Newsgroups: sci.aeronautics.airliners Path: news From: ctillier@phoenix.princeton.edu (Clemens Emmanuel Tillier) Subject: Re: Control Sticks (was Re: Airbus safety) X-Submission-Date: Sun, 13 Dec 1992 13:01:53 GMT References: <1992Nov25.191925.27991@news.mentorg.com> Message-ID: Approved: kls@ohare.Chicago.COM Organization: Princeton University Sender: kls@ohare.Chicago.COM X-Submission-Message-Id: <1992Dec13.130153.3984@Princeton.EDU> Date: 13 Dec 92 18:07:13 PST philip@rainbow.mentorg.com (Philip Peake) writes: (discussion about control technologies deleted) >I don't seem to have noticed any raving about the TGV, the latest versions of >which achieve speeds comparable to that of aircraft, and use a side-stick ... >(yes, I know, French again ...) There is MUCH more prior art in train design, >and they can write off considerably more people than even a fully loaded 747/400 >if something goes drastically wrong. > >Philip This may be a little bit off the subject, but I think comparison with the TGV is unwarranted. The engineer in a train has control over only one degree of freedom of motion; the pilot in an aircraft has control over all three. It is therefore not surprising that entrusting so much control to one component will cause some questions. Besides, the TGV is utterly devoid of any control sticks... It uses the same throttle control as previous French locomotives (a horizontal wheel). Commercial TGV speed (300 kph) is not quite comparable to airliner speed. The maximum speed ever achieved by a TGV (515 kph) is also lower. Clem