Complexity, it's not needed in many cases, and many systems don't scale up efficiently Agent_R. Look at the Lipo battery. It came in to replace NiMH ones in phones and portable radios, remote control cars and laptops, torches, all manner of consumer products and it was a total success. It revolutionized these devices. Then some idiot though he would revitalize the electric car meme with them but it pushed the envelope too far. Now you're moving a 2 ton car up and down hills and the reason it's 2 tonnes is because the battery pack, for a tesla long range is 1800 pounds!
You have lost all the advantages that lipo gave, it's light weight, and it's compactness. Put them in Golf carts sure, mobility scooters, but not a car that has to cruse at 60 mph up and down hills, one subject to accidents at speed. It's the same with computers in planes. You have two highly trained pilots, so in a sense you don't need a computer to fly it. But now the pilots are babysitters for a computer, instead of flying they are chatting away and watching for tell tails that all is well. When the computer spits the dummy and they are forced to take control of the plane they are often confused and spend half their time checking readouts and messages when they should be just taking the column and rudder pedals and checking the flaps and artificial horizon.
It's like when you first jump in your car and drive off down the street, you're not in the "Driving mindset" yet and that's why many accidents happen within 5 minutes of home. You're driving on mental autopilot then all of sudden you realize your on a street doing 35 miles an hour and there are cars all around you. You "get it", you're in the zone finally and your awareness is pretty much totally on the road and what's around you. You're still making driving inputs subconsciously, we rarely think about pressing the accelerator or turning the wheel, we do that instinctively, but in reaction to what we see happening around us.
It's the same with these pilots, I've seen enough air disaster episodes where they are totally befuddled when they should be right on the game. I watched one the other night where the angle of attack sensors got frozen solid in the level position and when the pilots realized the plane was flying them into a stall didn't react quick enough to save it. That's a rare event, and computer control has no doubt saved lives, but many crashes that are assigned as pilot error are made while inputting data into the computer or selecting computer modes, not actual "flying errors". Pilots are increasingly performing the duties of computer programmers not people trained to fly a plane as in the old days. The following article goes into a couple of computer related crashes and how the pilots got befuddled by the processes. There is no doubt computers have a place aboard commercial planes, it's just what place? Some are cheer-leading for fully automated planes, with no pilot at all up front.
https://admiralcloudberg.medium.com/thi ... 0758d374b9Then there is this cornuopian thinking
Will airline business go down if computer pilots are implemented ?
Sep 2016
No, the airlines will be fine. Within 10 years people will be used to self driving cars / robo taxis… that’s well before a clean sheet design which eliminates the pilots is launched. Let’s say 2030 - 2040 at the earliest.
By that time, people will routinely be operated on by robotic surgeons and automation in general will be “normal”. The airlines themselves will love it! Fewer crew costs, the aircraft themselves will be flown with such precision to mitigate delays and eek out every last bit of fuel efficiency. And the computers will probably have far superior handling skills, so they will be better in bad weather… fewer go arounds when there are crosswinds etc.
The airlines will push the manufacturers very hard to make this happen.
https://community.infiniteflight.com/t/ ... ed/67035/6Robotic surgeons? Working on my heart or my eye? No no no
We're 17 years past the peak now and the 3rd World is going hungry and dark. We'll be next, we're well on the way in fact.
