December 17, 1903

by Bryan

2 comments

1 Badtux { 12.17.15 at 12:20 am }

And in related news, yesterday LockMart delivered their 2,500th C-130 Hercules cargo plane.

Between Kitty Hawk and the first flight of the C-130 in 1955, there was 52 years. Between the first flight of the C-130 and today is 60 years. About the only thing that has happened in that intervening 60 years is that gas turbine engines have gotten more efficient and more powerful per unit volume thanks to better modeling of turbulent gas systems and computerized engine controls. Airframe-wise, the men who designed the C-130 in 1955 would be quite comfortable with the airframes of today, they’d marvel at the instrument panel but the rest would be depressingly familiar to them.

Progress was rapid between 1903 and 1955. Since then, all we’ve done is develop smaller and faster computers. Amazingly smaller and faster computers, my iPhone has more power than the mainframes I used in college, but still. We don’t have progress. We have comp-gress. And in many other areas, re-gress. SIGH.

2 Bryan { 12.17.15 at 10:01 pm }

The Herky-Bird [OK, Hercules, for purists] was my favorite way of traveling. They went through several engines changes and seemed to add blades to the propeller shaft every time you turned around. The first version couldn’t be pressurized, but the RC-130s I flew in when based at Rheinmain AB, Germany were pressurized.

All of the recent aircraft are over-priced and under-performing. The A-10 may be ugly and slow, but it does what it was designed to do, and brings pilots back after they shoot up the enemy.

Since corporations starting considering marketing as the only necessary research and development, progress has stopped.