United Airlines pilots said pedals that control rudder movement on the plane were stuck as they tried to keep the plane in the center of the runway during the Feb. 6 landing.
The pilots were able to use a small nose-gear steering wheel to veer from the runway to a high-speed turnoff. The rudder pedals began working again as the pilots taxied to the gate with 155 passengers and six crew members on the flight from Nassau, Bahamas, according to a preliminary report by the National Transportation Safety Board.
Boeing said this is the only rudder-response issue reported on a Max, although two similar incidents happened in 2019 with an earlier model of the 737 called NG or next generation, which has the same rudder-pedal system.
The manufacturer said the issue was fixed by replacing three parts. The plane has made dozens of passenger-carrying flights since then, according to data from FlightAware.
Holy dick bags Batman. Cold environment testing is normal stuff. Coupled with cycle testing, and this shit ain’t supposed to happen.
Cold environment testing? Isn’t it like -40°C to -80°C at cruising altitude anyways?
Yes, and we have machines to do these things. Ours could easily fit 4 flight computers for a 4, 8, 12 or 24 hour test at -70C to something crazy like 50C
… so your machine could probably cool my GPU nicely is what you are saying …
Yes. And it could change the temperature very quickly too. Unfortunately I can’t remember how fast.
Ohh, rapid tem changes testing too, nice, probably with some active heat transfer system (… I mean a fan).
Specialised machines/tools/machine-tools are great to nerd out for a bit.
Like I said, I didn’t appreciate how cool it was at the time. I was also paid a third of what I make now, that might have something to do with it.
Oh, I recognise that feeling of not being able to enjoy or be proud of work that you dont dislike, just because you know how unfairly you are compensated.
when I was a kid, my dad worked at Lockheed… they had the coolest Take your Kid to Work Day. The basement was where the fun was- specifically the prototype testing lab with the 50 pound hammer that they were constantly knocking around mock ups of computer cabinets, the ginormous vibration table, and, yes, a cubical-sized refrigerator to do just that. The sound isolating chamber was also kinda cool… and spec sheets of the x33 demonstrator.
Cubicle size - yeah that checks out. The other thing I remember about ours that it was extremely tall. And blue
Thinking back on what I worked with, it was far more impressive than I realized at the time. We had 15 foot custom cables to connect the 125+ pin flight computer (four of them) to our test system. The test system also controlled the environment chamber, which had like 90 minute cycles from -70C to 50C but it also had a vibration table that has incredible acceleration. I believe it could reach near vacuum, and pressurize, I don’t remember how much.