I just finished day 7 of 787 school, which is my first transition training since 1998. Nowadays they give a computer based test for systems knowledge, and that’s tomorrow. I probably should be studying.

The 787 is mostly like a GPS overlay of a VOR approach. It’s a 767 retrofitted with electric everything. Underneath the new knobs and screens is the same old jet, with cool improvements here and there. The interface is dated already, apparently designed before touch screen was a thing. I am still wasting time trying to find where I left my curser to select what I want out of the boxes. I don’t mind the fly-by-wire concept with regard to trusting normal and backup flight control. Boeing and I think alike when it comes to how an airplane should behave, mostly. The 787 has a trim switch, which trims for an airspeed. (I understand Airbus has no trim switch ). How it trims is decided in a box somewhere, maybe with the stab or maybe with the elevator; the computer decides. The one thing that is kind of wonky (if not objectionable, it might take some getting used to) is the way it “helps” you in a turn; a 30 degree bank turn requires no back pressure to maintain level flight.

Flying with a HUD is new to me and will also take some getting used to. If the flight director is programmed correctly, it is easy as pie. You just chase the little ball around and let the autothrottles take care of the airspeed. But, so far, chasing it robs me of mucho SA . On my first approach, the one pictured here, I wanted to click off the autothrottles, but the instructor told me no. Apparently we don’t do that; I didn’t argue, but I don’t like that policy for several reasons.

I just took my type ride in it yesterday...Same with the hud, takes getting used to. I like it for takeoff, gets in the way for landing, great excuse though..

IOE Monday DEN-HNL...

Welcome to the club.

Here are some 787 pictures of mine from when they were testing the brakes in Roswell, NM. It was a second brake vendor/supplier so that the customers (airlines) would have two choices. I don't remember the name of brake vendor, probably BF Goodrich Aerospace or one of the other big players.

The airplane and test people were there for a few days and they gave the brakes a big workout each day- lots of aborted takeoffs on runway 3/21. The routine was to make a takeoff run, do the abort routine (I suppose at worst-case scenario weights and speeds) for the data, taxi back for a real takeoff, fly around with the gear down to cool off the brakes (lots of wide open spaces south of the airport), and land. Lather, rinse, repeat.

They had a huge stock of tires on hand. I don't remember them having any problems (certainly nothing like blown tires, fuse plugs, or anything else from what I could see... blowing a tire on one of these would be very obvious!).

The Boeing folks were very gracious and gave us a nickel tour of the airplane and then some. I have a grainy photo of the cockpit but it's not even worth uploading. The cabin was occupied by giant water tanks for ballast for the test (both weight and c.g.) and instrumentation consoles- several technicians and engineers rode back there to monitor the tests in real time, rather than staying on the ground and using telemetry. Now that is confidence! I wish I'd got a picture of those water tanks too.

The engines are amazingly quiet, from the outside, at idle, when you're standing beside and behind the airplane, sort of off the quarter.







We traded patches with them too!




No, we didn't get to ride on her

I've got 6000+hrs sitting behind a HUD - it doesn't get better.

ABSOLUTELY MINIMUM brightness helps...a little.

I did discover it took the examiner a long time to work out I had dimmed the HUD down to clear and was carefully looking down at the PFD without moving my head during my type rating years ago

But he did work it out eventually

I still push it forward and up out of the way in cruise - especially at night.

Edit: Ref the AT - Years ago when I transitioned from 767 to 777 the company decided we would no longer be permitted to disconnect the AT and handily properly. I didn't endear myself to the powers that be.

So it's a no go item on the MEL?

No you can still carry it on the MEL.

So how long do you think it will be before we lose our manual thrust skills - or for the youngsters coming along who will never develop those skills?

Much grumbling "But they never fail"

Literally 12 months later manual flying including no AT was introduced into our cyclic every 6 months. Some years later KA crashed the 777 at SF.

hey I'm sitting on a 787 right now too
the view out the front isn't so great though

That's the seat to have. I love flying, but I'll take the cabin more often than not.

That wing is a work of art...and a little disconcerting the first time.

These are from the cheap seats in 2013...

They have cruise flaps. Above FL250 and within a certain speed range, the flaps extend a bit to improve fuel economy. This is controlled by system logic, rather than the pilots. Also, all the ailerons droop with the flaps, although only the inboard set are called flaperons. When the flaps extend, the spoilers relocate downward for a better aerodynamic seal.

More on cruise flaps: They remind me of the TWA 727 that did a no-notice aileron roll. I’m sure somebody else can tell the story better than me, but it turned into a barrel-dive and the crew had to extend the gear to recover. It was in the 1970s, after the oil crisis, and the captain had the opinion that he could save fuel by extending flaps by 2 degrees. I expect, even for those days, he was off the reservation. So, the story goes, to do this he had to pull the breaker for the slats so they wouldn’t extend. One day he forgot to brief his flight engineer about the whole thing. I can imagine the engineer saying “Captain, looks like we popped a breaker, let me try to reset it”. Click, roll, hearing.

Whether “cruise flaps” is vindication for that old captain or not, the feature does beg the question of why they didn’t optimize the wing for cruise with the flaps up on the 787. Can anybody explain that?

Just curious, does the 787 have a last resort cable to one of the flight controls in case all the fly by wire fails. IIRR the Airbus had one cable that went back to elevator trim. Would hate to fly aircraft that way, but guess it is possible.

Craig

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TWA_Flight_841_(1979)

I’ve heard some pretty eye-watering performance numbers for cruise in terms of Mach and fuel flow. Sounded pretty darn efficient “on the step”.

Long time lurker and finally a topic I can contribute to meaningfully.

I’ve been a capt on the 787 for a year now and we do mixed fleet 777 and 787. The aircraft is very efficient and with the current crisis a life saver for the airlines that operate it. However in saying that it is extremely integrated, too software focused, for my liking anyways and I’m not an old guy either! A lot of the flight control “addons” work in the background without feedback to the pilots. We have hybrid laminar flow control (which by all accounts wasn’t that successful and I see the new deliveries don’t have them), autodrag, landing attitude modifier, cruise flaps and super spoilers and all of these work in the background. I’m not a fan of the software cdu, the hardware one is quicker to use I find. I absolutely dislike the HUD but the airline insists we use it and its their plane so that’s ok but even on a Cavok day we have all sorts of green info clutter my view
I’d love to hear the HUD policy of other airlines
No mechanical backup to flight controls, only electric back up.
It is very efficient and you can work on 5t an hour for the medium haul trips and 5.6 to so on the long range ones. Taken it on regional 2 hour hops and 14.5 ultra long hauls and the capability is great.

In saying all this , I’m super grateful that I do fly it but truth be told when the roster comes out I’m a lot happier seeing 77W as the plane type for my flight. Gimme a 777-300ER any day!

Best regards

Deric, welcome to Beechtalk!

The B727 was somewhat critical on buffet margins at certain weights and altitude. With the JT8D-9A engines, you could get a -100 above where it should be and push the high speed envelope. Same with the -200 and higher thrust engines. The trick was to extend the trailing edge flaps without leading edges to increase lift and reduce the margin in order to fly higher. The only way to do that is use Alt Flaps switch (elect motor) but pull the Leading Edge flap circuit breaker before doing it. If the LE Flap CB is pushed in in that condition all of the leading edges will extend but not necessarily uniformly or in unison. Warning, instant upset may occur at cruise altitude.

Those were the good ole days!