Boat, aka traditional American car. Like six passenger, V-8, four door sedan. There was a time then that was all Detroit made. Then they started confusing the issue with station wagons, compact cars, intermediate cars, pony cars, mini vans, SUV's and crossover SUV's. The breed has been thinned down a lot, and there are just two survivors, Cadillac DeVille, and the Ford Crown Vic/Mercury Marquis/Lincoln.
My beloved '99 Cadillac DeVille bit the dust a few weeks ago. I just replaced it with an '03 Mercury Grand Marquis. The two survivors are an interesting contrast. The Caddy has better styling and more groovy gadgets then the Merc. Caddy's have, in addition to the standard electric seats and power door locks, power antenna, power trunk lid latch, power gas filler door, hands-off air conditioning & heating, all digital dashboard. Caddy engine is the magnificent all aluminum, double overhead cam, 4.6 liter Northstar. It's lighter and more powerful than the Merc's plain jane cast iron V8. Step on the Caddy and the Northstar would launch the car into orbit. Step on the Merc and it does accelerate, but it is modest. The advanced engine bought Caddy better gas mileage, 27 on the highway where as the Merc only gets 20.
The Merc is built stronger. The Caddy got scrapped because the rear axle loosened up and nearly came off the car. The combination of New Hampshire potholes and road salt caused the fasteners holding on the axle to loosen up and make an unnerving banging noise over bumps (of which NH has plenty). Two different body shops opined that 1. It couldn't be fixed; and 2. It wasn't long for this world. Caddys have also have heat gasket problems because you cannot torque up the head bolts enough to keep the head gasket in place with stripping the threads out of the aluminum block.
At 125K miles the drivers seat upholstery in the Caddy was sagging.
The Merc has a reputation for longevity, and long hard service as police car, taxi cab, airport limo, doesn't faze it. It has a better radio than the Caddy. Signal seek actually finds stations out here in the deep fringe area, the bass is stronger and it will play CD's AND tapes. The Merc does the plain car things well. It feels better charging thru a narrow slot between the Jersey barrier and the 18 wheeler at 80 mph. Ride on the interstates is smooth and solid, ride over bumpy back roads is confidence building. It doesn't bounce up and down.
In short, Caddy is a more advanced design, but the Merc is more rugged.
Tuesday, June 8, 2010
Friday, June 4, 2010
Multi Engine Aircraft
The biggest piece of aerospace business, possible the last big piece ever, is the F35 fighter program. They are talking about a thousand of them. The biggest piece of business in the F35 is the engine. Typically the engine accounts for a quarter to a third of the price of the airframe (plane less fancy electronics) Currently Pratt and Whitney's F135 engine is built, tested, bought, and installed in the F35.
However, Congress likes the idea of a second engine supplier for the F35, and so, there is $485 million of development money for GE to develop a second engine design. GE, and the congressional delegations from every state with a GE plant think this is a wonderful idea, the competition between Pratt and GE is supposed to keep the price of the engine down. After those development costs are paid down of course.
The Pentagon, (and Pratt) think $485 million could be saved this year, and a like amount in future years, by canceling the second engine and going with the existing design. As an old squadron level maintainance officer myself. I'm all in favor too. The thought of having a squadron of fighters with two different engines is unpleasant. You need two sets of special tools to work on them, two sets of spare parts, you have to train your guys on both engines, and you open up a whole world of nasty possibilities for maintainance errors. Not good.
In the old days, engines had multiple aircraft. The J47 powered the F86, the B45, B47, and others. The J57 powered the B52, the F100, the F101, the F102 and the early 707's. The J75 powered the F105, F106, U2, and later 707s. The thought of having two engines to power a single fighter is a kind of technological richness, or perhaps over indulgence, that we didn't have back when I was a flight line maintainance officer. Sounds like time for a cost cut here. Usually when the Pentagon doesn't want something and Congress does, there is pork involved.
However, Congress likes the idea of a second engine supplier for the F35, and so, there is $485 million of development money for GE to develop a second engine design. GE, and the congressional delegations from every state with a GE plant think this is a wonderful idea, the competition between Pratt and GE is supposed to keep the price of the engine down. After those development costs are paid down of course.
The Pentagon, (and Pratt) think $485 million could be saved this year, and a like amount in future years, by canceling the second engine and going with the existing design. As an old squadron level maintainance officer myself. I'm all in favor too. The thought of having a squadron of fighters with two different engines is unpleasant. You need two sets of special tools to work on them, two sets of spare parts, you have to train your guys on both engines, and you open up a whole world of nasty possibilities for maintainance errors. Not good.
In the old days, engines had multiple aircraft. The J47 powered the F86, the B45, B47, and others. The J57 powered the B52, the F100, the F101, the F102 and the early 707's. The J75 powered the F105, F106, U2, and later 707s. The thought of having two engines to power a single fighter is a kind of technological richness, or perhaps over indulgence, that we didn't have back when I was a flight line maintainance officer. Sounds like time for a cost cut here. Usually when the Pentagon doesn't want something and Congress does, there is pork involved.
Thursday, June 3, 2010
Stealth has a price.
Stealthy aircraft, namely the F22 and F35, no longer carry weapons on under wing racks. Instead missiles are tucked into internal missile bays lest enemy radar get a return off the ordinance. So far so good. Unfortunately the missile bays on F22 and F35 are just big enough to accept AIM-120 "Slammer" air to air missile. They are too small to fit the bigger anti-radiation missiles (HARM) used to knock out enemy radar and SAM sites.
The Air Force is working on smaller anti radiation missiles, small enough to fit, but this is probably a loser long term. An anti radiation missile has to be big to carry enough "bang" to do a ground site, which are more robust than aircraft. I remember the old AGM-45 Shrike we used in Viet Nam. Nice missile but the warhead wasn't big enough to do the job.
Then there is the never fading Air Force desire for a bomber. Every Air Force officer has seen "12 o'Clock High" and wants to have a modern B17. In Viet Nam and Iraq the bombing was done by fighters. The jet fighters carry as heavy a bomb load as the B17's and defend themselves as well. Or at least the old, reliable, but unstealthy F105, F4, F15 and F16 can, the fancy new stealth F22 and F35 may not. Be that as it may, USAF wants a bomber. They haven't decided range, payload and survivability requirements yet, but they know they want a bomber.
The Air Force is working on smaller anti radiation missiles, small enough to fit, but this is probably a loser long term. An anti radiation missile has to be big to carry enough "bang" to do a ground site, which are more robust than aircraft. I remember the old AGM-45 Shrike we used in Viet Nam. Nice missile but the warhead wasn't big enough to do the job.
Then there is the never fading Air Force desire for a bomber. Every Air Force officer has seen "12 o'Clock High" and wants to have a modern B17. In Viet Nam and Iraq the bombing was done by fighters. The jet fighters carry as heavy a bomb load as the B17's and defend themselves as well. Or at least the old, reliable, but unstealthy F105, F4, F15 and F16 can, the fancy new stealth F22 and F35 may not. Be that as it may, USAF wants a bomber. They haven't decided range, payload and survivability requirements yet, but they know they want a bomber.
Your Mail Box is 70% full; or This Is A Phish
Your mailbox is about to reach its configured size limit.
You have 18206776 KB remaining in your mailbox.
You may not be able to send or receive new mail until you reduce your mailbox
size. To make more space available, delete any items that you are no longer
using. Items in all of your mailbox folders including Deleted Items and Sent
Items folders count against your size limit. You must empty the Deleted Items
folder after deleting items or the space will not be freed.
Please see RR Help http://help.rr.org/ for more information.
This message is auto-generated, please do not reply.
This innocous email turned up this morning. Looks halfway authentic. Except for a couple of things.
1. My email reader pulls all my email off the server onto my very own PC. No way is my mailbox ever gonna fill up.
2. Never heard of RR Mail.
Based on 1 and 2, I decided NOT to click on the link. There are plenty of spammers and worse out there.
You have 18206776 KB remaining in your mailbox.
You may not be able to send or receive new mail until you reduce your mailbox
size. To make more space available, delete any items that you are no longer
using. Items in all of your mailbox folders including Deleted Items and Sent
Items folders count against your size limit. You must empty the Deleted Items
folder after deleting items or the space will not be freed.
Please see RR Help http://help.rr.org/ for more information.
This message is auto-generated, please do not reply.
This innocous email turned up this morning. Looks halfway authentic. Except for a couple of things.
1. My email reader pulls all my email off the server onto my very own PC. No way is my mailbox ever gonna fill up.
2. Never heard of RR Mail.
Based on 1 and 2, I decided NOT to click on the link. There are plenty of spammers and worse out there.
Wednesday, June 2, 2010
Cat shows backbone
Stupid Beast, who is so timid that passing pickup trucks make her hide under beds, faced down a dog this morning. It was a very nice young black Lab who wanted to make friends, but Stupid Beast wasn't having any of that. She did the arch back, fluff up fur and menacing growl bit so effectively that she drove the poor Lab right off the property. The dog was so impressed he failed to even bark.
How have the mighty fallen.
According to Fox Business News, the Caterpillar company will buy the Electromotive Division (EMD) from a pair of vulture capitalist firms for a measly $820 million. EMD is the company that made the diesels that replaced steam locomotives on US railroads in the 1950s. EMD started out in the 1920's making gas electric rail cars. They were what we would call a system integrator today. They bought the car bodies, the electric traction motors, the generators and the Winton distillate engines from suppliers and put them together to make self propelled rail cars. Gas electrics sold pretty well, plenty of railroads had thinly traveled routes that a single car train could serve. Compared to getting down to the roundhouse four hours before train time to light the fire and raise steam, a gas electric was simplicity to operate, you just hit the starter button and it was running.
As the Winton engine people squeezed more power out of the engines, the gas electrics gained enough oomph to pull a trailer car, yielding a two car train. Then in the middle 1930's the Electromotive Corporation built the two prototype streamline trains, the Burlington's Zephyr and the Boston & Maine's Flying Yankee. These were sensational trains, all stainless steel, ultra modern styling, fast, great looking interiors and they gained a lot of publicity. Somewhere along the line, the Electromotive Corp was bought by General Motors and became the Electromotive Division (EMD).
In the late 1930's, just before WWII, EMD introduced the first passenger and freight diesel road locomotives. In 1941, after Pearl Harbor, the War Production Board, faced with endless demands for guns and tanks and aircraft and all the logistics needed to supply American, British and Russian armies, decided that the scarce and high tech diesel engines should go into submarines, landing craft, transportable electric plants and other munitions. The railroads were told to haul the wartime traffic with steam engines. Of which there were plenty, and Baldwin, Alco, and the railroads own shops were all set up to make plenty more. Net result, EMD's road diesels ran through out WWII and by VE day all the bugs had been worked out.
After VJ day, the traditional steam locomotive makers, Baldwin and Alco, along with GE and Fairbanks Morse introduced road diesels, but they didn't stand a chance against the seasoned and debugged EMD models. In less than 15 years the railroads scrapped all the steamers and replaced them with new EMD diesels. That was a tremendous piece of business. EMD, and parent company GM, made money hand over fist doing it, and EMD dominance of the US locomotive market lasted well into the 1980's.
For reasons unclear to me, competitor GE stayed in the locomotive business and gradually pulled ahead of EMD by the mid 1980's. Could be of course that brain dead GM senior management screwed things up, I don't know that story, but it is likely. In 2005, as GM was sliding down the tubes, they sold EMD to couple of vulture capital firms. And now the capital firms sold out to Caterpillar.
I wish the new owners every kind of luck. They have a great name, 33000 locomotives in service, and $1.8 billion yearly sales. Caterpillar bought the place for only 1/2 the yearly sales numbers.
As the Winton engine people squeezed more power out of the engines, the gas electrics gained enough oomph to pull a trailer car, yielding a two car train. Then in the middle 1930's the Electromotive Corporation built the two prototype streamline trains, the Burlington's Zephyr and the Boston & Maine's Flying Yankee. These were sensational trains, all stainless steel, ultra modern styling, fast, great looking interiors and they gained a lot of publicity. Somewhere along the line, the Electromotive Corp was bought by General Motors and became the Electromotive Division (EMD).
In the late 1930's, just before WWII, EMD introduced the first passenger and freight diesel road locomotives. In 1941, after Pearl Harbor, the War Production Board, faced with endless demands for guns and tanks and aircraft and all the logistics needed to supply American, British and Russian armies, decided that the scarce and high tech diesel engines should go into submarines, landing craft, transportable electric plants and other munitions. The railroads were told to haul the wartime traffic with steam engines. Of which there were plenty, and Baldwin, Alco, and the railroads own shops were all set up to make plenty more. Net result, EMD's road diesels ran through out WWII and by VE day all the bugs had been worked out.
After VJ day, the traditional steam locomotive makers, Baldwin and Alco, along with GE and Fairbanks Morse introduced road diesels, but they didn't stand a chance against the seasoned and debugged EMD models. In less than 15 years the railroads scrapped all the steamers and replaced them with new EMD diesels. That was a tremendous piece of business. EMD, and parent company GM, made money hand over fist doing it, and EMD dominance of the US locomotive market lasted well into the 1980's.
For reasons unclear to me, competitor GE stayed in the locomotive business and gradually pulled ahead of EMD by the mid 1980's. Could be of course that brain dead GM senior management screwed things up, I don't know that story, but it is likely. In 2005, as GM was sliding down the tubes, they sold EMD to couple of vulture capital firms. And now the capital firms sold out to Caterpillar.
I wish the new owners every kind of luck. They have a great name, 33000 locomotives in service, and $1.8 billion yearly sales. Caterpillar bought the place for only 1/2 the yearly sales numbers.
Tuesday, June 1, 2010
Ratings Agencies, Welfare for Wall St.
Used to be, companies and state and local governments could just issue bonds. You know, written deals that said "You give me cash, I promise to pay it back, with interest over the next umpteen years." If the bond issuer seemed solvent, people bought the bonds. If the issuer was unknown or had a bad rep, the bonds didn't sell.
Then Congress got into the act. To issue bonds now, the issuer must get a rating agency like Standard & Poor or Moody's to "rate" the bonds. You know AAA or ABA or PUREJUNK. This was supposed to "protect" investors from unscrupulous junk bond dealers. Trouble is, the ratings agencies are less scrupulous than the junk bonders. The ratings agencies happily rated sub prime mortgage backed securities AAA. The defaults on AAA rated sub prime bonds caused Great Depression 2.0
Needless to say, this is pure gravy for the ratings agencies which now get a cut on every bond issued. The issuers have to pay the agencies for the rating. Needless to say, the issuers shop around for the best rating. If Moody's won't give me AAA maybe Standard and Poor's will.
It's welfare for Wall St.
Then Congress got into the act. To issue bonds now, the issuer must get a rating agency like Standard & Poor or Moody's to "rate" the bonds. You know AAA or ABA or PUREJUNK. This was supposed to "protect" investors from unscrupulous junk bond dealers. Trouble is, the ratings agencies are less scrupulous than the junk bonders. The ratings agencies happily rated sub prime mortgage backed securities AAA. The defaults on AAA rated sub prime bonds caused Great Depression 2.0
Needless to say, this is pure gravy for the ratings agencies which now get a cut on every bond issued. The issuers have to pay the agencies for the rating. Needless to say, the issuers shop around for the best rating. If Moody's won't give me AAA maybe Standard and Poor's will.
It's welfare for Wall St.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)