its 1,400th 747 Thursday.

The lucky recipient of the 747-400 freighter was GE Commercial Aviation Services, which plans to lease the jet to AirBridgeCargo Airlines, a Boeing press release says.

What really struck me about the news is that there are only 1,400 747s. It seems to me that every time I fly through Los Angeles, I see something like a couple hundred of the big planes on the tarmac, half of them owned by Qantas.

Of … Read more

The first ray guns to be used in combat may well be aerial weapons, and not phaserlike side arms in the hands of foot soldiers.

Certainly Boeing is working in that direction. For several years it's been providing regular updates on the (notably slow) progress of its marquee directed-energy effort, the Airborne Laser, to be carried aloft by a heavily modified 747 that's intended to stop ballistic missiles during their launch phase. Now the defense contractor is touting the steps it's taking with a smaller counterpart designed to strike ground targets, the Advanced Tactical Laser.

As of … Read more

Boeing has rolled out the marketing for its laser-equipped Humvee by zapping five IED-like targets on a test range at Alabama's Redstone Arsenal (PDF) in what it called "the company's ability to rapidly respond to warfighters' needs."

Dubbed the "Laser Avenger," the unit consists of a 1-kilowatt solid-state laser mounted on an air-defense Humvee. It works by "shooting an invisible beam just a few centimeters in diameter and 20 times hotter than an electric stovetop" into the offending munition until it combusts internally. It then just "pops" or "… Read more

If a Ferrari, tank or--heaven help us--a Hello Kitty Hummer limo just aren't "special" enough for you, consider this: a Boeing 727 jet limo.

You read that right. TechEBlog reports that one such item is up for auction on eBay, with a high bid of $269,900 as of this writing. (There's still time--the listing will remain open until Sunday around noon PST.)

It includes a "sunken living room with a dance floor, big screen TV, fireplace, and full bar," according to the listing, and "if you need a nap, go in the … Read more

Boeing is reporting progress in simulation tests of its HALE (high altitude long endurance) aircraft, an unmanned plane that runs on hydrogen.

While it has not yet gone aloft, the propeller-driven HALE aircraft was able to run for a total of three days in a chamber that simulated flight at 65,000 feet. The eventual goal is to get it to fly for more than a week at a time with a one-ton payload.

The turbocharged hydrogen combustion engine, which was developed by Ford Motor, managed to maintained proper torque control while getting better than expected fuel usage, according to … Read more

Like its diminutive avian namesake, Boeing's A160T Hummingbird is a whiz at hovering. And it turns out the prototype aircraft can also hoist a hefty load.

The unmanned helicopter this week flew for eight hours--its longest flight to date--and as high as 5,000 feet while burdened with a 1,000-pound payload. The test flight goes a long way toward proving the Hummingbird fit for use in military operations, where it could ferry supplies, sensors or weapons to the battlefield, perform surveillance and target acquisition, or even rescue pilots who've been shot down.

Over time, Boeing wants to … Read more

I finally got around to watching the recent episode of HDNet's Dan Rather Reports titled "Plastic Planes," about alleged safety problems with Boeing's new 787 "Dreamliner" passenger jet. I was interested in the story for two reasons. As I've said here before, I want to buy one of these planes someday-- and secondly, I've long been fascinated with composite materials.

Vince Weldon, a former Boeing engineer, alleges that the composites used in the 787-- principally forms of carbon-fiber reinforced plastic (CFRP)-- are brittle, insufficiently tested, dangerous in a fire, and vulnerable … Read more

Get out bat signal. The Caped Crusader is going to want one of these.

Boeing calls the design of its new flying-wing lookalike, the X-48B, a "blended wing body." That's for obvious reasons: the aircraft's wings blend smoothly into the fuselage, where older flying wings were really just, well, wings.

The experimental X-48B has made a half-dozen flights so far, all at Edwards Air Force Base in California since the middle of July, and is in the shop for a brief stint as researchers do some scheduled maintenance and start poring through the aeronautical data. It'… Read more