Max
E Bleck Beech
Aircraft Corporation
A five and a half year development program has resulted
in an FAA certified aircraft -- the world's first pressurized
all-composite business turboprop. The program cost more
than $300 million and millions of man hours. The task
was larger than simply developing an all-new aircraft.
Beech Aircraft had to master a new technology, build a
new manufacturing facility and train a workforce. Much
of this effort was concentrated on areas the industry
had not addressed before.
Beech had to work hand-in-hand with the FAA to develop
the standards for the construction of composite aircraft,
because none existed. The company also had to comply with
a series of special conditions set by the FAA to certify
the unusual configuration. The way in which Beech accomplished
those things will have a profound effect on future designs.
In 1979 Beech decided to begin to work on a new twin-engine
turboprop aircraft. The King Air was about 15 years old
and with its six models had about a 50 per cent market
share. The remainder of the business turboprop market
was divided among Cessna, Piper, Mitsubishi, Swearingen
and Rockwell. A new company, Learfan, had announced an
unusual-looking aircraft made out of composites which
was scheduled to reach the market in the early 1980s.
What's
new and works
Beech
began by studying a number of potential designs, some
radical, some quite conventional, including a tractor/
pusher and a twin-pusher version. Beech's merger with
Raytheon caused a temporary hiatus in development activity,
but by 1982 work was underway again.
The design goals became the configuration driver, and
soon one design emerged from the pack. It had its engines
mounted in the rear to reduce cabin noise levels. It had
an aft positioned main wing to mount the engines and balance
the lifting forces. A conventional rudder would have made
a huge sounding board for the propellers, so, instead,
control of the yaw axis and vertical stabilizer function
was assigned to tip-sails on each wingtip.
The King Air's large cabin had always been a major selling
point, and the new Beech design had an even larger one,
approaching the size of a medium jet's. Increased size
brings increased weight, and the decision was made early
on to build using composites for its favorable strength-to-weight
ratio.
The
world's acknowledged expert in tandem wing, all-composite
pusher aircraft at that time was Burt Rutan. In 1982 Beech
approached him and his company, Scaled Composites in Mojave,
California, to participate in the final configuration
study.
The result was the design for Starship, with its variable
sweep forward wing, all composite construction and rear-mounted
Pratt & Whitney turboprops. While Beech began preliminary
design of the full-size prototypes, Scaled Composites
was engaged to build an 85 per cent scale proof of-concept
prototype to flight test the configuration.
The proof-of-concept vehicle was completed in record time,
and made its first flight in late August of 1983. A little
over a month later the new aircraft, now called Starship,
was introduced at the National Business Aircraft Association
Convention in Dallas, Texas.
When the Proof of Concept Starship made its first appearance
in late 1983, it seemed to most people like a very real
aircraft. It was as large as a 90-series King Air, it
looked good in the air and clearly performed well. To
the uneducated observer it appeared you could put an interior
in it, tweak the design here and there and begin a certification
program. Sadly, this was not the case.
The Proof of Concept had no certifiable systems and no
pressurization. It did not have any of the airframe structure
that would be built into Starship, and it was not even
built out of the same materials. It was, quite simply,
a very large flying wind tunnel model, designed for a
program of 100 test flight hours or less -- although it
flew five times that long.
Not
only was the development not very far along, but Beech
Aircraft had virtually no experience with the materials
or the manufacturing techniques required to build it.
We had never built anything out of composites, and we
did not have any data on the properties of resins, fibers,
adhesives, composite honeycombs or sealants necessary
to design it.
But the Proof of Concept Starship's appearance at Dallas
gave the impression we were much further along and much
more knowledgeable than we actually were, and that gave
some credence to the extremely optimistic schedule that
we initially announced for certification -- the end of
1985.
The company had a plan to meet that schedule, by having
the majority of the three prototypes built in subassemblies
by outside contractors, with final assembly to take place
at Beech.
Development
frontiers
In theory this might have been a workable plan, but in
practice it definitely was not. By early 1984 it was clear
the subcontractors could not come close to delivering
on time, and some may not have been able to deliver at
all. If there was going to be a Starship, Beech Aircraft
would have to develop the technical skill to build it
by itself.
Clearly
this would require more time, so we set a new target date:
certification by the end of 1986. It was particularly
unfortunate for the image of the Starship program that
the 1985 certification target date was ever announced.
Less than five months after the program was introduced,
it had been branded as delayed. That impression has remained
ever since.
