How Brand New Aircraft are Cruelly Tested During Vertical Takeoff Before Being Sold

hello everyone and welcome back to the fluctus channel [Music] for as long as aircraft have been manufactured companies have invested millions of dollars and hundreds of hours into testing each completed design [Music] this was more the case in the early days the only way to really test a new plane helicopter or rocket was to launch it and see what happened [Music] nowadays with sophisticated computer models and drastically improved engineering techniques [Music] aircraft designers can more or less approximate how the final model will perform still that doesn't eliminate the need for extensive often extreme testing [Music] weather designed to test the entire vehicle or just a single component [Music] post assemble aircraft evaluations are still very important for both military and civilian planes [Music] Boeing is one of the biggest producers of commercial aircraft in the world and has been for over a hundred years through all those years the company has been highly regarded for its commitment to testing foreign [Music] planes for the military or one of its many Airline clients Boeing is a company that likes to know what its planes can do [Laughter] one of the ways they push them to the limits is through what's known as vertical takeoff tests this has the pilot leaving the runway and immediately pulling back on the flight controls [Music] as a result the aircraft immediately enters a vertical climb that it would almost never execute with passengers aboard unless there were a serious emergency [Music] during the evaluation the pilots will also perform several other Maneuvers such as sharp turns and descents to ensure the aircraft can do everything AST of it these types of demonstrations are common at air shows no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no [Music] no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no no whenever a company like Boeing puts out a new model plane international air shows are a great way to show them off to potential buyers [Music] like Boeing French Aerospace company Airbus makes both Commercial and Military planes thank you this a400m Atlas is one of the larger transport planes made by the company [Music] 148 feet long and a wingspan of 140 feet [Music] despite being 173 000 pounds empty this turbo prop powered airplane is fully capable of taking off at a near vertical angle [Music] in fact the atlas is surprisingly agile for a large cargo plane [Music] with a top speed of Mach 0.7 and a large wing area the plane can execute a number of impressive turns and maneuvers in order to get a comprehensive view of a plane's capabilities Airbus Boeing and other major manufacturers will put their aircraft into extreme scenarios one of the most important of these is extreme weather testing planes have a number of important components and systems that could be susceptible to extreme cold in some places where these aircraft must operate temperatures can reach dozens of degrees below zero [Music] ice weather testing is therefore essential for any aircraft to get its company's stamp of approval foreign [Music] goes for hot weather testing which can cause different parts of the aircraft to expand and behave differently air is also less dense which affects how the plane flies and turns [Music] when testing it's A330 Airbus made sure to perform what's known as a negative gravity test aircraft can be subject to this negative gravity for brief periods especially during turbulence thank you the pace at which this is done either lengthens or shortens the duration which can produce different results when flying an airplane with passengers one of the worst case scenarios would be to lose an engine when this happens the plane immediately loses a significant amount of thrust this means it will no longer be able to maintain its maximum speed or altitude [Music] foreign to see how their 787 9 Dreamliner would react with an engine out the Boeing team had the test crew perform a series of abused takeoffs [Music] these include taking off with a sudden loss of thrust just before or after takeoff [Music] this was followed up by the velocity for minimum control on ground test or vmcg [Music] during this exercise the pilot Maneuvers down the runway and turns off an engine [Music] the pilot must immediately compensate with the rudder to stop the plane from drifting off the Runway entirely the goal is to make sure the airplane can safely recover from such an event without going more than 30 degrees off course [Music] this Boeing 747-8 is undergoing a particularly high risk test known as a rejected takeoff [Music] is designed to recreate a situation in which the pilot or Ground Control decides to abort an aircraft takeoff at the very last second during the test the pilot must slam on the plane's brakes while moving at more than 200 miles per hour down the runway [Music] [Applause] the test was first performed under normal conditions [Music] after the 747-8 passed it was loaded to its maximum takeoff weight of 975 000 pounds [Music] even under these worst case scenario conditions the pilot was able to bring the plane to a safe stop [Music] a side effect of the test was that the wheels became overheated which meant they had to be deflated to protect firefighters from potential explosions Pilots will tell you that every Runway comes with its own challenges one of the most notable difficulties is what's known as crosswinds this is when Runway configuration and weather conditions force a pilot to deal with perpendicular wind forces while coming in for a landing [Music] during these Airbus flight tests Pilots must demonstrate that no special skills are required to land their aircraft even with strong cross-wind conditions foreign to accomplish this Pilots must use a technique known as the crabbed approach this is where the wings are kept level while the heading of the nose is slightly out of line with the runway at the last possible second the pilot must straighten out the plane using the rudder allowing the plane to touch down along the center line foreign [Music] s Airbus has regarding its plane's performance is what's known as water ingestion [Music] commercial airplanes often have to deal with heavy rain which can pool on runways and cause large splashes during takeoff foreign ly turbine engines can sometimes stall or flame out when they ingest too much water [Music] to avoid this Airbus Engineers designed the aircraft engines and landing gear in a way that would push water around the fuselage rather than out towards the engines to test if this is working properly a test Runway is set up with multiple pools of water foreign a350 then drives through them at varying speeds using both visual recording techniques and sensor data Engineers can analyze how much water is ingested each time at the McKinley climatic laboratory in Florida the U.S military has designed a massive climate control hangar where temperatures can be set anywhere between negative 65 and 165 degrees Fahrenheit in 2014 airbus's a350 xwb became the first of the company's aircraft to be subjected to all extreme conditions from hot and dry to hot and humid cold and wet to simulated rain and snow [Music] it may seem harsh or even a little cruel but it's the only way today's aerospace engineers can be confident in the aircraft they produce [Music] foreign [Music] [Music] that's the end of this video I hope you enjoyed it make sure to subscribe to this channel so you don't miss any of our new content see you next time

Channel: Fluctus

Views: 4,159,754

Keywords: Vertical Take off new plane testing, aircraft testing, extensive aircraft testing, A400M Atlas, A400M testing, Atlas vertical takeoff, A330 negative gravity test, negative gravity testing, engine loss test, rejected takeoff testing, water ingestion testing, extreme climate testing

Id: tup4lkykai4

Length: 16min 43sec (1003 seconds)

Published: Wed Feb 15 2023