With eight engines located forward of the wings, the B-52 bomber presents an unusual reengining challenge. U.S. Air Force
Forbes: Hanging New Engines On 60-Year-Old B-52 Bombers Will Raise Some Serious Risks
The U.S. Air Force wants to continue operating the venerable B-52 bomber through 2050. As I have written recently, that would make it the longest continuously operating jet in history.
In order to accomplish this, Air Force leaders plan to make major upgrades to the 76 B-52H bombers in their fleet, including the installation of new engines.
Today’s commercial turbofans are so much more advanced than the TF33 engines currently powering the bombers—there are eight on each plane—that the Air Force believes it can get a 30% gain in fuel efficiency and (given less weight) a 40% gain in range.
A request for proposals issued to industry in May also specified big gains in engine reliability, so that the new engines would never need to be removed from wings during the bombers’ remaining time in service.
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WNU Editor: It is amazing that these bombers are still flying.
5 comments:
I worry a lot about the structure.
After reading that article, I think it may be wiser to just keep rebuilding the existing engines.
Jac,
Multi engines planes that fly this long have in the past have had their roots of their wing replaced. That is where the wing and fuselage meet shas been replaced. So it is not original
"Steel" For Cargo planes this has been done at Earner Robbins in Georgia.
Of course these are the same people that refurbished a plan and the prop came of and hit the fuselage and the plane fell out of the sly over Alabama/Mississippi.
https://www.af.mil/News/Article-Display/Article/1931575/173-to-173-a-10-enhanced-wing-assembly-replacement-program-comes-to-an-end/
They have replaced parts of a the wings on a cargo plane, but I can see no such effort for the B52
The wings on the C-5As were replaced during the 1980s to restore full design capability
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lockheed_C-5_Galaxy#Design
They are definitely veterans.
In 1968 and '69 I would hear a sound in the night coming from the east. A vague, ever so slight indistinguishable sign Ho's conscripts were dying on his road through Laos.
By the thousands.
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