Burt Rutan Is Up To Something…

http://www.wired.com/autopia/2011/11/burt-rutan-is-up-to-something-cool/

by bootload • 15 years ago

28 16 15 years ago

I wish he was still working on spaceships. Planes already work and large corporations dominate their development. But a breakthrough in spaceship technology could really change all our lives.

frisco4• 15 years ago

One thing I've been waiting a long time for someone to announce -- and realize I probably have a long time to keep waiting -- is a light, subsonic jet that can do NY-SF without refueling, in about 6 hours. The current VLJ projects (Cirrus, Honda, Diamond, etc) don't have a range that comes close to that, nor do decommissioned NASA/USAF jets (which, though they can be much cheaper and obviously way faster, devour gas). Especially if you want to go international: either you're flying essentially an arctic route and bringing survival gear for a 3-day trip, or you're buying a $20M+ jet. A VLJ capable of the North Atlantic tracks? Amazing.

If I ever have the resources, and Rutan is still designing aircraft, one of the first things I'd do is see if I could commission him to design that plane. A very long range, low-cost, 2 or 4-seater would be huge.

feralchimp• 15 years ago

These are the performance stats from the Wikipedia page for the U2 spy plane:

Maximum speed: 434 knots (500 mph, 805 km/h)

Cruise speed: 373 knots (429 mph, 690 km/h)

Range: 5,566 nmi (6,405 mi, 10,300 km)

Service ceiling: 70,000+ ft (21,300+ m)

Flight endurance: 12 hours

Not known for their affordability, cushy interiors, or convenient parking. But reaaal easy to fishbowl, and if you have the means to be commissioning Burt Rutan you can probably afford a pretty wide hangar.

frisco4• 15 years ago

Hah. Also, the US won't sell you a U2 spy plane (and, even if they would, you might as well get a Gulfstream for that kind of money).

I once saw a quote for an old NASA supersonic trainer (a T-38 Talon) at around $300k, and the civilian very light jets price out around $1-$1.8M, notwithstanding the fact that they aren't actually shipping yet. The problem is that they all have a 1,500 mi range!

joshwa3• 15 years ago

This article[1] is a very good explanation for why VLJs are un-economical and will never have the speed, range, and efficiency of a larger jet. Written by Austin Meyer, the developer of X-Plane, an FAA-approved flight simulator package (and seeming inheritor of the MSFS legacy).

[1] http://www.x-plane.com/adventures/50_avanti.html

frisco4• 15 years ago

I guess I don't really care if it's a jet or a turboprop. The point about the relationship between surface area and volume and drag is a good one. It'd be really cool if your VLJ was supersonic, in which case you win a lot for being really small, but there are other problems there that are even more serious.

On the topic of the specific plane in the article, I've seen the Avanti and its range still sucks wrt what I want.

Also, I wouldn't call X-Plane the inheriter... it's been around forever, too!

VladRussian• 15 years ago

while all this is true, there is still some interesting possibilities - 300mph non stop around the world (25K+ miles):

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virgin_Atlantic_GlobalFlyer

with only 1/5 of the fuel it would be a VLJ by weight (though not really by other parameters like wingspan, landing and maneuvering characteristics...) with range of 5K+ miles at least.

cameldrv• 15 years ago

The SJ30 can do it. It really is a remarkable aircraft, but it has gone through three bankruptcies so far to get there. That said, no other 10 million dollar airplane can go 2500nm with 8 people Mach .8, particularly on such a low fuel burn. If your budget or patience aren't sufficient for the SJ30, The PC-12 is the king of the long range fairly fast turboprop. The earlier models have a 2000nm range.

suivix• 15 years ago

This is an article about nothing. Some guy I've never heard of it has a secret idea. Just wonderful. There's millions of tech-savvy people with secret ideas in various fields, and yet there is nothing reportable about it.

bootload• 15 years ago

"... Some guy I've never heard of it has a secret idea ..."

Bert Rutan is one of those Apollo inspired aero-engineers. A product of the 60's space race which inspired people to become pilots, astronauts and engineers. You might not know of his work as a test pilot of the MD F4 [0] but every geek & nerd knows, or should know, he is responsible for the design & building of SpaceShipOne. [1]

Rutan is to commercial space travel what Von Braun was to Apollo.

[0] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burt_Rutan#Life_and_career

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SpaceShipOne

MHBerryman• 15 years ago

I would also throw in he gave a nice TED talk. Available at http://www.ted.com/talks/burt_rutan_sees_the_future_of_space...

daimyoyo• 15 years ago

I wish Scaled would work on a supersonic plane that could replace the Concord. With the engineering knowledge we have today, and EC2 assembled supercomputers to handle the computational heavy lifting a project like that would need, the only part missing is the right company to go after it.

cstross• 15 years ago

Alas, development costs typically scale as the cube of the take-off weight. Concorde was a 100-passenger SST with trans-Atlantic range at Mach 2.2 -- it burned over 100 tonnes of fuel making the crossing and take-off weight was comparable to a wide-body, so if you want composites as well you're talking dev costs probably in the same range as the Boeing 787. As it is, Concorde cost multiple billions of pounds sterling to develop in 1960s money. Even if you shave an order of magnitude off the cost, you're still talking something that Rutan could only manage if Bill Gates or Warren Buffet were to open their wallet and bankroll him.

(Scaled Composites is no longer owned by Rutan; last I heard it was a subsidiary of Hughes.)

Burt Rutan Is Up To Something…

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