Re:Boeing altered key switches in 737 MAX cockpit limiting a...
by __m on Sunday May 12, 2019 @03:00AM
(#19890580)
Wouldn’t they eventually all freeze at roughly the same position when the AoA doesn’t change for a while? Can’t they be heated?
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Re:Boeing altered key switches in 737 MAX cockpit limiting a...
by madarcho on Sunday May 12, 2019 @03:18AM
(#19890622)
They definitely are now. If you want to see what they look like, the channel AvE on YouTube tears one down (Search for BOLTR AoA) and discusses the mechanics. You can see what they suspect to be small cables for heating go up into the element.
Re:Boeing altered key switches in 737 MAX cockpit limiting a...
by silvestrov on Sunday May 12, 2019 @03:43AM
(#19890696)
Re:Boeing altered key switches in 737 MAX cockpit limiting a...
by cardinalfang on Sunday May 12, 2019 @05:11AM
(#19890902)
The A350 has two types of AoA sensor - vanes and multifunction probes - which should reduce the chance of everything failing together.
Re:Boeing altered key switches in 737 MAX cockpit limiting a...
by rurban on Sunday May 12, 2019 @03:05AM
(#19890593)
They are heated now, after the Air France loss.
This incident was also the reason for the MCAS system in the first hand: "Don't trust the pilot, regulate it into safety by your own".
Re:Boeing altered key switches in 737 MAX cockpit limiting a...
by presto8 on Sunday May 12, 2019 @11:15AM
(#19892395)
Are you referring to AF447? According to the BEA incident report, the AF447 plane was already equipped with heating systems for the pitot probes and AoA sensors.
"1.6.9.1 Probe heating The probes that are installed on the aircraft are heated electrically to remove water by vaporisation when the aeroplane is on the ground and to protect them from icing in flight."
Reference: https://www.bea.aero/docspa/2009/f-cp090601.en/pdf/f-cp09060...
Re:Boeing altered key switches in 737 MAX cockpit limiting a...
by rurban on Sunday May 12, 2019 @03:13PM
(#19893818)
Right, I mixed that up. With AF447 the initial problem was not the AOA but the very common pitot tube icing, which renders the airspeed indicator useless, thus leading to wrong stall warnings.
Even if the pitot tube is heated (mandatory), very often airframe icing leads to a blocked static port, rendering even more indicators useless.