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Aviation History
1962
1962 - 2118.PDF
481 FLIGHT International, 20 September 1962 Almost every week Boeing release yet another photograph of major component assembly for the first 727. With only ten weeks to roll-out this latest picture shows the aft fuselage assembly being lowered on to the substantially complete wing by means of overhead gantries. Later this month the forward fuselage and tailplane will be attached to the major assembly and it will then be possible to get the first true overall impression of the size of this aeroplane PROF RICHARDS ON AIRLINER NOISE IN a paper read recently before the International Congress of the Aeronautical Sciences in Stockholm, Prof E. J. Richards of Southampton University made a penetrating survey of the problems of aircraft noise in the 1970s. As a basis for investigation, Prof Richards had assumed that during the 1970s virtually all short- and medium-range airliners in service would be powered by fan engines, and that supersonic airliners would operate the majority of long- range services. On this assumption he listed the outstanding noise problems likely to affect people on the ground, and his recommen dations as to how they should be tackled. These were:— (1) With the increase of airport movements, lower limits of allowable noise will be necessary. Their form and amplitude should now be agreed internationally, in order that each airport and engine designer can abide by them without fear of a unilateral performance penalty. There is some evidence that the public is offended by the frequency of noisy take-offs rather than by their exact intensity, since it is the number of intrusions which count rather than the degree of each intrusion. It is difficult to assess the noise reduction really needed to compensate the increased frequency of landing. A direct adjustment based on a fixed total-noise energy per hour would involve a reduction of some 8PNdb in the allowable peak noise over a built-up area—probably not too pessimistic an estimate. (2) Landing noise must increase in significance, particularly with the narrow delta configuration of current supersonic airliner proposals, in which the high induced drag during the final approach must be countered with engine thrust. It is vitally important that steps are taken to counteract the effects of increased operational frequency by a reduction of compressor noise at source. (3) Supersonic transport aircraft will significantly increase noise in the close vicinity of airports and may require suppressors to cope with this phase. New work on noise suppressors is urgent. (4) Sonic booms are sure to cause extensive objections under some circumstances, even though flight planning is aimed at keeping the objections within bounds. Extended experience of military aircraft operating over built-up areas, to give mild booms of the kind likely in the future, is needed in addition to single flights and simulated-boom experiments in order to establish acceptable sonic boom limits. The effect of an indoor or outdoor environment, turbulence in the atmosphere, sharpness and reflec tions of the boom, surprise element, etc, will modify the limits. (5) VTOL operation of civil airliners is limited by noise, even on helicopters. There is a need for studies of the noise of fan systems, multiple jets and low-velocity interacting jets. (6) Supersonic airliners will require far more power for taxying and apron manoeuvring, and this will mean extra consideration for ear protection when planning visitors' enclosures and the working conditions of apron personnel. NON SKEDS NOT DEAD TABLE 1765 of the current ABC World Airways Guide gives details of a regular service between California and Hawaii which has just been started by one of the smaller US supplemental carriers, Standard Airways. This company's twice-weekly service under cuts PanAm and United by about a third, and also undercuts a rival supplemental, US Overseas, by about a sixth. That Standard's fares strike a record low in bargain-basement air travel—the $158 return ticket works out at only three cents a mile—is a sign of the ingenuity which the supplemental are now displaying in attempting to make good the much publicized recent preference of MATS for scheduled operators. The CAB's latest traffic digest gives comprehensive figures for the supplemental in the year ended September 30, 1961, and these show that their military trooping fell to one-third of the previous level (from about 1,800m to 600m passenger-miles), most of this fall being borne by a single company, Overseas National Airways. Traffic in other directions showed a healthy expansion, however, as freight doubled and civilian passenger operations rose by some 50 per cent. Taken together, these changes meant that the supple- mentals' total traffic—in ton-miles terms—remained more or less unchanged although the military trooping proportion dropped from a half to a fifth. As 1960 saw the demise of Transocean, so 1961 saw the near collapse of the biggest remaining supplemental, Overseas National. Although the scale of this airline as a passenger carrier was much reduced, it remained the largest supplemental in terms of passenger- miles, keeping just ahead of US Overseas (206m v 191m passenger- miles). The only other supplemental to pass the 100m mark were World Airways, Capitol Airways, Trans-Alaskan Airlines, Currey Air Transport and Great Lakes Airlines. With the exception of Overseas National and World Airways these carriers concentrated on civilian services, rather more than half of which were on domestic routes. Whereas the supplemental' passenger business last year became less military in character, their military freighting boomed. Almost all their 173m freignt ton-miles were provided by the Forces, and half of this was carried by Capitol, most of the rest being shared between World Airways and US Overseas. Except for the last- named, all the bigger supplemental enjoyed sharply increased military freight traffic, most of which continued to be restricted to domestic routes. The dramatic switch away from military trooping which retarded the supplemental development in 1961 was the mark of the end of an era during which these non-scheduled operators were able to undercut the scheduled carriers when quoting for Forces' contracts. The more enterprising supplemental are now aware that much of their remaining business might also be in jeopardy unless they re-equip with jets.
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