Windowless cockpit - would you fly in this?

[fly_tornado]

You could always get something like Virtual Reality goggles like Rift (http://www.oculusvr.com/) as a backup to the big screen.Plus if you start spilling coffee on instruments in normal airliner, you're not going to get very far anyway.

VR goggles are now less than US$30

 

http://www.cnet.com/au/news/get-a-google-cardboard-vr-kit-for-26-99-shipped/

 

 

[Zibi]

VR goggles are now less than US$30http://www.cnet.com/au/news/get-a-google-cardboard-vr-kit-for-26-99-shipped/

Yes, but you still need a $500 phone to put inside them.

 

According to Google, Cardboard works with "most modern Android phones," but only about half a dozen models (including the Galaxy S4/S5, Nexus 4/5, and Moto X) have been tested by Google and designated "fully compatible."

[fly_tornado]

And when your not using your goggles you have a good phone

 

 

[Marty_d]

Aircraft design will go the way of the dinosaurs when humanity works out how to manipulate gravity. Let's face it, once your craft can go anywhere it wants by changing local gravitational conditions (including 90 degree inertia-free turns at any speed), all you need is a sphere.

 

 

[Old Koreelah]

Marty how did you find out about my new prototype? I signed an exclusive agreement with those funny green men...

 

 

[Marty_d]

Marty how did you find out about my new prototype? I signed an exclusive agreement with those funny green men...

"Exclusive" doesn't mean the same thing to them...

 

 

[cscotthendry]

The flight crew could sit in the bowels of the aeroplane and the pointy end could become truly pointy.

In fact, they could put the pilots anywhere in the plane and put bigger windows up front (think B17 etc) and make a viewing lounge out of it.

 

 

[rgmwa]

The flight crew could sit in the bowels of the aeroplane and the pointy end could become truly pointy.

No need for flight crew at all. They could stay home and fly it, and the airline could sell two more tickets.

 

rgmwa

 

 

[facthunter]

They might sell LESS tickets. The history of modern aviation is full of examples where a plane would have been lost if a very competent crew hadn't been there to assess and respond to an unpredicted situation. The human can be a threat to safety and also be the saving of a situation. How can the experience of crew that has been the saving of the situation be incorporated into a ground based remote control person who may never have even flow the type of plane that he/she is manipulating.? Nev

 

 

[SDQDI]

If pilot is not on board I won't fly with it and won't allow my family to either. I like to know if I go down the people who are in control are coming along for the ride:thumb up:

 

 

[rgmwa]

No argument from me. I wouldn't fly in a remote controlled drone either, and I'm sure no airline that wanted to stay in business would go that far. But it could be done - assuming nothing went wrong.

 

rgmwa

 

 

[Marty_d]

In fact, they could put the pilots anywhere in the plane and put bigger windows up front (think B17 etc) and make a viewing lounge out of it.

Why have windows at all? Give the passengers a VR headset each and they can share the pilot's view. Better than bending your neck down to look out of a tiny porthole.

 

 

[facthunter]

A large percentage are scared of flying already. Putting them in a tube with no windows wouldn't go down too well with some. Nev

 

 

[SDQDI]

But for those who are scared they could have a VR headset and just beam them video of being on the ground really you could choose what you saw maybe some would like the views of a cruise on a boat or a four wheel drive track

 

 

[facthunter]

That would reinforce the feeling of being in the wrong place. No? Nev

 

 

[Zibi]

You would probably say the same about driverless train...yet there are several places in the world where such trains run, and work quite ok (yes, yes I know, trains run on predefined tracks and all that).

 

It's just a matter of perception...once people are shown that it's safe (or at least as safe as one with a pilot on board) they will use it.

 

 

[Marty_d]

My first reaction to remotely piloted planes was the same as someone else's (Nev I think?) - damn well want a human pilot risking their own skin at the same time.

 

However on reflection there's something to be said for having the pilot sitting in a secure bunker somewhere, AS LONG as the technology is as least as reliable and backed up as current fly-by-wire, the data stream is un-hackable and glitch-free.

 

1. Try hijacking a plane without a cockpit.
    
    
   
2. Backup. A pilot's plane gets into trouble, several senior pilots of the same type can bung theirs on autopilot and come help.
    
    
   
3. Sleeping in the same bed every night has to be more restful, albeit maybe less exciting, for the pilot.
    
    
   
4. No more MH370 situations. At least if the plane goes down you know where and why without having to find the boxes.
    
    
   

 

 

 

I'm sure there's more reasons but my tiny brain can't think of them at the moment.

 

 

[SDQDI]

Ok to hijack a remotely piloted plane..... I'm not real tech savvy but I guess all you would have to do would be jam the signal getting in even if you couldn't hack the system if you stopped it getting commands it wouldn't end nice and I dont think you could guarantee any remotely piloted control system against hacking there is always a way.

 

I can't see any company taking remote pilots seriously unless it was just cargo that might have it's benefits but otherwise they would lose too many customers and the remaining companies who stayed old fashioned would get them.

 

The windowless cockpit certainly has its merits and of course isn't without problems, I like the idea and will watch with interest.

 

 

[Ultralights]

just dont ask the Americans how many drones they have been losing over in the middle east due to crashing in bad weather, or just plain old comms failures. from what i have been hearing around work is the number is nearing 1000.

 

i have seen a video, not on the internet, of a predator drone arriving at an airfield in Afghanistan in a 30 kt crosswind, lets just say, it never flew again, and gave the fire crews something to do for a while.

 

And on another note, with current automated airliners, whats the first thing the computer does when it encounters something thats beyond its programming? such as Air France flight 447, and others, at the first sign of trouble, the computer hands over to manual control and says im outa hear!

 

 

[Marty_d]

just dont ask the Americans how many drones they have been losing over in the middle east due to crashing in bad weather, or just plain old comms failures. from what i have been hearing around work is the number is nearing 1000.i have seen a video, not on the internet, of a predator drone arriving at an airfield in Afghanistan in a 30 kt crosswind, lets just say, it never flew again, and gave the fire crews something to do for a while.

 

And on another note, with current automated airliners, whats the first thing the computer does when it encounters something thats beyond its programming? such as Air France flight 447, and others, at the first sign of trouble, the computer hands over to manual control and says im outa hear!

I don't think anyone's saying it's going to happen tomorrow. But a couple of hundred years ago if you suggested mankind would ever move faster than the speed of a galloping horse, you'd probably be locked in Bedlam.

 

 

[facthunter]

A lot of the restrictions on new fangled horseless carriages were from commercial interests. Knowledgeable people knew of high velocities and Leonardo Da Vinci was well ahead of his time in prophesising many things. Everyone wants to get humans out of the equation because they are hard to handle . Train, keep happy and pay. If they are all unemployed they will be an even bigger problem.

 

Regarding control by a HUMANs from afar, you have, time delays, lack of sensory input. I've never seen an autoland that can get a plane to land in bad conditions as well as a properly trained human, in anything but a simulator. Cruise control will use more fuel than a trained driver as the human can anticipate hills for instance and braking points as it knows where the turns are.. Nev

 

 

[Marty_d]

As things stand today, I 100% agree with you. But the technology improves exponentially over time. Apparently at the moment auto-park only works properly about 30% of the time, mind you that's probably better than a blonde.

 

Consider things like the Google driverless car - approved for testing on public roads in at least 2 US states, advances in robotics, facial recognition software, and research into nanobiotechnology with the possible construction of viable biocomputers. These are all happening today. I wouldn't be surprised to see, in my lifetime, pilotless passenger aircraft.

 

And hey, look at the upside - you can relax on the porch with a beer and watch your Drifter fly itself...