Boeing provides Sonic Cruiser progress report

Walt Gillette, vice president and programme manager for the Boeing Sonic Cruiser, outlined the progress being made on five technology fronts as Boeing continues to focus on this major product-development effort.

The international team helping develop the advanced technology solutions for the Boeing Sonic Cruiser has grown with the appointment of Austria- based Fischer Advanced Composite Components (FACC) AG. Boeing has also added Stork Fokker Aerostructures, based in the Netherlands, to the Sonic Cruiser technology development team. The team is working to develop the solutions for the Sonic Cruiser a success.

"We are making very good progress on the fundamentals required to create the Sonic Cruiser," Gillette said. "These fundamentals involve the technology needed for the airplane, the processes needed to create the airplane, and the basic configuration exploration activities necessary to reveal the very best shape for the airplane."

Gillette characterised the current phase of development as a "learning" phase and said that progress is measured by how fast the team is learning about the technologies, tools and processes that will allow it to create an all-new class of flying machines.

Advancements in computational fluid dynamics (CFD), the computer coding used to evaluate and develop the aerodynamic flows of structure, have been instrumental in allowing rapid learning on the Sonic Cruiser program. Gillette noted that a second round of wind tunnel tests continues to verify that the CFD coding is predicting performance to within 1 percent.

"That means we can do a lot of learning before we ever get to the wind tunnel," he said. "We've looked at more than 25 wing planforms, 50 nacelle shapes and 60 fuselage designs in the past 16 months. We could never have done that on earlier programmes."

The discussion concerning the primary materials for the Sonic Cruiser continues, according to Gillette. The current design assumes that the new aeroplane will be about 60 percent composite material. Boeing has built a test fuselage section to examine both the build process and the material properties of one of the proposed composite materials. The 20-foot long section is being used to test installation techniques, durability and repairability.

The Sonic Cruiser is likely to be a "more-electric" aeroplane, according to Gillette. He noted that some systems traditionally powered by engine bleed air could be powered by electricity on the Sonic Cruiser allowing the engines to be more efficient.

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