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Sorry, late notice, sorry one night only. Number two child is doing a physics assignment and is looking for physics related safety features on aircraft.
I know nothing about physics. Best I've got is a seat belt, weather radar and pitot tubes. The partner mentioned blackboxes.

He can do the research, just interested in any safety features that might be more physics...
 
@jb747 do you feel that now you've stopped flying, your sleep patterns have returned to normal and you feel like you have a better quality of life?
 
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@jb747 do you feel that now you've stopped flying, your sleep patterns have returned to normal and you feel like you have a better quality of life?

Even though I have stopped flying with the odd flight every 45 days I can definitely say my sleep patterns have returned to normal, I’m more hydrated than I was before, and I can taste food again. So yeah I think it has improved and it’ll be an adjustment when I go back (hopefully).
 
Sorry, late notice, sorry one night only. Number two child is doing a physics assignment and is looking for physics related safety features on aircraft.
I know nothing about physics. Best I've got is a seat belt, weather radar and pitot tubes. The partner mentioned blackboxes.

He can do the research, just interested in any safety features that might be more physics...

Aircraft pressurisation in general, or this can be further broken down into how hard it is to open a door in flight.

The 4 principles of flight are very related to physics.

An emergency escape slide?

Although not directly related to safety, aircraft winglets?
 
AV, how does this affect your SIM requirement ?
CASA have given us an extension if it’s required, but I’m not due until the end of July anyway which will reset my currency should I not get another flight by the end of this month.
 
Aircraft pressurisation in general, or this can be further broken down into how hard it is to open a door in flight.

The 4 principles of flight are very related to physics.

An emergency escape slide?

Although not directly related to safety, aircraft winglets?

Well, I was going to say that flight itself is physics. The safety related feature had me stumped, when does a basic requirement for flight (lift drag etc.) become a safety feature? I'm still confused on that one.
 
Well, I was going to say that flight itself is physics. The safety related feature had me stumped, when does a basic requirement for flight (lift drag etc.) become a safety feature? I'm still confused on that one.

Well if an aircraft doesn’t have lift, it doesn’t fly...?

Or...if there’s no thrust then the aircraft no longer has the ability to maintain altitude. The other 3 Forces are still prevalent. So the aircraft does not drop out of the sky like a rock, rather it glides.

The pressurisation system is definitely a safety feature and key for an airliner.
 
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Maybe a silly question but what does it do?

A couple of things actually. A lot of people think that they’re looking through the actual window but there’s a few layers to it.

The bleed hole sits in the middle pane and is there to equalise pressure between the passenger cabin and the air gap between the panes. It also helps reduce the amount of fogging up of the windows.
 
@jb747 do you feel that now you've stopped flying, your sleep patterns have returned to normal and you feel like you have a better quality of life?

A dramatic change to the way I sleep, and how I feel. No jet lag is a wonderful feeling. You literally never recovered from it when you were working. At the moment, I think I'm solar powered. Sun goes down...me too. Or perhaps that's an age thing.

Well, I was going to say that flight itself is physics. The safety related feature had me stumped, when does a basic requirement for flight (lift drag etc.) become a safety feature? I'm still confused on that one.

I guess there's a split between safety features and engineering features. FBW has made aircraft safer, but that's not really physics per se.

Weight and balance comes into play because an aircraft will crash if the balance goes too far out, at either end. It changes in flight, as fuel is used, or if you're unlucky enough to have cargo shift. And, as you say, there's lot of physics in why they fly, but that's not a specifically a safety feature.

The reason doors won't open in flight is simple physics, and something most people don't understand.

You've mentioned radar, but there's a bit more too it. Look up doppler radar. And phased arrays.

Gyroscopes make instrument flying possible. The calculus of acceleration, velocity and distance is at the heart of INS. Lasers come in to play in laser ring gyros. A simple turn and slip indicator as fitted to a light aircraft uses a gyro that's mounted with its axis parallel to the wing.

Collapsible floor panels exist to stop the floor caving in during depressurisation.

Chemical emergency oxygen generators exist in many aircraft. That's a bit of chemistry/physics that I don't understand.

Aircraft become very hot, and also very cold. There are sometimes visible expansion joints. The SR-71 corrugations were part of managing heat expansion. The A380 has a stainless steel strip on the lower fuselage just aft of the wing....
 
While watching a short video tour of the flight deck of a 767 freighter I was surprised to find out there is an unmanned mini-FE position/panel behind the FO seat (and I understand Ansett 767 had a more complete FE station). Did all 767 had at least some kind of panel here? If so what controls/gauges did it contain and was it ever used? Do any other (post flight engineer) aircraft also have panels of some kind next to one of the jump seats, if were/are they ever used?
 
While watching a short video tour of the flight deck of a 767 freighter I was surprised to find out there is an unmanned mini-FE position/panel behind the FO seat (and I understand Ansett 767 had a more complete FE station). Did all 767 had at least some kind of panel here? If so what controls/gauges did it contain and was it ever used? Do any other (post flight engineer) aircraft also have panels of some kind next to one of the jump seats, if were/are they ever used?

When the 757 & 767 were initially in the design stage, I think there was still a plan to include a flight engineer. That disappeared as the designs progressed, with the early Ansett aircraft being the only ones that had an F/E station. From what I recall, it was eventually deactivated. The panel you are referring to is called the P61 panel, and it includes a bit of a hodgepodge of components, that are mostly of use to the ground engineers during maintenance. Below the panel is a large circuit breaker field. On the panel itself, about the only thing I can recall being of interest to the pilots was the fire extinguisher squib test controller, which was looked at during the preflight. There were switches for the engineers to shut off hydraulics to various systems, used during servicing. There was an intercom controller for anyone in the jump seat, and oxygen too. And a bookshelf.
 
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Thanks for all the help. Feedback gratefully received, well as gratefully as a teenager can manage. ;)

Interestingly enough the child gave a big outline of how the oxygen isn't from oxygen cylinders but from chemicals.

A couple of things actually. A lot of people think that they’re looking through the actual window but there’s a few layers to it.

The bleed hole sits in the middle pane and is there to equalise pressure between the passenger cabin and the air gap between the panes. It also helps reduce the amount of fogging up of the windows.

He also picked up on the little holes in the window.
 
Interestingly enough the child gave a big outline of how the oxygen isn't from oxygen cylinders but from chemicals.

The oxygen system for the pilots is from bottles. Chemical systems don't have sufficient duration, nor are they able to provide oxygen under pressure, as is needed at very high altitudes.

Passenger oxygen could be from either type of system. The 737 and 767 use chemical generators. The 747 and A380 use bottled oxygen.

And for something completely different, the A-4G used liquid oxygen.
 
The oxygen system for the pilots is from bottles. Chemical systems don't have sufficient duration, nor are they able to provide oxygen under pressure, as is needed at very high altitudes.

Passenger oxygen could be from either type of system. The 737 and 767 use chemical generators. The 747 and A380 use bottled oxygen.

And for something completely different, the A-4G used liquid oxygen.
Cool. Nice little fire risk with liquid I guess. But the advantage must be greater on board volume in gas form, I guess.
I was wondering about the qantas 747 where the oxygen bottle failed.

Yeah, the chemical generator I carried for underground mining weighted about the same as the cap lamp battery, and gave 15 minutes of oxygen.

I'm not sure what FWB means - Fuel weight and balance? Google shows me lots of focke wulf search results. lol
 
Cool. Nice little fire risk with liquid I guess. But the advantage must be greater on board volume in gas form, I guess.
I was wondering about the qantas 747 where the oxygen bottle failed.

Yeah, the chemical generator I carried for underground mining weighted about the same as the cap lamp battery, and gave 15 minutes of oxygen.

I'm not sure what FWB means - Fuel weight and balance? Google shows me lots of focke wulf search results. lol
I read it as FBW = Fly By Wire?
 

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