Seen on the street in Kyiv.

Words of Advice:

"If Something Seems To Be Too Good To Be True, It's Best To Shoot It, Just In Case." -- Fiona Glenanne

“The Mob takes the Fifth. If you’re innocent, why are you taking the Fifth Amendment?” -- The TOFF *

"Foreign Relations Boil Down to Two Things: Talking With People or Killing Them." -- Unknown

“Speed is a poor substitute for accuracy.” -- Real, no-shit, fortune from a fortune cookie

"If you believe that you are talking to G-d, you can justify anything.” — my Dad

"Colt .45s; putting bad guys in the ground since 1873." -- Unknown

"Stay Strapped or Get Clapped." -- probably not Mr. Rogers

"The Dildo of Karma rarely comes lubed." -- Unknown

"Eck!" -- George the Cat

* "TOFF" = Treasonous Orange Fat Fuck, A/K/A Dolt-45,
A/K/A Commandante (or Cadet) Bone Spurs,
A/K/A El Caudillo de Mar-a-Lago, A/K/A the Asset., A/K/A P01135809

Sunday, July 4, 2010

Something You Don't See Every Day Anymore

A DC-7 taking off. They've been working towards this day for six years.



The DC-7 was the penultimate piston-engined airliner as made by Douglas Aircraft, capable of fly westbound from London and Paris to Idlewild Airport non-stop. It suffered from persistent engine problems with its Wright R-3350 turbo-compound engines and engine shutdowns were almost a routine event. One retired airline captain once said that the major difference between the DC-6 and the DC-7 was that the DC-6 was a 4-engined airplane with 3-bladed propellers, while a DC-7 was a 3-engined airplane with 4-bladed propellers.

DC-7s had flight engineers and navigators. (Earlier transoceanic airliners also had radio operators; better HF voice sets allowed the airlines to stop using Morse Code on HF and the radio operators were history.) The flight engineers were often real mechanics, not young pilots just starting out. The navigators used the sun and starts for over-ocean navigation. The much better reliability of jet engines eventually made the flight engineers obsolete. Inertial navigation systems displaced the navigators.

As soon as the airlines can figure out how to do it safely, the pilots will be gone as well.

6 comments:

Frank Van Haste said...

Dear Miss Fit:

As he said, "Son of a gun!" Thank you for posting that. There's nothing quite like the sound of big round engines.

I wonder if they are operating with the Parts Recovery Turbines enabled?

Regards,

Frank

Comrade Misfit said...

Frank, I don't know if they have disabled the PRTs. I know the warbird operators tend to disable the turbos in their radials.

Nangleator said...

The first day a robot passenger plane flies is the last they'll let a human fly a GA aircraft, if the airlines have any say. They'll try to pin every accident on the nearest flying human until the law is passed.

Mark Rossmore said...

Beautiful! I'm thrilled that old lady got off the ground, and in Eastern colors too! (My dad worked for EAL for 23+ years)

Just to give you an idea of how far that aircraft has come, this is a pic I took in October 2006 while I was doing my flight training at Opa Locka (where that vid was filmed).

http://img684.imageshack.us/img684/2624/dscn0621s.jpg

Sarah said...

"Son of a gun!" Sounded like uncle Walter there.

I hear there is to be a DC7 @OSH this year; is this the one? I look forward to the sound of 4 ( or even 3 ) big round radials.

Comrade Misfit said...

Sarah, that's the one.